Chapter 7
The Wolf's Den
The hideout wasn’t a house; it was an open wound in the earth. It lay hidden beneath an abandoned tobacco farm on the Tennessee border, a reinforced concrete structure that smelled of stale air, gun oil, and that cheap antiseptic used in field hospitals.
When Esperanza pulled the truck onto the hidden freight elevator, the silence that fell over the cabin was so heavy it was almost tangible.
Esperanza sat with her hands frozen on the steering wheel. Her fingers were stiff, numbed by the tension of driving through goat paths in the dead of night. She glanced at Silas. He was leaning against the window, his forehead resting against the armored glass. His breathing was an erratic hiss—the sound of an engine running out of fuel.
"Silas... wake up. Please, don
