The coach smiled. “This is your last warning, Grandpa. Walk out that door while you still have the chance, or my boys are going to carry you out in a body bag.”
I smiled back.
It was the same smile I used to give brand-new recruits moments before I broke down their confidence.
“For fifteen years, I served as a Force Recon hand-to-hand combat instructor,” I said quietly as I loosened my cuffs. “I trained MARSOC Raiders and more than three thousand combat-ready Marines.”
I rolled my shoulders, and that familiar, icy focus settled over me again.
“Four men won’t even be close to enough.”
They all laughed. It was the last mistake they would ever make.
PART 2
The knock came at exactly 6:00 AM the following morning.
Two detectives stood outside: Roosevelt Kent, a Black man in his fifties with weary eyes, and Sue Shepard, a sharp-featured woman in her thirties. Julian opened the door wearing his bathrobe, a cup of coffee in his hand, as though he had been expecting them.
