The 141

The rain came down in sheets over the East End, turning the cobblestones slick and black as oil. A foghorn bellowed somewhere out on the Thames, mournful and distant, while the blackout curtains in the second-floor flat kept the warmth—and the secrets—inside.

Price stood at the window, cigar clamped between his teeth, watching the street below through a gap in the heavy fabric. Behind him, the others were scattered across the cramped safehouse—Gaz at the small kitchen table cleaning his Webley with practiced care, Soap leaning against the wall with his arms crossed, and Ghost a silent presence in the far corner, skull mask catching the faint ember-light.

The job had gone sideways. That was putting it mildly.

They'd hit the warehouse expecting a routine meet—target acquisition, quick extraction, minimal noise. Instead, they'd walked into a bloodbath. Someone had tipped off the coppers. Someone had known. And in the chaos, with bullets flying and the rival firm scattering like rats, they'd ended up with something none of them had anticipated.

The heir.

Price exhaled smoke through his nose, turning from the window. His gaze swept across the room before settling on the figure they'd brought back with them.

The Harrington heir. The name carried weight in London's underworld. Old money, old grudges, and a reach that stretched from the docks to the halls of Westminster. The Harringtons had been at war with half the city's firms for years—and now their legacy sat in the 141's safehouse, blood on their clothes and nowhere else to go.

"Sitrep," Price said, his voice a low rasp. "What do we know?"

Gaz looked up from his revolver, cloth in hand. "The warehouse was a setup. Someone wanted the Harringtons hit tonight, and they wanted us to take the fall for it." His jaw tightened. "We weren't the only ones who knew about the meet. This goes deeper than a simple turf dispute."

"So we've got a leak," Soap muttered, pushing off the wall. His usual humor was absent, replaced by something harder. "Someone set us up tae take the fall for wiping oot a rival family. And now we're stuck wi' the prize." He glanced toward {{user}}, expression unreadable.

Ghost said nothing. He didn't have to. His silence said enough.

Price removed his cigar, rolling it between his fingers as he studied {{user}}. The decision they made tonight would ripple through the city's underworld for months—maybe years. Turning them over to whoever had orchestrated the hit would buy them breathing room, maybe even a tidy profit. But it would also mean trusting the word of whoever had set them up in the first place.

And that sat wrong in his gut.

"You've got two options," Price said finally, addressing {{user}} directly. His tone was calm, measured—the voice of a man who'd made harder choices before breakfast. "We hand you over to whoever's hunting you, wash our hands of the whole mess, and hope they leave us be. Or..." He paused, taking a slow draw from his cigar. "You tell us what you know. Who set this up. Who wanted your family gone. And maybe—maybe—we work out an arrangement."

He let that settle, smoke curling around him like a shroud.

"Your call."

Soap MacTavish was currently bleeding through the backseat of a stolen Austin 10, one hand pressed against his side where a blade had slipped between his ribs during what was supposed to be a straightforward collection. The job had gone sideways the moment someone recognized Price's man, and now here they were—Gaz driving with white-knuckled focus, Ghost in the back seat like a silent specter, and Soap beside him, cracking jokes through gritted teeth while blood seeped between his fingers.

"Ach, it's just a scratch," Soap muttered, though his face had gone the colour of old parchment. "Had worse from me ain's cooking."

"Shut up and keep pressure on it," Ghost said, his voice low and flat. The skull-pattern balaclava caught the passing streetlights, making him look like something conjured from a nightmare. "You're talking too much. Wasting energy."

Gaz swerved around a corner, the engine whining in protest. "We can't take him to a hospital. They'll ask questions. Police report, paperwork—and Williams will have eyes on every A&E within the hour."

Price, who had been silent in the front passenger seat, processing the failure and calculating their next move, leaned forward slightly. His cigar had gone out, forgotten between his teeth. "There's a clinic. East end, off Commercial Road. No questions asked. But it's closed at this hour."

"Then we wake someone up," Ghost said.

The Austin screeched to a halt in a narrow alley beside a red-brick building with a faded cross painted on the door. A sign read: Mile End Emergency Station - Out of Service. The blackout curtains were drawn tight, but a faint light flickered behind them.

Ghost was out of the car first, moving toward the door with that unnerving silence he carried everywhere. He didn't knock. He tried the handle—locked—then stepped back and delivered a single, precise kick near the latch. Wood splintered. The door swung inward.

Inside smelled like antiseptic, old cigarettes, and something metallic. A small reception area gave way to a treatment room where gurneys sat folded against walls and medical supplies lined the shelves in orderly rows. An ambulance was parked out back, visible through a rear garage door, its white paint dulled by years of service.

"Clear," Ghost called over his shoulder.

Gaz and Price helped Soap out of the car, the Scot's arm draped over both their shoulders as they half-carried him through the broken door. He hissed when they jostled his ribs, finally silent.

"Set him down there," Price ordered, nodding toward a treatment table. "Gaz, find bandages. Ghost, watch the street."

It was then that a sound came from the back room—footsteps, hurried. Someone had been here the whole time.

Price's hand went to the pistol beneath his coat, his blue eyes fixed on the doorway. He didn't draw. Not yet. But his posture shifted, shoulders squaring, jaw setting beneath his beard.

When the figure emerged—looking like they'd been roused from sleep—Price studied them with the calm assessment of a man who'd spent decades reading people in dangerous situations.

"You're the ambulance driver," he said. It wasn't a question. He'd done his homework on the neighborhood weeks ago, filed away useful names and faces. "We need your help."

The RMS Orion cut through the Irish Sea.

Four days out from Liverpool. Two days to New York. A floating palace of teak and brass, temporarily insulated from a country still wearing its ration books like a second skin. Here, the champagne flowed. The orchestra played. And the wealthy—old money, new money, and money that didn't bear close examination—danced under crystal chandeliers as if the war had never happened.

John Price stood at the rail of the promenade deck, a cigar clenched between his teeth and a glass of something amber in his hand. The wind tugged at the brim of his fedora. The Atlantic stretched out before him.

Behind him, the ship's band launched into a languid foxtrot.

"Target's made three appearances in the smoking lounge since we embarked," Gaz said quietly, appearing at his shoulder. He looked like he belonged here—dark suit cut well, a glass of something non-alcoholic in hand. "Always alone. Never stays longer than twenty minutes."

"Routine's useful," Price replied, not turning. "Means we can predict him. Also means someone else can."

"That's what I'm worried about."

They'd taken this job from a contact in the Foreign Office—off-book, deniable, well-compensated. A diplomat named Sir Henry Whitmore was carrying something valuable to Washington. Documents. Names. The kind of information that could end careers or save them, depending on who got their hands on it first. Intelligence suggested a contract had been put out on Whitmore's life before the ship docked.

The contract killer was already aboard. That was the working theory.

Price finally turned, surveying the deck. Couples strolled arm in arm. A group of Americans laughed too loudly near the lifeboats. Somewhere below, Soap was making himself useful in the engine room, and Ghost—

Not even Price is sure where he is.

"The description we were given," Price said slowly. "Run it by me again."

Gaz pulled a folded note from his inner pocket, consulting it briefly. "Average height, medium build. No distinguishing marks. Could be male or female. Wearing a grey coat. Last seen boarding in Liverpool with a leather suitcase."

"That's half the passengers on this ship."

"Which is why we're not making moves until we know more." Gaz pocketed the note. "Soap's keeping an eye on Whitmore's cabin. Ghost is... somewhere. Doing what Ghost does."

Price grunted. He trusted his team with his life, but this job was a needle-in-a-haystack situation, and those were the kind that got people killed. Too many variables. Too many civilians. Too many places for a professional to hide.

"Get below," he said. "Check in with Soap. I want eyes on Whitmore around the clock."

"Price." Gaz's voice carried a note of hesitation. "If this assassin is as good as the money suggests... we might not see them coming until it's too late."

"Then we'd better be faster."

---

Two decks down, in the cramped confines of a second-class cabin that smelled faintly of salt and old cigarettes, Soap MacTavish sat on the edge of a narrow bunk and studied the deck plan he'd pinned to the wall.

He'd marked Whitmore's cabin. The dining room. The smoking lounge. The lifeboat stations. Every exit, every staircase, every stretch of corridor where a body could be dropped without witnesses.

Paranoia, his old sergeant used to tell him. Keeps you alive.

He heard footsteps in the corridor—measured, deliberate—and didn't reach for the revolver under his pillow. He knew that walk.

The door opened without a knock. Ghost stepped inside, pulling the door shut behind him. In his black suit and tie, he looked like an undertaker. The balaclava, worn despite the warmth, made him look like something worse.

"Whitmore's eating dinner," Ghost said, his voice low. "Table by the window. Two guards. Amateur placement."

"You get close?"

"Close enough." Ghost moved to the porthole, gazing out at the dark water beyond. "Ship's too big. Too many passengers. If the assassin's any good, they won't make a move until we're almost to port."

"So we wait."

"So we wait." Ghost's tone suggested he didn't like waiting any more than Soap did. "Anyone catch your eye?"

Soap scratched his jaw, considering. "Couple in cabin 42. Arguing since we left Liverpool. Woman's got a shiner she's trying to hide with powder. Man's a drunk. Not our problem, but..." He shrugged. "Something to watch."

"Noted. Anything else?"

"There's a passenger." Soap hesitated, which wasn't like him. "Second-class. Booked last minute. Paid in cash. I saw them on deck this morning, looking like they'd never seen the sea before."

"Description?"

Soap shook his head slowly. "That's the thing. I can't quite... they were just standing there. Looking lost. Then they were gone."

Ghost turned from the porthole, dark eyes fixing on Soap through the mask. "Lost isn't a crime."

"No. But it's interesting." Soap smiled faintly. "And on a job like this, interesting makes me nervous."

---

The night deepened.

The Orion sailed on through waters that had once carried convoys and U-boats, now carrying vacationers and businessmen and at least one diplomat with a price on his head. The band played on. The champagne flowed. And somewhere in the labyrinth of corridors and cabins, a clock ticked toward an outcome no one could predict.

Price found himself in the ship's small library, a glass of whisky untouched on the table beside him. He was pretending to read a newspaper already days out of date, while keeping one eye on the door.

A woman walked past. Then a steward. Then an elderly couple, arguing softly about the price of drinks.

Nothing. No one.

And then—

The door opened again. A figure stepped through, moving with the uncertain gait of someone who wasn't quite sure where they were going.

Price lowered his newspaper.