"They can arrest me; they're not buying those kids," Anders whispers into the comms to another chorus call from the team. Abigail instructs the guy behind the counter to his knees, subduing him with a pair of handcuffs from the display case. Rafi and Everett join Abigail and Anders in the shop. Rafi walks over to the wall and chooses a compact rifle he's had his eye on, grabbing the appropriate ammo by the box full. Pulling out his wallet, he shoves several hundred-dollar bills into the guy’s back pocket.
Everett notices the blinking Wi-Fi tower and pulls it out of the wall.
"Good move, Ev,” Jake says. A few seconds later, he’s cursing on the line. “Shit. Someone's trying to use their cell phone as a hotspot to complete the transaction.”
Anders, impatient to get the killing started, kicks open the door, thus ending any conversation about logistics.
"Honey, I'm home!" he says, putting a bullet in the first guy on the right. As he takes aim at the second piece of human filth, Abigail saunters in behind him, taking the assholes on the left. Finally, Rafi walks in, pulling up his brand-new rifle, and, in quick succession, takes out the four upstanding citizens at the end of the table. Pretty sure he only used three bullets.
Looking down at the rifle, Rafi nods, happy with its performance. "This is a nice gun, decent mid-range shooting." Turning to my brother, irrespective of the blood spatter, he continues, "Hey, do you think your parents would mind if I did some target practice out at the hay bales this weekend?"
"Of course not! Bring Everett, make it a weekend. Dad's new blend is actually good."
Thane lets a low grumble fill the line. “Guys, can y'all wrap up at the shop?"
“Sorry, Thane. We’re on it."
On his way out the door, Anders skids to a halt in front of the display, even as the faint sound of sirens filters in across the comms.
"No way!" He turns to the handcuffed man. “Is this an airhorn?”
He nods, and Anders squeals with glee, going around the counter to grab up all of their stock.
DeShaun turns to me. "What the fuck is wrong with your brother?"
I hold out my hand, tilting it back and forth. "There have been several attempts to diagnose him, but he's pretty wily when it comes to testing. We just call him Tex and accept it."
After lining up the airhorns and a random tape gun on the counter, Anders reaches into his backpack and grabs a few hand grenades. Looking like a kid at Christmas, he starts taping the grenades to the air horns.
“Anders, what the fuck are you doing?” asks Thane. A reasonable question.
Everett, Rafi, and Abigail pick up the handcuffed man, hurrying him out of the shop down to the greenbelt. Anders gathers his air horn-hand grenade combos, pulls the pins on all of them, and chucks them one at a time into the room before shutting it and hauling ass.
An explosion, complete with the sound of dying airhorns, rocks the building seconds after he’s cleared the door. The comms all squeal and go silent, and from the video camera across the street, my brother gets knocked to his ass and appears to be laughing. He hops up, dusts himself off, and jogs over to join the team on the greenbelt. They’re talking to each other, but we can’t hear them.
"Jake, can you hear them?" DeShaun asks, adjusting the volume on the laptop.
"Nope. I think that last bit fried their comms," he says, still slightly amused.
"Anders is insane," Ronan says, laughing.
"How far out are the police?"
Jake fields that. "Three minutes. Plenty of time. The police won't have any surveillance, and the guy behind the counter can't describe anyone with any accuracy."
DeShaun is not quite as amused. “Thane?”
“Yeah, boss?”
"Take the building and replacement comms out of Anders’ cut. Make sure the shop owners are compensated.”
“Ten-four."
We end the call and wait for the team to get back to the tattoo shop for the debrief. With light traffic, they’re about forty-five minutes out, so I take advantage and kiss on my boyfriend a little.
“Bed?” DeShaun whispers against my lips.
“Bed.”
