I crouchbehind the blacked-out SUV, my breathing slow and measured despite the adrenaline pumping through my veins. The wharf stretches out in front of us, the moonlight cutting through the low-hanging fog as we wait for Brennan’s command.
Kieran is beside me, scanning the shadows as he tightens his grip on his gun.
The cranes loom overhead, creaking slightly in the cold breeze, but I barely take notice.
Dim yellow floodlights cast long shadows over the wharf, turning every corner into a potential hiding place. The rest of our men are spread out, hunkered down behind barrels and shipping containers, each one primed and ready.
“This is bullshit,” Kieran mutters after a few minutes of silence. “We should be in there too, getting ready to attack. Fuck sitting around like this.”
I shake my head, my eyes fixed on the black water beyond the dock. “No. You and I rarely deal with shipments, so if we went in there now, it would raise suspicion.”
Kieran snorts. “Maybe that’s not a bad thing. Declan might piss himself and run if he saw us.”
“He might. But next time, we might not be lucky enough to know what’s going down in advance. If he figures out someone tipped us off…”
“Then he’ll know he’s got a rat,” Kieran growls.
I nod. “Exactly, and that rat would be fished out very quickly. It’s better we handle this now and send Walsh a very clear message.”
Kieran grunts as his finger flexes on the trigger of his gun. It’s not an agreement exactly, but it’s enough. He knows I’m right, even if every muscle in his body is begging to rush in there and open fire.
It takes another fifteen minutes for Brennan’s signal to come through, his voice crackling in my earpiece.
“Go.”
I give the hand signal to our men and they move like shadows, silent and lethal.
We’re barely twenty steps from the entrance to the warehouse when headlights blind us as a convoy of black SUVs appears.
Declan’s crew.
A cruel smile tugs at my lips as I send my first bullet right into the wheel of the car, sending it swerving into the side of the warehouse.
Chaos erupts around me as men start piling out of the vehicles.
Under the bright floodlights, I barely have time to scan the faces of the men to make sure they’re not Declan before I aim and shoot.
One by one, they hit the concrete, many not getting up again. It’s clear that Declan’s crew is panicked by our ambush. They scatter, caught up between containers and crates with nowhere to go.
I crouch low as I sprint across the shipyard, scanning every face I come across as I try to find Declan.
Some of the casualties are ours, but I don’t have time to mourn the losses just yet. I need to find Declan before he decides to make a run for it like the coward he is.
It doesn’t take long for me to spot him, considering the fact he’s the only one running in the opposite direction.
“You fucking coward!” I bellow at his retreating back.
Declan turns just outside the open gate to the shipyard, his face covered in blood spatters and his eyes wild under the bright security lights.
“This isn’t over, Ronan!”
I keep my gun aimed and ready, pointed directly at his chest, but I don’t shoot.
“It can be! But if you keep coming, I’ll make it my personal mission to bury every single one of your men before I bury you.”
He sneers, half-laughing as he lingers near the shadows. “Those are some big words, Sullivan.”
“Trust me, you donotwant to make an enemy out of me.”
