My phone lit. I snapped it up, but it was Tyler in the group chat he’d set up for the night.
Tyler: Check in.
Heretic: All good. Can’t see shit.
Ash: Boring as my brother’s taste in music, and quiet enough to hear my will to live pack up.
I started typing.
A light flashed somewhere above the muted sea.
I squinted into the dark made pale by the mist. But it was so thick, above head height at the water’s edge, I couldn’t locate it again. I deleted my half-written message and fired off another.
Kane: Light out at sea. Seconds ago. Fucking weather making it hard to be sure where.
A group call instantly came in.
Tyler spoke in my earpiece, his voice low. “Everyone silent unless the action’s on your stretch, then we’ll converge. Stay on the line and keep your senses sharp.”
No one replied, but a sense of connected energy grew between us.
Putting my phone away, I prowled closer to the water, adrenaline rushing and preparing me for a fight. The bay I was monitoring had black, slippery rocks at either edge and jagged outcrops in the water. It left a short channel which a boat could come in by. But if I couldn’t fucking see, they could walk right up to me and I wouldn’t know until the last second.
An engine rattled, the sound distorted by the mist but close.
At my back was a cliff face with a road carved into it, barely wide enough for my car which I’d hidden further along the beach. The coast road above had been silent and still for hours. Rocks popped under tyres.
Fuck yeah, they were coming to me.
I touched my earpiece. “Vehicle approaching at my back.”
“On Kane,” Tyler came back instantly.
Scrabbling followed, my team mobilising. I sucked in a lungful of fog-laden air and reminded myself of my priorities. I was here to rescue whoever they were smuggling. Anyone who got in my way would get taken out, though I’d try to secure the leader.
Trusting that Tyler and the others had my back, I closed in on the water and paced along a line of rocks that led to the surf, only the spill of a wave over my boots clueing me in to exactly how close I’d got. The white haze rose above my head, swirls of it so thick I could only catch glimpses of the world around me.
I hated the sensation. I couldn’t see. I might not be trapped, but it felt the same.
The engine cut out.
A rushing sound came from the water followed by a short, snapped instruction. Gravel crunched, a boat landing. A light blinked on, dispersing in a wide flare before extinguishing. Not quick enough to hide my target.
I leapt forward and connected with a figure jumping down. A man from his grunt of surprise. I threw a fist and decked him, his body crumpling to the beach.
Satisfied but far from done, I felt out for the prow then closed my fingers around damp wood and hauled it a few feet up the beach. No fucking way was I letting them back out.
Engines roared up the cliff, one the deep growl of a motorbike. Shouts followed.
Mere feet away, another male voice exclaimed, then a woman whimpered in fear.
In a heartbeat, my brain flipped the situation to Lovelyn and the bastard who’d threatened her. Fury flooded my system, and I vaulted the side of the boat and landed on its deck. A cloud of white swirled, and I stepped carefully through it, my fingers speared outwards.
A body launched at me. I grappled them to the deck, using my forearm to pin their neck with my weight on it. They were smaller. A slight figure.
They didn’t fight back.
A mewl of terror came from my victim, and I leapt away. Shite, no. They’d thrown a woman at me. I’d realised it too late. Wait, not even a woman. She was a kid from the reveal of features.
