“Because I’m looking at them setting their lab up on my security camera, asshole. Move now and you’ll have her and at least the Vultures.” There’s no bite to his tone, just stone-cold seriousness.
I’ll ask him how the Vultures got ahold of his property some other time. I keep that as a note tucked away in my mental box and focus on what matters right now.
“Make sure you call in backup. These men are armed and we both know you won’t be able to take on all the Vultures alone. You feel me, Beast? I don’t need the headache of dealing with your brothers wondering why I sent you off to get killed.”
I let out a low chuckle.
“I didn’t know you cared.”
“I hate cleaning up blood. It ruins the old woodwork.”
He doesn’t need to say what’s at stake. I already know.
“Stop fucking around. She’s there, but there are as many of them as there are of the Savages. Maybe more.”
I can hear the worry in his voice, low and tight. The man on the other end of the call has a different reputation than most of thepeople I work with. A dirtier one that fits closer to my needs, the more I consider it.
“When this is over and the intel is good, call in your favor and I’ll personally be there to do whatever it is you need. Copy?”
“Understood.”
As soon as the call ends, my focus shifts. The tension in my shoulders settles into something sharper, more precise. A weapon I know how to use. I tuck my phone away, slide on my gloves, and let the adrenaline thread through my veins like wildfire. The sun on my back is a furnace, but I don’t feel it anymore. All I feel is the need to move, to act, and to finally end this long, brutal search.
I end the call and immediately dial Reaper.
He picks up in one ring. “I found her, Prez. This is it.” My heart is a damn machine going off in my chest. I lock it down just like I did when I was sent out on a mission for the U.S. Marines. I got the work done then and I’m about to do the same now.
“About fucking time.” Reaper tells someone at his side to get ready. Storm probably.
“I'll drop you a pin. Come fast, I’m not waiting. I see a chance to grab her, I’m taking it.” I don’t believe in easy and I have a feeling hell is about to pay us all a visit top-side and I’m in the mood to return some demons where they belong.
I end the call before Reaper can talk sense into me. I crank my bike and twenty some-odd minutes later I kill the rumbling motor and let the bike’s substantial weight carry me through the dappled shade and the deep green hush of the city’s outskirts. The further I get from city limits, the more the world narrows tosound and movement. The crunch of gravel under my tires, the flutter of birds bursting from the cane grass, the distant slap of water against a dock all play havoc with my focus.
The plantation rises out of the landscape like a ghost. Sun-bleached columns guard a sagging porch. Spanish moss hangs thick from sprawling oaks. Weeds riot over what was once a manicured drive. The energy in the air seems to become darker and heavier with the promise of death. And it smells of river mud, blooming magnolia, and something sharp and chemical that doesn’t belong.
I ditch the bike in a pocket of shadow, hidden behind a curtain of willow branches, and move through the undergrowth on foot. My boots sink into soft earth, dew soaking through the leather. Green swallows everything—the wild surge of palmettos, vines strangling what’s left of the old fence, tall cane waving in the slow, sticky breeze.
Sweat beads on my brow, dripping into my eyes. I breathe deep and taste the moss, rot, the metallic tang of my own nerves. My heart pounds, steady and low, as I slip between the crumbling outbuildings, pausing in the lee of a broken smokehouse to survey the grounds.
The house itself looms ahead. It has large windows across the front with paint peeling in strips down the sides. Willows surround it on the east and west sides with dried up moss hanging from the branches that look like ghosts from my peripheral. Rusted wrought iron bars adorn the busted out windows along the first floor. And I’m just waiting for a lady in white to pass through the overgrown cemetery I spy in the short distance. The whole location needs restoration, but if you don’t mind the haunted look, it's a good place to hide out in the middle of nowhere.
I tuck in close to the shadows to stay hidden. Out by the warehouse, I catch sight of a skull with a large black feather pushed through the gaping mouth on the back of leather cuts.
The Vultures.
I want the scourge of those fuckers wiped off the earth. From the looks of it, the ones I spot playing at perimeter guards are bored, guns tucked away and arrogant enough to think no one will ever sneak up on them. One spits tobacco while another leans against a rusted truck, eyes half-closed in the heat. I count them, memorize their habits. Each one is a barrier between me and Layla. Each one is a problem I plan to erase.
I become a shadow, a ripple through grass and clover, every muscle tuned for violence and patience. The first man goes down fast. My arm tightens around his throat, as my blade makes quick work of ending his life. I move to the next.
Same thing. Same result. One less man between me and Layla.
His breath hisses against my forearm, the dead drop of his weight is a soft thud, muffled by moss. I lay him gently in the weeds, more out of habit than mercy.
The next never has time to raise the alarm. A knife, silent and efficient, ends him beneath the tangled branches of an old willow tree. The world here is a chorus of insects and the thud of my pulse. Sweat slicks my grip, and the taste of salt is bitter on my tongue.
There are more guards at the edge of the warehouse. Their dead president didn’t do well in training them to stay focused. All I hear is obnoxious laughing, passing a bottle. None of them are aware they’re living out their last borrowed minutes. I time myapproach to the gusts of wind, the rattle of branches, each step measured.
I move swiftly.
