Too late, my injured ears hear the faint shuffle of movement.
A steel-toed boot stamps down on the bag, crushing it against the floor.
CHAPTER TWO
MADDOX
“Take the east side,”Zane yells while my ears ring from the explosion. Dust and debris rain down on us as we boot in what’s left of the door and charge into the old warehouse, scarves across our lower faces to filter the smoke.
The destruction is incredible, filling me with a sense of power, invincible almost. The makeshift C4 came from a dodgy contact and until the moment it tore the night apart, I thought it was probably fake.
Now I’m amped on the noise, eyes filled with blind spots from the flash. I sprint through the lower level, whacking a softball bat against the wall, against stacked crates, against the calves of a running man, cash spilling from his pockets.
A fucking dealer.
I slam the bat into his lower leg again as he falls, shrieking at the pain. My next blow doesn’t connect, hitting an inch beside his head while his eyes bug out in fright.
The pleas start, but I couldn’t give a shit. The only begging I respond to comes from humans, not this cockroach growing fat on the desperation of his customers.
A parasite would earn more pity.
I stamp a boot on his face, making him curl in pain, then aim another kick at his ribs, feeling the satisfaction as they give under my reinforced heel.
The guy should thank his lucky stars I don’t knock every tooth from his mouth, crush every bone in his face. Grind him to pieces against the old concrete and stone.
“Score,” Wilder shouts as I move away from the battered figure. He runs straight at me from the smoky gloom, tossing a dark object with so little warning I fumble the catch.
It’s a gun.
A piece of 3D printed nonsense that smells like burned plastic and looks like a toy, but when I aim the revolver at the wall above his head, it fires.
“Fucking hell,” he screeches, brushing flakes of concrete from his tousled hair.
I laugh until he waves a second weapon in my direction, and I have to jump away from the barrel’s aim. “Don’t do that. It’s dangerous.”
He scoffs at the advice, whooping as he dashes into a cloud of black smoke pouring from the corridor near the entrance. The explosion must have caught, the fire spreading, but there should be precious little in this old storage warehouse to burn.
I take off in the opposite direction, slowing to duck under a connecting door already sagging on its hinges; possibly due to age and disrepair, possibly due to us.
The new room is empty, both of people and thankfully of smoke. I kick aside a couple of empty boxes, stalk across to the outside wall, and stare through a slit cut in the thick metal door, noticing others dotted farther along.
It takes me two seconds to understand the layout and props to whoever dreamt this setup into being; it’s low-key genius. Customers kept on the outside, dealers safely on the inside with a concrete wall between them to lessen the impact of any complaints.
I tuck the gun into my waistband and crouch, testing each drawer in a large filing cabinet, drag marks on the floor showing where it travelled to its new home. That’s when I hear a weird noise and stop what I’m doing, head tilted, eyes narrowed to thin slits as I try to place the sound.
The angle of the cabinet hides me as I stand and peer around the edge. A girl worms her way through a rough cut hole in the door, arms hauling her into the building that everyone else is fleeing.
A second later, I see the reason. There’s a baggie of narcotics lying on the floor.
Just as she gets a grip on the plastic, I stamp my foot down, pinning it until I snag it off the floor and hold it aloft, shaking it in the scant light from the windows.
“Lose something?” I tease, expecting her to see me and immediately reverse direction. But the girl must have a death wish because she stays in place, even when I click the LED light on my army knife, shooting the beam directly into her eyes.
She’s stuck.
I laugh with delight, stuffing the bag into my jeans pocket. With my free hand, I grab her around the upper arm and haul her inwards. She squirms and batters at me with her soft hands, giving a cry of pain when she finally pops free from the door.
There’s a long streak of darkness along the side of her dress. Hopefully dust and dirt rather than blood. I’m a vigilante, not a monster. I didn’t come here to hurt strange girls.
