A chuckle bursts out of me and I shake my head. “You’re kinda nutty, you know that?”
“Yeah, but I figure that’s why you like me.” She winks at me from her position beside me, guns resting on the windowsill.
Fuck me, I think she might be right.
Switch
It’s quiet. Too quiet. This is when life or death mistakes are made. Lower our weapons too soon and we risk a second wave ambush.
“Did you hear that?” Rider asks through gritted teeth as he peers out of the window.
A cackle. Not a giggle or a guffaw. No, a spine tingling cackle that seems to amplify until it sounds like more than one cackle. Or some shit.
“Chewy! Give me status!” Marx barks through the comms, almost blowing my damned eardrum out.
“Sounds like Marx is hearing the same thing we are. “ Rider murmurs.
There is radio silence and I know that the women are into something they shouldn't be, and I swear that if they’ve dragged Joy along heads will be rolling.
“Chewy? Babe?” Rhodie tests out, before he too growls directly into my fucking ear.
Thundering footsteps sound out, all headed for the door to the basement which leads down to the club's safe room and that's when we hear it. Screaming. Sharing a look with Rider we head toward the front door, meeting up with the rest of our brothers in the entrance, Mad Dog and Willa standing on the stairs looking down at us.
“Two teams. Rhodie you lead Switch, Tav, and Savage out back. I’ll take the rest and have eyes out front until intel changes. Wire and Judge, check the status of the women. Everyone shootsto kill.” Marx orders before stomping toward the door, gun drawn.
“We will join you. We are armed and ready,” Roman nods, Sasha at his back as usual. Marx gives them a hard look before dipping his chin.
The same screams can be heard again and then cackling joins the cacophony. I share a look with my brothers and we follow close behind Rhodie, pulling up short as soon as we step foot in the backyard.
“What the fuck?” Savage whispers as we take in the scene. “How the fuck did they get out of their enclosure?”
“Ummm,” Savage hums, coming to a stop next to where we’re standing.
I stare at the carnage and hesitate to get any further. There, circling three men on the ground are the fucking bobcats that some of the Ol Ladies got for Valentine’s Day. Out in the open and not in the cage that Savage took two fucking weeks to build.
“Think fast, there are seven armed men coming from the rear, east side. That’s the last of them by my count,” Chewy says over our comms before laughing and mentioning something about “bobcat chum”.
“You heard her,” Marx says over comms, his breath coming in pants until he materialises beside me. “Go high,” Marx murmurs over his shoulder at me, Tav, Savage and Rhodie, indicating the kids' tree house.
We drop low and run as fast as we can in the general direction of where the Big Littles’ treehouse is. From down here it’s fucking hard to see, Elio and Cove having camouflaged the fuck out of it. Tav manages to find the lever to bring down the ladder, thank fuck, and we hustle our asses up it.
“Holy shit,” escapes me as I take a quick glance around the space.
“This ain't like no treehouse I’ve ever seen,” Savage says.
This thing is huge. Me, Tav, Rhodie and Savage aren’t small men, but we’ve got room for at least three more brothers.
“Did you see this?” Savage says, pointing out binoculars fitted into a small window.
In fact, taking a look around the hexagonal shaped space, there are small windows with binoculars attached to every wall. They also have electricity up here somehow, because I bump into a tablet that flares to life, showing us a six screen set up of the backyard through surveillance cameras.
“What the actual fuck?”
“Oh. Yeah, that’s right, I gave the kids some outdated cameras and shit,” Tav says like he didn’t just provide full surveillance for fucking 9 year olds.
“Well, that made our job easier,” Savage says, hands on hips.
“Hey guys,” a voice calls out from somewhere and I about shit my pants.
