Page 79 of Brandon’s Mate

They were all edgy for the next few days. They’d pressed Raines for the meeting location, which he refused to give until Saturday.

Which, Brandon pointed out, was exactly what he would have done—not giving them time to set up their own ambush or prepare defenses for one from Raines.

Colt’s and Brandon’s weapons sources came through, so they had all the firepower they needed. But it was going to be a big job for Remy to set up any kind of defenses in the short time between them learning the location, and the actual time of the meet.

Brandon tried again to convince Kitty to go, but she couldn’t bring herself to say yes. That made them both even edgier.

They all knew they were taking a big risk, and it could go very, very wrong. But Raines was so reclusive, they had to take the chance when they could. Especially now that they knew he might be targeting the Bad Blood Crew.

Brandon and Kitty spent all the time they could together. Neither one of them wanted to talk about the future.

Kitty was too filled with guilt over not being there for his showdown with Raines. Something had called her here, because his life was in danger. What if he died because, in the end, she didn’t trust herself to be there for him?

On the other hand, her visions had seen Brandon in danger at the Crows’ Nest, not some other place. So maybe she was doing the right thing, keeping an eye on the bar and Caleb.

And of course, just when she needed them most, her dream visions had abandoned her. She hadn’t had one since the first night she and Brandon made love.

It would be awesome as fuck if that was because having sex with her was a magic shield that would keep Brandon safe, but she had the feeling her veejay was just not that powerful.

On Saturday morning they got a message from Callie, through her cloud email. Caleb had found out Jax and his boss were meeting with Brandon that night to discuss working with his new crew instead of the Talons.

He’d gone ballistic and called a meeting of the Talons, plus another crow gang from about an hour away. Callie was afraid he was going to try to move on Raines while Brandon was there and take them both out.

Kitty said, “See, I knew we needed someone to stay here and monitor the bugs. We’ll have the inside track on what he’s planning, and I can warn Remy if it seems like they’re going to move on you.” She turned to Remy. “You’ll have your phone, right?”

“I’ll either have it in my carry bag, or in a secure location where I can fly back and check it periodically.” He turned to Brandon. “Are you guys going silent while you go in?”

Brandon nodded. “Unless it’s an emergency worth blowing the mission for, you can’t contact us. There’s a good chance Raines will make us surrender our phones when we get there, so there can’t be anything on them that will tip them off Remy’s out there, or that we’re watching Caleb. Raines needs to believe for as long as possible that we really want to make an alliance with him.”

Kitty nodded, but all she could think about was her nightmares of the bar on fire. Sheets of flame, and danger coming at Brandon that he didn’t see.

Danger none of them could see.

She couldn’t wait for this night to be over.

By ten o’clock Kitty sat at Remy’s command station, the speaker set to the bug in the main bar area of the Crows’ Nest. They’d only gotten the location of the meeting at nine—and it was a good forty-five minutes away, out in the woods in the middle of nowhere.

They’d checked satellite photos and there seemed to be some kind of compound out there. Probably full of Raines’ soldiers and maybe even their families, so they might have non-combatants to worry about.

It also meant the chances of Brandon being able to take Raines out were getting slimmer. They might succeed in killing him, but if it was a compound full of his people they’d never get out alive.

Their best chance was to hope that Raines really was considering putting Brandon in Caleb’s place and giving him Farville as one of his sub-territories. Then they could figure out how to bring him down for good.

Remy had left as soon as they had the meet location, in a rented Jeep with a stash of weapons in the back. His job was to check for ambushes, and set up weapons caches and exit strategies in case they had to get Brandon and Colt out fast.

Brandon and Colt had left just before ten. They’d drive to within ten minutes of the compound, and Remy would fly out to meet them and brief them on the situation and the exit plans. Then they’d go in.

If Kitty had any news, she needed to get it to Remy before then.

She could hear a buzz of voices growing now, as the crows gathered for their meeting.

So far it was just a jumbled mess of sound—the meeting hadn’t started yet. She glanced at the second screen that showed the recording information for the office bug.

Nothing—there must not be anybody in the room.

There was a package of cupcakes in front of her, but she didn’t feel like eating anything. The gnawing in her stomach wasn’t hunger.

It was anxiety—and guilt.