Page 11

DANTE

“ M ission tonight,” Hayden reminds us all as we scarf down dinner. “We’ll meet in the garage at nine.”

Jacob cooked jambalaya that made the whole house smell like sizzling herbs and spices.

Sometimes when he cooks something extra delicious before a mission, I wonder if he knows we’re all going to die and that’s his kind send-off.

But it’s probably more he’s anxious and that’s how he deals with it.

I won’t complain about it though. His cooking is delicious.

“What’s this one again?” I ask because at some point, all the missions started to blur together.

“Apparently that medical facility off highway 32 is testing on animals, but also stealing studies that undergrads are doing at the university and passing it off as their own. We’re stealing the data back, not the animals!” Hayden shouts just as Parker is about to interrupt him.

Parker slumps down in his seat, distraught at not being able to save the animals.

Soft-hearted jerk. He pushes his glasses up his nose, the steam from the jambalaya making them fog.

We finish dinner in peace, then disappear into our rooms to get ready for the mission.

I dress in my typical all black with the gun harness strapped over my chest. I jog down the stairs to slip on my new lucky Chucks, the replacements Hayden bought me, that are all black with flames dancing up the sides.

“The skull ones are better,” Parker notes as he finishes snapping on his watch. Dressed in tight black dress pants and a black fitted dress shirt, he looks like he’s going to a fancy ball rather than partaking in some slightly, probably shady criminal activity.

“The skull ones got puked on and have an odd yellow tint on them that I can’t get out.”

Parker sighs in misery for me. “Sorry, buddy.”

“Whatever. These are fine too.”

Parker and I stand side by side while we wait for Jacob and Hayden to join us.

It’s always been easiest with Parker. Yeah, we piss each other off, but I think we understand each other the best, despite Parker and Jacob being a matching set.

Parker likes to kill, but only does it for good.

I like to kill, but only evil people that deserve it.

It’s pretty much the same thing. Although sometimes I think that Parker would happily kill, even if we weren’t involved in the missions.

There’s something inside of him that frankly scares me sometimes, but I love him like a brother, so I’d defend anything he ever did wrong.

Hayden comes down the stairs first, golden-blond hair perfectly styled in this weird slicked-back way that I could never accomplish with my slightly curled ends.

He’s dressed similarly to me, but with a tight, almost sheer black T-shirt.

Must be cold because his nipples are like ice.

Jacob’s nostrils are flared as he follows behind Hayden, fingers carefully hooked into his own harness .

Hayden is the best up-close shooter of us, although I’ll never admit that out loud.

He can kill someone in a second flat as long as he’s got his silencer on him.

Jacob and Parker are the sharp shooters, able to shoot from an extreme distance.

Whereas I just do whatever I have to do to get the job done.

Hands, fists, guns, whatever, as long as the bad guys are defeated and we can complete the mission.

“So, simple, we get there, you and Jacob handle the security or medical personnel still there, while Parker and I get the information off the computers inside.” Hayden holds out the iPad he carries around that contains enough information to put us all away for life.

“Robin requests we don’t kill anyone on this one since it’s high profile, it’ll be in the news soon. ”

“Wait.” I look from Jacob to Hayden, and neither of them will meet my eyes. “Why is Jacob with me? Usually he’s with you.”

Jacob always has Hayden’s back. That’s just the way we’re always paired up.

Parker and I are on kill duty while Jacob and Hayden get the goods, that’s the way it is, the way it always goes.

But the tension in the air is thick enough that I could cut it with a knife and have a nice-sized dinner.

When no one says anything, Parker claps his hands with something between a grimace and an awkward smile.

“Let’s get going,” Parker announces with false cheer.

Hayden sighs from deep in his soul. “Just do what I say, Dante. Stop asking so many questions.”

I glare at the back of Hayden’s head as we make our way toward the car.

At least the seating sticks to the pattern.

Parker drives, Jacob sits up front, while Hayden and I are squashed together in the back.

The stereo starts blasting angry alternative rock when Jacob clicks into the playlist we all contribute songs to on a rotating basis.

Half the time it’s rock, the other half of the time it’s classical music, depends on the mood when the song was added by one of us.

I lean my head against the window as the city blurs by, wondering what Reid is doing, wondering when I can see him again.

Now is not the time to be thinking about him.

I’ve got to get my head in the game so I don’t end up shot, or worse, my Chucks getting sullied again.

Even the thought of my vomit-covered Chucks makes me smile.

“Oh my God, why are you smiling?” Hayden asks, voice fearful.

I scowl. “I’m not.”

“You were.” Hayden cocks his head at me. “And it was scary, don’t do it again.”

Parker looks in the rearview mirror at me, eyes calculating, then he reaches out to turn the music up to drown Hayden out.

Thank God. When we park around the corner of the medical facility, my heart starts to race like normal with typical pre-mission jitters.

A brief thought of Ama passes over me, her smile when I got taller than her, when she said she could still beat me up even though I was bigger than her now.

That pang of missing her hits me again, making my heart skip a quiet beat, just in time for us to park.

Time’s up.

We all take a moment to sit there, silently hyping ourselves up for the mission. In a synchronized movement, we all tug masks over our faces in case we leave people alive, which is always the hope in a retrieval mission.

Hayden hops out of the car first, with Jacob following a close second, obviously pissed at Hayden’s inability to care about his surroundings or safety.

One day Hayden is going to get himself killed.

He’s worse than Reid in that way. Parker and I shrug our shoulders at each other when we climb out of the car, then go around to the back to join the other boys.

The facility looks exactly how I expected.

Big, white building with lots of bright lights that make it seem like it could moonlight as a car dealership if it didn’t have that weird something-nefarious-is-being-done-here feeling radiating from it.

Hayden squints one eye at the facility, then the other, licks his finger and holds it up to the sky.

Parker huffs in frustration before nudging Jacob in the back.

They’re all children.

Jacob points at the entry point. “Cameras are angled in a way that only catch the edges, so if we walk right up and in the front door, we won’t be seen if we keep our heads down. Don’t look up.”

“That’s what he said,” I tease, because I can never read the room.

Parker sucks his teeth and clears his throat. “Jacob and Dante, you’ll take down the two security guards out front, tie them up, then I’ll bring the one employee still in the back up front for you to handle while Hayden and I focus on the assets.”

“No murder,” Hayden reminds us.

“Yes, Dad,” Parker replies.

Hayden glares at him while Jacob makes an aborting, slashing kind of movement with his hand.

I am truly too exhausted to understand all of the layers of dynamics that are occurring right now.

I just want to punch someone like I was promised.

Tired of the shenanigans, I breeze past them all and jog across the street.

The stars are blotted out today, clouds covering the night sky, and the harsh bright lights of the medical facility make me want to sneeze.

But I keep my head down and walk right up to the doors.

The soft sounds of the boys' footfalls echo behind me, letting me know at least they’ve got my back.

I stop at the front door because I didn’t think this through. “So, do I knock or?”

“Jesus Christ,” Hayden mumbles. The rustling of his hands over his clothes reaches my ears, just in time for him to step in front of me with gloved hands to open the doors wide.

“Hey!” a security guard shouts, but falls to the floor when Parker leans over me with his tranquilizer gun. The other guard falls shortly after in a heap of messy limbs.

“Forgot about that,” I tease Parker with a smile.

He carefully rearranges his dress shirt cuffs. “I didn’t. No, you can’t use the gun.”

“Fine,” I sneer because this has been a year-long fight. Only Parker gets to use the tranquilizer gun because he’s convinced the rest of us will either shoot ourselves or the wrong person.

Hayden and Parker disappear into the back, just for Parker to reappear with a man that has a gag in his mouth and the fear of God radiating out of his eyes.

Amazing. I’d probably feel the same way too if Parker was manhandling me with crazy eyes.

Parker disappears again while I hover over the guy who’s shaking at our feet, the two security guards still out cold.

Jacob leans against the check-in desk, fingers flexing a few times out of restlessness.

“Doesn’t Parker usually get brawn duty with me?” I ask from the corner of my mouth.

Jacob snarls. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

Ah, that’s code for he pissed Hayden off again.