Page 49 of Fire and Smoke (Nothing Special #9)

Wesley (Wes) Drake

The air smelled like asphalt, piss, and rotten meat as Wes crouched behind a battered steel dumpster in the rear alley of the five-story apartment building.

Despite the nerves creeping down his spine like fire ants, he stayed still, every muscle strung tight, eyes locked on the back entrance.

The projection display flickered to life inside his visor, glowing faint red in the dark. It mapped doorways, thermal signatures Free was feeding in real-time, and silent comm messages scrolling at the edges of his vision.

Beside him, Law adjusted the matte-black helmet, eyes wide.

Wes wanted to touch him, but he stayed focused on the fight…not their love.

Above them, Michaels and Ro were in position on the opposite rooftop, their rifles aimed toward the doors.

Free whispered, his voice cool and low in his ear as if he were right beside him, “Thermals show seven heat signatures moving on the first floor. Hall service entrance clear for fifteen meters. Copy?”

Wes’s pulse thudded in his throat.

He cast a final look at Law, gripping his utility belt so tightly his gloves creaked.

“We’ll get through this,” Wes murmured, low enough only Law could hear.

“Steele and Tech will never leave your side,” Free said.

Oh yeah.

He forgot Free was always watching and listening.

Law’s gaze didn’t waver, but his jaw twitched hard.

“Stay close to me,” Law stressed.

Wes gave a sharp nod.

He’d come back for this—for Law, the team, and the promise he’d made.

He was a man of his word.

God’s gravelly voice cut through their comms. “Alpha team moving. Bravo, stand ready.”

Wes cut his eyes to God, Day, and Hart’s team standing close to each other at the far end of the alley, their black tactical gear blending them into the shadows.

Syn, Ruxs, and Green huddled farther up the wall, prepping flashbangs, checking the breach door. Ruxs cracked his neck like he was warming up for a bar fight.

“I hate these nonlethal weapons,” Ruxs muttered.

Green sighed. “We’ll live to kill another day, babe.”

“Seriously,” God gritted. “Shut the fuck up.”

Hart raised his gloved fist, chopped the edge of his hand twice across his chest, and pointed two fingers to his eyes before slicing them outward.

What the fuck?

Wes frowned. He had no idea what any of that meant until Free translated it for him.

“Two at a time. Sweep in a circular pattern. Watch for crossfire zones.”

“Uh, yeah, okay.”

The steel service door blew inward with a muffled thump as Syn’s breach charge split the lock.

“Atlanta PD SWAT! Down on the ground!”

Within a minute, panicked voices hollered a barrage of curses before the gunfire erupted. Bullets sparked off the concrete around Wes’s boots as he and Law lunged sideways, pressing his back to the doorway.

Steele, composed and silent, moved to Wes’s side.

Tech crouched in front of Law and returned fire with a Bryna Launcher, firing the .68 caliber chemical projectiles Law made.

“Hostiles moving west hallway,” Free called.

Once inside, the apartment building lobby was flooded with men fleeing in all directions—it was an active deal in progress—while firing wild shots behind their backs.

Steele spun around him, snapped his arm up, and fired a short burst of rubber bullets while Tech hit them with the irritants.

They dropped like sacks, coughing up bile and gasping for breath.

“We gotta move,” Tech urged.

Law flipped the cap off a small black canister. Thick white smoke surged outward, filling the entryway and making them invisible.

Through his mask, Wes could make out the red silhouettes moving inside the fog.

Tech motioned forward, while he and Law stayed crouched between him and Steele.

Tech broke formation, moving like a ninja, and grabbed a man—waving blindly through the smoke—by the collar and slammed him into the wall.

He disarmed the second one with a strike to the wrist, spinning the weapon and kicking it across the floor before Steele sprayed him with rubber bullets in his chest.

Commands were being hollered from the back as God, Day, Hart, and his team made their entrance.

“Floor clear,” Free advised.

“Alpha team moving to rear stairwell. Bravo, keep the rear,” Hart ordered.

One floor down, four to go.

They moved in a tight formation, clearing each apartment.

As they rounded the second-floor landing, Steele came to a sudden halt, almost causing Wes to slam into his back.

Hart had his fist up.

A wild-eyed man stood in the center of the hallway, sweat dripping down his temples, his arm wrapped tight around the throat of a half-naked woman thrashing against him.

Her face was red, her eyes full of terror, her feet barely skimming the floor as the man dragged her backward.

Another woman knelt at the bottom of the stairs, cradling her arm, which was bent at a grotesque angle. Her sobs were desperate and heart-wrenching as she begged them to help her.

Wes wasn’t sure what a person on meth looked like, but he suspected he did now.

The man dug his pistol into the woman’s temple. “Don’t fuckin’ move! I’ll blow her fuckin’ brains out!”

Wes didn’t think his heart could beat any harder. He didn’t want to see a woman get killed.

“Tell them outside to back off!”

A chopper circled overhead, its spotlight roaming over the building, occasionally flashing a beam of light into the hall.

Hart lifted two fingers toward the window, then tapped his shoulder twice.

What are we doing? What’s happening?

“Michaels is gonna put a round in his shoulder, brace for glass,” Free whispered.

The man pointed his gun at Hart, who didn’t even flinch.

“Don’t try to be a hero. I’m getting out of here…just walk away, and I’ll let her—”

A single muffled crack split the air as the bullet punched through the dirty window in a burst of glittering glass.

The bullet slammed into the man’s shoulder, spinning him sideways. His gun clattered to the floor as he dropped, screaming, blood blossoming across his shirt.

The half-naked woman tore free while the other woman scrambled backward, sobbing and clutching her mangled arm to her chest.

The Alpha team tightened their formation and kept going as if nothing had happened.

Three of Hart’s SWAT members broke away and helped the hostages down the stairs while the other snapped on a pair of gloves and instructed Free to radio for an ambulance.

“Steele.” Wes trembled. “I’m on your six, brother, keep moving,” he answered. “Hold it together.”

Law was eyeing him

The third-floor hallway reeked of ammonia and chemicals, a sure sign they’d reached the labs.

Free cast a projection of the room through their goggles. There were so many heat signatures he lost count.

“Could be workers,” Hart noted. “Female.”

“Neutralize the area,” God ordered.

Law yanked two orange canisters from his belt and cracked them open as Wes pulled a fire suppressor.

Dinah and another SWAT member blew open the door and fell back.

Law hurled his charges around Steele and into the lab. They hit the floor and burst open, flooding the room with a thick gray mist that crawled low, neutralizing fumes and converting volatile chemicals into harmless residue.

Beside him, Wes aimed his fire suppressor and released a blast of cooled vapor that washed over heated glassware and sizzling burners. The bottle of freon followed, dropping the room’s temperature to a tolerable chill, siphoning away heat to prevent ignition.

Ruxs and Green rushed in behind the Alpha team, barking orders at everyone inside to get face down.

There were men and women, yelling, running, and hiding behind steel tables and benches. It was total mayhem.

A guard darted from beneath a table, eyes wild and teeth bared, sprinting toward the doorway—and straight for Law.

Wes’s adrenaline and fear slammed into overdrive as he realized Steele’s—who was supposed to be guarding the love of his life—attention was on Tech, who was fighting two men.

Without a second thought, he lunged.