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Chapter Eighteen

Case

We all sit in front of the screens set up in Marlow’s office. Along with decrypting the files, Marlow has been getting Jimmie to help go over footage from the night Jolie was rescued, to make sure nothing is missed. It was a hard task because the machines were fried, and we have only just gained access to the old system.

“The footage is in bad shape, but you can see for yourselves,” Jimmie says, pushing his glasses up his face. His grim look indicates it’s nothing good.

Jolie is upstairs with Sinclair and Blayne. One of them is in a pregnancy crisis, again.

“Just fucking press play already,” Boston growls, growing impatient. We watch as Chester, Creed, and Laughn fill the screen. They went through a formal debrief and told us what happened that night, but watching them all work together—taking out everyone and everything in their way—is different. I’m glad Jolie is preoccupied; this isn’t something she needs to see.

The footage glitches for a moment before it comes back. Jimmie has two different lots of footage running alongside each other. Mr Z is on one screen, and we watch as one shot hits Laughn, but the crazy bastard doesn’t even notice. Laughn just continues to stalk towards his target, black eyes void of emotion. More shots are fired, and on screen two the footage zooms in just enough to see the man’s face as he fires his shots. On the original screen, Laughn, Chester, and Creed don’t look human as they tear into Mr Z. He was never making it out alive.

Laughn drops to the ground, but none of them noticed the bullets until it was too late. But we see it now.

“Fuck,” Laughn roars, standing from his seat. “I’m going to kill him.”

Chester and Creed are quick to stand alongside him. The rest of us look to Brennan—he is the brains, the one who thinks before he acts. “Sit down,” Brennan demands.

“Are you fucking kidding me? You can clearly see Ziyon fucking shot me! The same man who was supposed to be on our side. The one, if I remember correctly, you said we could trust.”

“Don’t you think I know that? Every move I have made in the last few years has backfired,” Brennan says, running his hands through his hair. “Everyone is always ten steps ahead of us, but Jolie will never forgive us if we storm in there and Melinda gets hurt. Let’s call Corey and see what he has to say.”

“You can call him. We,” Chester says, pointing to himself, Creed, and Laughn, “are going to bring him in. You are either with us or you stay behind.”

They have a stare off, both men not backing down.

“I think Chester is right.” We all turn to see Jolie standing in the doorway. “If you call Corey, you run the risk he is a snitch. I know Davis is the best, and at the time, I’m sure Corey meant every word he said. But people are quick to jump ship. You have enough weapons stored at Olympia, and it’s not suspicious for everyone to go there. You can load up with weapons and bring him and Melinda in.”

“Are you sure? We’ll risk her safety going in,” Brennan argues.

Jolie nods. “I’m sure. Her safety is at risk if he already knows what we did. Corey isn’t high on the payroll—he is at arm’s length and only watches from a distance. Boston, you can run point on this one. Brennan, you can babysit me.”

“Me?” Boston raises his eyebrows.

“You’re a natural leader, just like your brother, and you won’t let those three wear you down and get their own way. You’re to go in and bring them back to Olympia. This will be no damn suicide mission like last time. Marlow can do his thing with you and conference back with Jimmie.”

“Holy shit,” I say, “I think I like this boss bitch version of you.”

She smiles like the damn Cheshire cat. “I think I might just like it too.”

“It is pretty goddamn sexy,” Kai says, and I scowl at him. I have been trying so damn hard to work through my issues with him. I blamed him for four years, and it tore us apart. While I know now what they did, that doesn’t make it better. He lied to me when he saw my heart breaking and my spiral of self-hatred—he could have easily ended it. Why the hell should I be the one to offer forgiveness when he isn’t even sorry? All he said was we did the same thing to her that they did to us when we were trying to keep her out of this whole mess... both times. Maybe he has a point, but I don’t know how to move past it.

Jolie pulls Brennan from the room, leaving us to come up with a plan. Boston isn’t like Brennan handing out orders; he lets us get involved in the planning process. It takes half an hour to decide who will do what and who will be where. As always, I’m sent in to pick the damn locks, even though it’s something all of them are capable of doing. Since there is no lock I haven’t been able to pick, they throw me under the bus, but I’m five-ten and seventy kilos on a good day, and clearly not the person you want to send in first. I can hold my own and all, but I’m not a scary mofo like Chester or Laughn.

Everyone knows their jobs, and Marlow sets Jimmie up here in the office to watch our backs. We all head out and take our normal cars, planning to switch out at Olympia. Any way we take into Ziyon’s house, he will see us coming. He is a smart man, but we can only hope he is unaware of our spy, and that—in addition to his brother being dead—will mean his security is no longer as tight. From what Corey says, Ziyon employs one main security guy and two or three others, depending on his movements. We plan to move in on shift change, which gives us time to act slowly. Marlow has Jimmie working on looping Ziyon’s security cameras in the underground tunnels. Once they are looped, we will have exactly an hour. Marlow is trying to get the alarms turned off and the elevator doors opened without sounding an alert. If by chance Ziyon runs and locks himself down in his bunker, our options are for me to pick the lock, or to blow the entire thing up—which Laughn voted for and lost.

“Is everyone clear on the plan?” Boston asks, and we all nod.

Our group moves out of the office with the plan to meet at Olympia, it being our first stop. Trace says the food deliveries happen today, and he has ordered one truck to log all its inventory. That will give us enough time to intercept it, and we have Colt meeting us there to be the faux delivery driver. He was our best option because he is down for anything and never questions what is asked of him. Even when he was told to not tell his girls, he’s just happy to know they are here safe with Brennan.

I head into the living room and spot Jolie snuggled against Brennan on the couch. Sinclair and Blayne are cuddled with each other on the other couch, and the surround sound is blaring away as zombies chase some guy.

Jolie leans her head back, and I press a soft kiss to her lips.

“Be safe,” she says, against my mouth. “And don’t let those idiots kill themselves.”

“No promises,” I joke.

I head out to my car and Kai, of all people, jumps into the passenger seat. “What?” he says. “Your face looks like I punched your dog.”

“You’re not exactly my first choice of passenger,” I state, turning the car on and reversing from my spot.

“I get that, but we need to move on. Shit happened in the past, but Jolie is all that matters now, and we are about to become fathers. Doesn’t this all seem stupid?”

“I’m fucking trying, but every time I close my eyes, all I see is you not going with her and getting that call.”

“For what it’s worth, I’m sorry. Our intention was never to hurt you guys—it was always to keep her safe.”

“I would have done the same thing,” I admit with a sigh. “Maybe that’s why I’m so mad. I just don’t want to hurt anymore.”

“Me either. Can we start again? Take it day by day and see what happens?”

“All we can do is try.”

Kai puts the stereo on, and some nineties punk band blares through the speakers. He sings at the top of his lungs, and I find myself tapping the steering wheel.

Once we reach Olympia, I park in one of the underground parking spaces and most of the others are already here. Stopping to kiss Jolie and Kai tagging along slowed me down. We both head up to the meeting spot and see that Boston already has the weapons out and is ready to go. He doesn’t waste any time with small talk, and that is one upside to Brennan not being here. He is big on the safety lectures whereas Boston doesn’t give a shit. If you’re stupid enough to stray from the plan and you’re stupid enough to get hurt, then he sure as shit isn’t coming to save you.

We load up, and Boston gets a text from Colt saying he is ready to go. Everyone heads out, and sure enough, Colt is sitting in the driver’s seat of the van. We all slip into the back, and I slide the door closed. Colt turns up the music so much that Boston tries to yell at him, but it’s no use—Colt just pretends not to hear him.

Once we are clear of the Olympia gates and on the highway, and we are going well over the speed limit, “Bad Boys” by Inner Circle comes on the stereo. Kai climbs through into the front seat and sings at the top of his lungs, bouncing around, and all I can do is smile. I’m glad he is happy.

We make a sharp right and dip down into the area Marlow needs to open. The van comes to a screeching halt, and we all pile out.

“Everyone put these in,” Marlow says, handing us our earpieces. “Jimmie has disabled our tracking devices, but it only allows us an hour. We have already used almost fifteen minutes.”

“No problem, brother,” Chester says to Marlow, clapping him on the shoulder. “We get in, grab the bastard, and get out—simple.”

“Not so simple, actually. But you just stick to your part of the plan,” Marlow snaps.

I fit the small device into my ear and Jimmie’s voice rings out loud and clear, along with the rest of the guys.

“Let’s disable the cameras and loop them now, then open this door,” Marlow says, and we all wait.

“And done,” Jimmie declares moments later.

We head towards the elevator. It’s a bit of a trek from the bottom, wasting more time that we don’t have, and it gives me a few minutes at most to get the door open at the other end.

Once the doors to the elevator open, we all run—walking isn’t an option with this time limit. Leading the pack since I’m up next, I see the ladder come into view. I’ve never had to pick a lock at this angle. To be honest, I’m not even sure why he put a lockable door there anyway—one with an external lock and key would have worked better to keep us out. Though bolt cutters would have been needed in that case, and Brennan’s spy to cut it open. Either way, we would have gotten in.

I scale the ladder and pull out my kit and get to work. I shake my head as my damn hands tremble, the tools unsteady in my grip. What the fuck is wrong with me? I have never stumbled before, but it doesn’t help that I have eight idiots staring me down as they wait on me.

“You can do this,” Kai says, climbing the ladder behind me. “Remember when we were kids, and you would always try to outdo me in everything? When you realised you were better at this, you couldn’t stop smiling for a week.”

“It’s true, I am better at this than you.”

“You are. Let’s do this so we can protect our girl.”

This time he is right—we have to do this to protect Jolie. These sick and twisted fucks need to learn to leave her alone or they will all endure the same fate. Mr Z is a prime example: he tried to take what belonged to us. I might not have torn him apart like they did, but I would have happily put a bullet in his skull. How Ziyon is going to make it out of here alive is beyond me. I just don’t see it happening, and Jolie is going to be pissed.

“I got it,” I whisper and climb down the ladder. Boston immediately takes my place and gently pushes the hatch open.

Boston, Chester, Laughn, and Creed lead the pack for this part of the plan as the rest of us pile out and scan the yard.

It’s empty, completely devoid of life.

There are usually security guards everywhere. Something about this doesn’t seem right.

“Maybe Brennan should have contacted Corey,” Trace says. “Something feels off.”

“Let’s sweep the house. They are probably locked down in the bunker if they knew we were coming,” Boston says, signalling that we move.

We each go through and check the areas given to us. The main house is completely clear, just as the yard was. Kai and I go to the bunker, and I pull out my tools to attack another damn lock.

“Wait,” Kai says, “let’s check to make sure it’s locked first.”

He twists the handle, and it opens easily. This has to be a trap; a man like him wouldn’t just leave his door open.

“Creed,” Kai says through his earpiece. “This one is a job for you and Laughn.”

If the door is unlocked and we can open it, there is a good chance he has rigged a bomb to the door. Creed not being able to feel heat, and Laughn not feeling pain like us, really helps. An explosion probably wouldn’t kill them; they would be seriously injured, but not dead. That’s something, at least.

The brothers push to the front of the pack, and the rest of us step back. Laughn pushes Creed back. “Step back, brother. Jolie needs you more than me. You take away her pain, and I won’t let her lose that over the rest of us.”

Creed doesn’t argue, as Laughn has a point. We all watch as Laughn twists the handle and pushes the door open. The seconds feel like hours as we wait for the bang, one that never comes.

We all enter the area in a tight formation and look around, staking out everything we can. I take the hallway off to the right and check in the main bedroom. Everything looks right except the closet door is slightly ajar. I open it, and it’s empty—no clothes, no nothing. He bloody knew we were coming and has packed up and left. It makes no sense to me. He isn’t going to let go of Olympia without a fight, which means he is going to wait it out.

“Anything in here?” Boston asks, popping his head into the room.

“They have cleared out,” I say.

“Fuck, guys, run,” Colt yells in our ear. “The fucking elevator just blew up. I’m coming to the front of the house.”

We all sprint back to the bunker door and get out of there as quickly as possible. Not only did he know we were coming, but he’s also going to try to kill us. We make it to the main house just as everything explodes around us.

Debris falls, smoke and dust fills the air. I dodge and weave through the building, following the others, but something explodes beside me, sending me flying into a wall. The force of the blast causes me to hit hard, and my eyes get heavy.

“Is everyone out?” Jimmie asks.

“All clear,” Boston says.

“Where the fuck is Case?” Kai asks, a growl in his voice I have never heard before.

“He was just behind me,” Marlow says.

“Where the fuck is my brother?” Kai shouts.

“You can’t go back in there—the bombs are still going off!” Davis says.

“Try to stop me! I fucking dare you,” Kai warns. I want to call out to him, but when I open my mouth, nothing comes out.

Another blast goes off beside me, and it’s so close, my ears ring. It sounds like it’s inside my brain. I blink a few times, and all I can see is a bright light.