Page 29 of Ravens

“Sure.” I shrug, mentally exhausted by the constant song and dance with York.

“Want to go shooting after lunch?”

“Why not,” I say breathlessly as I stare into the fire.

York thinks I’m in a position of power, but all I really want is the power to hold him down and make him tell me the truth, make him tell me what he really wants and why he didn’t shoot me.

“What’s the date today?” I ask, resuming my perch on one of the logs.

“Uh . . . twenty-eighth or twenty-ninth, I think.”

And I need to get my hands on a burner soon. Shit.

But . . . I can’t deny that York has a point. He has orders, and he probably wants to hold me down and make me spill my gutstoo. A chunk of meat flops onto a flimsy paper plate, alongside some plastic cutlery, and I take it from William’s hand.

I saw that thing up and eat it like it’s the last meal I’ll ever have.

Fifteen

After lunch, I follow William through the woods. I didn’t tell York where I was going, and I didn’t see him before I left. Fuck him.

We exit the trees a dozen meters or so from the edge of a cliff, and he turns and hands me his rifle. I look at it, holding it out awkwardly for a second.

“Can you shoot a rifle?” he asks.

“I’m sure I can, but I don’t have any experience.” Lie.

“No problem.”

Walking ahead of me, he stops a few feet from the cliff edge and stacks a few fist-sized rocks up before carefully lowering himself to his stomach. I drop down beside him and rest the muzzle of the rifle on the rocks as I tuck it into my shoulder.

“Good grip.” He nods. “Set this dial for the distance to target—estimate it,” he clarifies. “Fire selector switch: safe, semi, auto.” He flips the little switch on the side back and forth. “Mageject.” He indicates to the outside of the rifle and then taps a handle close to my face. “Charging handle. Pull it.”

I do it, feigning difficulty when extending it fully. It clicks.

“Ready the weapon,” he breathes out.

I flip the safety switch to semi and peer down the scope.

“Good. Get that tall dead tree in your sights. At this distance, every breath is going to affect your aim. Hold your breath for accuracy.”

Pretending you can’t shoot is difficult when the skill is drilled into your head, becoming muscle memory.

“So,” he mutters, lifting his spotter’s scope. “Target is to your front, at your own time, go on.”

When the tree is in my crosshairs, I watch it. Breathing puts your target into a gentle ellipsis at this distance, which I need to get the feel of and then time. After a couple of revolutions, I hold my breath just as the target hits the center of my crosshairs. I squeeze the trigger, and the sound of the rifle cracks the air as splinters fly.

“Good.” He shifts beside me.

I just grazed the outside of the trunk. It was intentional. I’m not sure what buy-in looks like, according to York, but there is no way I’m going to be at the end of a sniper’s rifle for whatever the hell he has going on. Regardless, I can’t be too good at this, and I can’t look completely incompetent either. I’m not sure they’d believe the incompetence anyway.

“Are you buying in yet?” I keep looking down the scope.

“No,” William says quietly. “Again. Try to hit the center this time.”

“Why not?”

“I’m not a cheap date.”