Page 72 of Ravens

“Did you get your bingo?” I ask hopefully.

“This sucks so bad.”

“I’ll take that as a negative,” I breathe out. “We need to draw them out, so stop fucking shooting at them, William, and York, yes, you’re a prick.” I put my hands on my hips and stare up at the scaffolding. “A prick I could really use to have my six at the moment.”

“Inbound,” he responds.

I stay hidden behind the thick plastic, pacing, waiting. Minutes feel like hours, but I know there is only one way to sort this out.

“Thirty seconds. Coming up the back.” York's voice cuts through my thoughts. I can’t wait for him to arrive because he’ll try to stop me. I just need him to cover me.

“Eyes on me, William.” I look up to where I know he is, even though I can’t see him from here, and I step out onto the road. “Roger,” he breathes into my ear.

“Tripoli!” York barks, and I can hear him in my ear, but also behind me.

“Just have my back,” I say quietly as I cross the street.

“Come on, kid, what are you doing?” Carter chimes in.

I swing my eyes to the left for him but can’t see anything. “No man left behind, right?”

“We’re British,” he retorts. “We eat our own.”

“Glad I’m not one of yours then,” I mutter as I make the sidewalk and keep going.

“Stop!” a firm voice calls out from the building.

I stop. Breathe. Take another step.

“I saidstop!” An agent shifts forward, stepping through one of the large, broken windows.

“Code name Tripoli,” I call out. “Turning myself in.”

A string of curses lights up in my ear from multiple voices, but I ignore it as the agent inches forward out the window. There are whispers inside, the crackle of radios.

“Grab her,” someone else calls out.

The agent in the window strides out, gun still trained on me, and then another. And another. My eyes flit to the desk, and I hope August has had a chance to plug his drive in.

“Three? That’s it?” I put my hands on my hips. “I’m kind of insulted.”

“Good to know you talk to everyone like that,” William says through the radio.

“You’re lucky you don’t already have a bullet in your head,” one of the agents growls.

“Oh, you and I both know none of you are authorized to kill me. Isn’t that right?” The first one moves up, pulling out a pair of cuffs. “But . . .” I look at him and then the cuffs. “I do like it rough.” I thrust my wrists forward to him with a smile. “Don’t try to be gentle.”

“For fuck’s sake,” William breathes out, and I can hear the sound of York’s wordless groan too.

The agent cocks an eyebrow as his partners close in, but I’m not getting locked up today.

When he raises a cuff above my wrist, I grab his gun in one hand and the cuffs in the other as I kick the agent beside him. Disarming him, I slap a cuff on his wrist before grabbing the other agent, keeled over from a kick to the gut, and slap the other cuff on him.

The third man pops off a round, and I draw my sidearm, putting a bullet in his knee before turning on the two cuffed together and putting a round in each of them. Nothing serious . . . just seriously inconvenient and painful.

With all of them down, I kick away the remaining two guns and march straight through the front windows.

“Carter, start a fire, because I’ve got some serious wood now,” William says over the radio.