Total pages in book: 51
Estimated words: 49215 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 246(@200wpm)___ 197(@250wpm)___ 164(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 49215 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 246(@200wpm)___ 197(@250wpm)___ 164(@300wpm)
We had our weak moments. Lord knew he’d picked me up off the floor more than a few times these past two weeks.
He nodded once and cleared his throat. “We have to find him. He’s gotta be okay.”
I nodded too.
He broke our gaze and looked down, his exterior cracking. “I miss him so fucking much.”
Goddammit. “Listen—” Fuck me. He made me crack too. We didn’t have time for this. I swallowed my emotions and gnashed my teeth. “I need my backup down there, all right? I can’t do this without you.”
He sniffled and nodded once more, and he composed himself. “Yeah—sorry, I just—”
“I know. I get it.” I squeezed his neck. “We can fall apart when we have Shay sandwiched between us, okay?”
“Yeah.” He cleared his throat again and reached up to adjust my face covering. “I’ll get my rifle.”
Good. We were back on track. I couldn’t handle him breaking, ’cause that’d be the end of me. His strength was mine.
I took over and removed my helmet to put on the balaclava properly. Then only my eyes were visible.
I pressed the button on my earpiece for the last time—until tonight was over. “RT1 and 2 back online. Initiate blackout in sixty seconds.”
“Blackout in sixty seconds, confirmed,” Ramirez replied. “Remember, you’re on your own when you get inside. The cameras will die too.”
“Roger,” I said.
Once Riv had his precision rifle, we hurried up to the top of the ridge, and I lowered my monocular and switched to night vision. Headlight off. I was careful not to peer directly at the house, because the lights were too bright down there, and I needed my vision to adjust to darkness ASAP.
While River lay down on his stomach and positioned his rifle, I signaled to him that I was heading toward the house.
“Approaching the house,” I reported quietly.
I hated this type of house. It was a modern monstrosity, a fish tank of straight lines and floor-to-ceiling windows.
“Thirty seconds to blackout,” Ramirez added.
As the glow from the house reached part of the slanted mountainside, I veered left to remain in the shadows.
When it was ten seconds to blackout, I had about sixty feet left to reach the concrete wall on the west side of the house. Ramirez counted down from there, and I took off in a run and let the adrenaline pump through me.
“In five, four, three…”
The loud club music roared into the night until it suddenly stopped, and the entire property was cloaked in darkness.
I sprinted the last bit, latched on to the top of the wall, and threw myself over it to the sound of the initial confusion from the guests. Shouts of complaints. Where’s the music? What happened? Come on, man! Don’t kill the party! I knew I had a handful of seconds before people were gonna start turning on the flashlights on their phones. I jogged over to the patio and moved seamlessly between the groups of people.
My focus sharpened; I was catapulted right back to the times when all this had come naturally. I zeroed in on guards and gave River the green light. A couple women in bikinis began chanting for the lights to come back on, which prompted others to follow.
“Lights back on! Lights back on! Lights back on!”
Idiots.
A second later, the first shot cracked through the air.
That ended the fun.
Several guests screamed in terror, while others scattered.
I unholstered both my handguns and found a strange calm in the mayhem where only I could see clearly. No matter how fast someone was, emptying a backyard of over fifty people took time, and most civilians couldn’t handle themselves for shit in a crisis. The second I spotted a guard, I aimed at his head and fired. River caused a few to drop too, and it was officially chaos on the patio.
“Someone call 9-1-1!” a guy sobbed.
“Help me!” a girl screamed.
“Target running toward the stairs,” River stated. “I can’t see farther than that.”
I hurried after, pushing past a handful of guests and killing another guard on the way.
I counted three other shots that didn’t come from us.
At the bottom of the stairs, just past the living room, I fired at one of Luiz’s personal guards. Then I was darting up the stairs, and River told me to go right. It was the logical direction—where Luiz had his office. My ears rang loudly, my breaths came out rapid and shallow—
“Fuck,” I exhaled, almost ramming into one of the guards. I immediately flinched forward and shoved him away from me, only to get enough distance between us to shoot him in the head.
I heard yelling from inside the office—
“He has at least one guard with him in there.” River spoke quickly. “Three are dead.”
I fired at the lock, then stepped back and put all my strength into a kick, and the door loosened from its hinges.