“We need to leave, Ms. Yvette,” Phillip said.
“No, we’re going to kill him.” A slide of metal, then a hollow clank against the ground. She backed up, and so did the remaining man.
Robert joined them.
“I want him dead.” Yvette’s voice raked the air. “Do you understand me? I want his fucking head at my feet.”
A slide clicked. Shoes scraped against the asphalt.
Marcel waited.
Dark spots bloomed in his good eye and shadows in his bad one darkened. He didn’t fight the fatigue and pain. He acknowledged its power, and just like the pull of gravity, he let it guide him.
Sound took on a high-pitched echo, scents turned pungent.
The movements of the two men crackled the fabric of their clothing. Their inhales stuttered, and their exhales huffed, sending plumes of white to drift in near-transparent clouds past the edge of the pillar as they closed in.
One on each side, there would be no moving past them.
The muzzle of a gun passed the edge, the back of a hand, a cuff of a suit. Concrete ground against the soles of shoes. Marcel turned, moving into the gunman’s space as he emerged from the other side at the same moment as his companion.
The first shot muffled the sound in Marcel’s good ear, and with the second man on his blind side, he now had the advantage. But those were more things Marcel didn’t dwell on. Facts he had no way of changing.
The dagger made no sound when it punched through the gunman’s chest. Another shot left heated metal blistering Marcel’s cheek and preceded the butt of the gun, slamming into his jaw. He let the pain roll through him and swung the man impaled on his dagger around, putting his back to the one named Robert. Two more shots popped off.
The first one blew a hole through Marcel’s opponent only to rake a gouge on the inside of Marcel’s arm on exit. The second emerged from the dying man’s shoulder, striking Marcel in the collarbone.
His left arm collapsed, and all he could do was keep his fingers curled around the hilt of his knife. Marcel stormed toward Robert, who skirted out of the way as Marcel shoved his companion toward him, almost knocking him over.
Marcel took to the shadows, sliding the dagger he held in his right hand back into its sheath and rescuing the one in threat of being lost from his left.
He swept around the concrete column. Another pop and heat blazed a hole close to the shoulder of his useless arm, spraying the concrete behind him with bits of flesh.
Yvette stepped from the closest pillar. The gun kicked in her two-handed grip, a weapon clearly meant for a much bigger person, but she wielded it with deadly accuracy. Marcel moved around the corner out of her line of sight, and a second shot struck him in the side.
Robert rushed forward, mouth stretched wide. Teeth gritted. Success blazing in his eyes.
Marcel jerked to the side, and the shot stripped some of the scalp from his head. But Robert was too close now to miss, which meant he was too close to stop, too close to escape.
Marcel sliced his dagger downward, driving the blade just above Robert’s wrist, severing nerves and tendons. His fingers opened, and Marcel jerked the dagger free, catching Robert in the side of the neck, unzipping the skin from his collarbone, his throat, jaw, across one eye.
Robert fell away, hissing air on the back of red spittle and holding his neck with his remaining hand.
The click of a gun broke the silence.
Yvette stared at the weapon in her hand like she couldn’t believe it inconvenienced her by running out of bullets.
She dropped the gun and pulled what resembled a flip phone from her pocket. “Stay back, or I’ll burn it down.” Makeup ringed Yvette’s eyes, blood stained her silk-blend clothes. More matted her hair into clumps, and the hand she held the detonator with shook.
There was no doubt she’d push the trigger. Here or a block away, she would set off the explosives.
Yvette inched away, muscles tightening, readying to flee. She quickened her steps, and Marcel matched her pace.
Yvette glanced back but not long enough to judge any direction. Her desperation to run caused her to pause a hair too long.
Marcel closed the space between them.
Yvette jerked away, but Marcel was already dropping the dagger back to his side.
The rush of crimson devoured the cream color of her blouse, soaked her skirt, cut rivulets down her arms. Her knees folded, and the color drained from her cheeks.
Marcel sheathed his dagger and kneeled in front of her. Terror and confusion fogged Yvette’s gaze.
Gone the arrogant woman, leaving behind the teary-eyed child who’d lost her brother. The broken heart. The lost little sister who only wanted to avenge the most important person in her life.
Facts Marcel knew and witnessed playing over her horrified expression.
Details with no more importance than the wind in the night kicking loose the last of leaves from the branches they clung to.
“I accept your gift.” Marcel held her chin.
Yvette lifted the detonator.
Marcel smiled, and she pressed the switch.
Sam was too young for this kind of shit. Hell, Ben was too young.
And Jacob?
He stood with a distant look on his face and his lips pressed into a firm line. A smear of blood check-marked his cheek. The dark splash of a bruise colored his jaw. Jacob especially didn’t deserve it. His life had been hard enough.
Ben went over to the clutter of junk on the makeshift plywood table.
“What are you looking for?” Jacob said.
“My gun.”
“Dead guy has a gun.” Sam nodded at the man by the elevator shaft, then the other by the door.
Ben really didn’t want to go digging around a corpse, trying to find a weapon. But the bag laying next to him? It wasn’t a dead body, and maybe he could avoid more blood. Ben picked it up and brought it over to the table.
“We need to hurry.” Jacob joined him.
“Yeah, I know, but if we run into them, we need some chance of defending ourselves.”
“Didn’t work out too good last time.”
Ben gritted his teeth. No, it didn’t. He unzipped the bag. Wires, clay blocks, a few tools, clips, gun. He took it out. It weighed more than the one he’d brought with him. He pocketed a couple of clips.
“That the only one?” Jacob tugged the bag over.
“Yeah.” Ben wasn’t about to tell him he didn’t need one. Because he probably did, seeing how useless Ben was. “C’mon.”
Sam held open the door to the stairwell; Ben stepped onto the landing. “I think it’s—”
Jacob held a gun.
“Where did you…”
The dead guy lay on his side now.
At least one of them had a strong stomach.
“I’m gonna take a wild guess that you know how to use that thing.”
Jacob gave Ben a seething glare. “Yeah, I know how to use it.” He popped the clip, checked the rounds, snapped it back in then chambered a round.
Sam pushed past them.
“Hey, wait.” Ben hurried to catch up.
“Then don’t waste time getting all starry eyes with your boyfriend.” Sam hit the next landing, and Ben stopped him. He checked the stairs.
Jacob moved halfway down and peered over the railing. “Pretty sure it’s clear.”
“Of course, it’s clear.” Sam jerked out of Ben’s hold. “They’re not going to stick around if they’re planning on blowing it up.”
They took the last steps and exited the stairwell.
The punch of sound slammed into Ben, knocking him off his feet. Nausea rolled up his throat, and a familiar acrid scent burned the inside of his nose. Sparks shattered the few working lights in the stairwell and garage.
The golden copper glow of fire crawled up the walls.
Jacob swayed on his knees, confusion twisting his features. Sam lay on his stomach.
Ben crawled to Sam and rolled him
over. “I’m okay.” His voice came from behind a high-pitched ring in Ben’s ears.
Sam stood.
Jacob stared at his empty hands. “I dropped the gun.”
Ben’s hands were also empty. He searched the ground.
“Here.” Sam pushed the gun over with his foot.
“The other one?”
Sam shook his head. “I don’t see it.”
Ben flipped on the safety and secured the weapon in the waist of his jeans.
Jacob still stood.
Ben held his face.
“I dropped the gun.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“Dropped…it.” Jacob blinked several times, gaze distant, expression confused.
“Hey.” Ben patted him on the cheek, leaving a smear of blood from the cut on his hand he didn’t even know was there. “Jacob…hey, look at me.”
Slowly, as if the demand came from far away, Jacob lifted his gaze.
“Ben…”
“Yeah.”
Heat pushed at Ben’s back. There was no time to look for the other weapon. Ben could only hope they wouldn’t need it.
“C’mon, we have to move.” He grabbed Jacob’s arm. Sam took his other hand. They walked, but Ben had no idea where.
Just like Shelly’s car, the flames crawled across the ceiling and spread over the floor.
Another burst of sound shook the air, and a second plume of liquid flames devoured a wall connecting the building to the garage. Ben started to head toward the opening they’d used to enter the building from the street, but fire transformed the lower level into a deadly maze of blackened wood and rolls of burning tar paper.
He turned back toward the garage.
Clouds of smoke joined the fire, becoming impenetrable walls.
“Which way?” Jacob’s voice barely penetrated the continuing bell in Ben’s ears.
“I don’t know.” Ben gagged on a breath of bitter air.
Another muffled boom sent all of them to the ground. Pebbles of concrete pelted Ben’s shoulders. Flames dripped from a crack in the ceiling. Ben fled, Jacob in tow. Sam limped beside them; the knee of his slacks ripped open.
Flames howled, the roar rising until it beat the air. Seeing the fire was one thing, but to hear it? The monster. The dancing hungry creature looking for flesh to devour.
“This way.” Sam made a right.
“Where are we going?” Because Ben had no idea. He wasn’t convinced they weren’t moving in circles.
“Straight.” Sam coughed. “We’re in the garage. If we keep moving in one direction, eventually we’ll get to an outside wall.” He pointed at the end of a white line on the floor.
Smoke rolled overhead, searing Ben’s eyes.
Jacob coughed close to Ben’s ear.
He put Jacob’s arm over his shoulder. “Not far, just stay with me, okay?”
“I’d like that.” The glow of copper flames painted Jacob’s wet cheeks. “To stay with you.”
It took Ben a moment to realize what Jacob meant. To stay with him. Be with him. To share moments.
In spite of everything, Ben smiled. “I’d like that too.”
Jacob’s expression went serious. “But dating first.”
Ben laughed a little. “Okay, dating first.”
“You’ll have to wine and dine me. Flirt. Buy me flowers.” Jacob’s cough sounded more like a sob.
“Whatever you want, Jacob. Anything you want.”
Jacob glanced at Ben, and there was so much sadness in his eyes. “I just wanted you to know that, because…” Jacob coughed violent enough to double him over, almost taking Ben to the ground.
“We’re not going to die.” Ben was determined to make it the truth.
“Even if we survive, I’m dead.” Jacob struggled to stand up.
Again they moved.
“We’ll be fine, we just have to keep going."
“Getting out won’t save me.” Jacob’s inhale wheezed. “I betrayed him.”
“What are you talking about?” Maybe he was still confused.
“Marcel.”
The smoke ahead thickened, clinging to the ground.
“He told me…” Jacob coughed close to Ben’s ear. “He told me not to sleep with you. This morning when he called. I had to. I wanted to, and I wanted to do what I wanted.” He wiped the soot from his face.
“But he told you to…”
Sam disappeared and reappeared behind rolling waves of gray.
Ben leaned closer. “He told you to sleep with me.”
Jacob nodded. “Then he told me not to.”
“Why would he care?” They’d been together for almost two weeks, sharing a bed. Not always for sex, sometimes it was just to watch something stupid on TV. Others, to talk.
And of course, to listen.
“He told me not to, and that’s all that matters.”
“That doesn’t make any sense.”
“It doesn’t have to. It was Marcel’s Rule.”
Rules. More fucking rules.
“Before we left, he told me if I defied him again, he would take back the gift he gave me.”
Ben shook his head because he didn’t understand.
“My life. He saved me and gifted me with my life as long as I obeyed him.”
A vice tightened around Ben’s chest. “Then why did you do it? I could have come alone.”
“I had to give him a way to come after us. I knew if he did, he could kill her and protect you and Sam.”
Ben’s heart sank a little. “But he said he wouldn’t come.”
“He said he couldn’t protect you if you chose to go to Yvette.”
Ben still didn’t understand and said so.
“He’s not here to save you, Ben, he’s here to kill me. Yvette’s just in the way.”
In that moment, Ben’s heart threatened to shatter.
But there just wasn’t the time for it to happen.
“I can’t tell which way to go.” Sam turned in a circle. There were no lines where they stood. The aisle hadn’t been very wide, but with the smoke so thick, they could only see a foot or two. What had been a mere dozen feet turned into miles.
“Just keep going.” Surely if they stayed on course, they’d pick up their trail. Sam did; the lines returned, and they hit a wall. No windows, a solid concrete barrier.
They stumbled to a halt.
Sam chewed his lip. “There should be openings, an exterior ramp. Why isn’t there a way out?”
“The self-storage building. This has to be an internal wall,” Jacob said.
“That would mean part of the garage goes below street level.”
“Yeah.”
“Who makes a garage go below street level?”
“Apparently, whoever’s building this place.” Ben scanned the wall. No sign of any way through.
Jacob waved an arm. “Follow the wall, keep it on the right. It’ll eventually take us somewh—”
The ground shuddered, and a crack followed the lines of mortar binding the concrete blocks. The hair-thin line widened.
“Oh, shit.” Sam backed up.
Ben did too.
Metal groaned.
“Run.” Sam grabbed Ben’s hand and pulled. Smoke and the cry of steel beams chased them back into the inferno. Light fixtures broke free, pipes ripped from the I beams, releasing a torrent of water soaking them.
The thick metal supports overhead twisted as they bent on their way down.
A deep rumble filled in the background. It could only be one thing. Yvette’s explosives might not have been finished, but there was enough to take at least part of the building to the ground. And Ben had no idea if that part was over them or in the distance.
Collapsing metal disappeared behind the acrid clouds, but the crack in the pipes ran farther. At least it cleared the air enough for them to follow the I beams. But when it trickled away, the smoke thickened again. Flames in the background crawled closer, riding on puddles of fluid.
/> Sam tightened his grip on Ben’s hand. “I don’t know which way is out.”
Because now the fire seemed to close in every direction.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I don’t—” Sam sobbed.
“This isn’t your fault.” Ben squeezed Sam’s hand. This was the fault of one crazy bitch hell-bent on destroying one man, no matter the collateral damage.
But it didn’t matter who was responsible because now they would die. Burned alive.
Father like son.
Jacob turned, holding Ben. “I don’t regret it.” The brush of velvet touched Ben’s temple. “Nothing. I’d do it all over. No matter what.”
Ben nodded. “Me too.”
It was a tug on his hand that made Ben look up. He followed Sam’s gaze.
Darkness moved through the clouds of gray. Orange cast out dark shadows where they highlighted the billowing smoke. Marcel emerged, and smoke pulled back, pushed by movement or sheer will, Ben had no idea.
Blood coated his hands, flowing from gouges in his arm, another on the side of his face, and saturated bits of cloth cinched around his thigh and one arm. The left one hung limp. Singe marks edged the remaining tatters of his button-up, and where his skin showed, the scars blazed red with the threat of burns.
Marcel’s dark complexion had grayed, leaving his lips pale. He approached, and his injured leg gave him a hitch to his gait.
Nothing showed in his expression, and his dark eye remained as blank as the one frosted in white.
But there was no doubt who he stared at.
Jacob.
Ben instinctively raised his gun.
Marcel stopped.
“Stay away.” Ben stepped in front of Jacob
“The exit is not far. You and Sam may leave. Jacob will stay.”
Ben curled his lips. “Why, so you can kill him?”
“Loyalty was my price for the gift I bestowed on him.” Blood dripped from the fingers of Marcel’s fingers, forming a puddle. He shifted his weight to his uninjured leg. It was the only hint he even felt his injuries.
“I will kill you before I let you hurt him.”
“I know.” And he spoke with the finality of a man who only knew truth.
But a man who cut down an army didn’t have anything to fear from one person with a gun.
So why didn’t Marcel act?
Sicarii 3 Page 21
