"She was," I tossed back, opening my window and flicking the cigarette butt out. "She made her choice."
"No!" Fox barked, refusing to accept my words.
"It was ten years ago," JJ reasoned. "Even if she did-"
"She didn't," Fox snarled ferociously. "She wouldn't have. I refuse to believe that fucking asshole took her virgi-"
A car slammed into the side of us and I cried out as we spun violently sideways and I jerked hard against my seatbelt as we were forced off of the road. My heartrate skyrocketed as our car whipped around onto the beach and I was already undoing my seatbelt and grabbing my gun before it came to a stop.
Bullets ripped into my car door and Fox shoved my head down as a few sailed in through the window.
Shattering glass cascaded over us from Fox’s side and I cursed, popping Fox's seatbelt as I turned my head to check JJ was okay in the backseat. The sound of return fire split through the air painfully close by and I saw JJ peeking out of his now shattered window, firing his hand gun with a continual pop of bullets.
Fox pushed off of me, shoving his door open and I crawled out after him, dropping onto the sand and tugging open JJ's door to give him an exit route.
"Fuck, how did they know we were coming?" I snapped.
"Maybe they got lucky and a patrol spotted us, I don't wanna consider the alternative just yet," Fox growled, moving to sit behind the wheel at the front of the car before returning fire over the hood. I took my phone out, dialling Merkle and he answered on the first ring.
"We’re already coming up behind them!" he called in my ear and a split second later a rattle of more gunfire carried from the road.
“Hurry,” I demanded and killed the call, peering through the Honda with my gun raised and shooting at a big asshole with a machete on his hip.
He hit the ground with a cry and the amount of blood that poured from him said he was a goner. Merkle and our guys were shooting from the alley behind them and the final assholes fell under their assault.
The night air rushed around me and I stood, peering through the battered car as JJ hurried to scramble out of it beside me. Three men lay dead on the street and Merkle and our guys were moving to sweep the area for any others.
"Come on." Fox looked toward the lighthouse, his shoulders tense. "They'll know we're coming. We have to switch to Plan B."
"Hell yes, I love Plan B," JJ whooped and I smirked at him, happening to agree on that.
JJ ran around to the trunk of the car, popping it open and taking out a rucksack then slinging it over his shoulder before tossing a pack to me. Fox reached into the trunk and took the huge assault rifle, shouldering it and nodding to me. I grabbed the three plastic oars and Fox whistled to Merkle across the street to signal the change of plan.
Merkle nodded and started running up the road, taking his men with him while we hid in the shadows on the beach, waiting as they made a charge for the lighthouse. Gunfire soon echoed back to us from up near the looming Sailor's Eye. The light no longer worked on the top of the huge structure since the boat yard down this way was no longer used for commercial goods. But this marked the very edge of The Divide and if Maverick claimed this territory it would make it easier for The Damned Men to push further as they’d be claiming the best fucking lookout in the area.
"Come on," JJ encouraged, pushing me to get me moving and we all started running across the sand towards the waves.
It was pitch black out here and we had to make sure we weren't fucking spotted or the moon didn't decide to give us away. But so long as Merkle was keeping The Damned Men busy at the lighthouse, no one would be looking for us anyway.
JJ dropped his pack, taking out the folded black dingy and me and Fox stood back as he yanked the cord on it. Air filled it fast and as soon as it was full, I passed ski masks out from my bag and we tugged them on to hide our faces in case any lights flashed our way while we were on the water. JJ pushed the boat into the waves and we all grabbed onto the sides of it then ran into the sea.
I jumped in behind Fox while JJ dove in behind me and I tossed them an oar each before pushing my gun into the holster on my hip. We started rowing hard against the waves, totally silent but in complete synchronicity. We'd practised this a thousand times and knew each other to the depths of our souls and back anyway. We'd learned to communicate without words a long time ago and that was what made our unit so unwavering.
We were soon out in the open water, moving fast towards the lighthouse as we circled around to the rocky outcrop it sat on, coming up behind our enemies in the shadows. The waves were calm tonight and we made steady progress towards the dark rocks ahead of us.
Shouts of pain sounded out from somewhere ahead but it was impossible to tell if it was one of our men or Maverick's. We just had to grit our teeth, stick to the plan, keep moving. Reclaim our fucking land.
We finally made it to shore and Fox leapt out, tugging the boat up the rocks as we dove out too to help. Then we ran across the rocks towards the smooth stone wall that rose up high above us, the darkness thick and giving us good coverage as we reached it. We pressed ourselves to the cool wall and I took my handgun out, raising it as I moved behind Fox who had his assault rifle ready to fire.
We reached a back door which was firmly locked and I unzipped my pack, tossing Fox a small pack of explosives. He stripped the tape off the back and used the adhesive backing to stick it over the lock.
Fox stood well back, aiming the gun at the doorway and JJ snatched the trigger from my hand just as I was about to blow it, winking at me before pressing the button. Asshole.
A bang sounded that echoed through my skull as stone and a chunk of the door scattered at our feet. I forgot to curse JJ as Fox kicked the remains of the door open and swung his gun left and right, hunting for enemies. But none showed their faces.
We moved after him as he led the way into an icily cold stairwell and shouts and cries of agony sounded from somewhere above us. Merkle had had plenty of time to make it through the front entrance, but as I checked my phone, I found we had no message from him confirming it. It didn’t mean a whole lot; if he was facing Maverick’s men he’d have had no chance to text us.
Fox started moving up the winding stairs, his back pressed to the wall as he tried to see as high as possible, but the stone steps just kept circling tighter and tighter. I clutched my gun harder, adrenaline making my ears train onto every sound around us. The cries of pain, the gunfire, the waves crashing against the shore.
We kept climbing, moving ever up through the lighthouse as we sought out the fight and hoped to get the jump on The Damned Men.
A scream carried from far above us then cut off abruptly, the sudden silence making my gut constrict. People were dying for sure, but on whose side?
A small amount of light fell on us from above and Fox paused to peer out of a narrow window in the wall, the lights from the town illuminating his eyes. I stepped up beside him, frowning down at the empty street below where Merkle would have approached from. He'd had seven guys with him. Where the fuck were they?
"Something's wrong," JJ whispered as another scream rang out from above.
Gunfire suddenly roared down below us, bullets ricocheting off the walls and sparks flying as what sounded like an army of men pursued us on the stairs. "For The Damned!" they bellowed and I swore, my heart thundering as we did the only thing we could do and ran the fuck onwards while JJ shot blindly behind him.
"Here!" Fox tossed him the assault rifle and JJ caught it mid-air, slamming it to his shoulder and firing wildly.
I couldn't see the men falling as I ran after Fox, the steps circling too sharply for me to catch sight of them. But blood sprayed up the walls and gunfire kept returning as I held onto JJ's shoulder and half dragged him after us as he continued to shoot. Fear and adrenaline surged through me and I thrived on both, hungering to spill the blood of my enemies.
My feet suddenly hit flat ground and a shadow lunged at me in my periphery. My heart stopped. A g
un went off. I swore as fire blazed across my right arm and wheeled my handgun around, not hesitating a single second as I pulled the trigger and the asshole who'd shot me fell dead at my feet.
There was no time to check the wound, but my left arm was still working, so I figured I wasn’t on the verge of bleeding out just yet. The huge light stood at the heart of the room and men were coming at us from all sides of it. It was a fucking ambush.
I roared in defiance as I fired shot after shot, taking out every motherfucker that came at me, while bullets flew past me by a hair’s breadth.
"Take cover!" Fox bellowed, catching my wrist and dragging me against the railing that circled the huge light.
JJ was still firing mercilessly down into the stairwell with the rifle and I pitied any asshole daring to come after us from that direction. The heat of blood poured down my arm but with the adrenaline still coursing through my veins, I could barely feel the pain. That would come later. If I survived this shit. Which currently seemed like a toss of a coin.
Shots were still being fired at us by the remaining fuckers on the other side of the light, none of them daring to come closer as we sent return fire back at them.
Fox drew a knife from his hip before lowering down to a crouch and making a signal with his fingers which told me to distract them.
I nodded, taking a deep breath before crouching down and moving around the light in the opposite direction to him, reaching into my bag and taking out a smoke bomb. I ripped the pin out of it, shouting loudly to get their attention as I threw it around the light. Smoke poured from it, filling the space fast, the burning scent catching in my throat. They ran from it and blood curdling screams filled the air as Fox gutted them with his blade.
I pulled my ski mask off and tugged my shirt up to cover my nose instead as the smoke raked the back of my throat.
Fox stepped through the smoke splattered in blood as he tore his ski mask from his face and used it to wipe the gore from his knife.
My ears were ringing so heavily that it took me a second to realise JJ had stopped firing and quiet came from the stairs.
“You okay?” Fox asked J and he nodded, pulling his own ski mask off.
“You know I love surprise parties,” JJ panted and I chuckled, though I wasn’t letting my guard down yet.
I took a long breath, looking around at the carnage, spotting a trail of blood that led up to the glass door which gave access to a large balcony outside.
Fox walked over to it and pushed it open, raising his handgun as he stepped outside, his eyes ablaze as he followed the trail and I hurried along after him with JJ.
"Hey, Fox!" a familiar voice boomed which made my blood chill.
As we rounded the corner, we all raised our weapons at the man who'd once been a brother to us.
Maverick stood up on the edge of the balcony, the motherfucker holding a bloody head in his hand and a grenade in the other, the pin sticking out the corner of his mouth. He spat it over the edge of the lighthouse the second we slowed before him and he ran his tongue across his lips which were stained with blood.
Tattoos crawled up his neck and coated his muscular arms right down to his fingertips. Every piece of skin I could see was covered in ink aside from his face. His dark hair met with equally dark stubble on his jaw and his strong features were set in callous amusement.
My gut knotted as I realised it was Merkle's head in his grip, his face twisted in pain, fixed there forever in death.
"You fucking asshole," I snarled, pointing my gun directly at Maverick’s head as hatred coursed through me, but Fox held up a hand to stop me and JJ from firing.
"Clever boy, Foxy," Maverick said with a smirk. "You always knew how to follow the rules, huh?"
"Your men are dead," Fox snarled. "Surrender, asshole."
Maverick laughed coldly. "So are yours, brother." He gestured with his chin to the edge of the balcony and I side stepped towards the edge apprehensively.
A railing stood on top of the stone wall to stop anyone from falling over the hundred foot drop beyond it. I forgot to breathe entirely as I saw the butchered men hanging by their necks from lengths of rope tethered to it. Blood ran from their wounds, painting the white wall in red splashes that poured down towards the ground.
"You fucking piece of shit!" JJ roared, raising the assault rifle to point at our enemy.
"This grenade is going off one way or another, Johnny James," Maverick warned. "Pull that trigger and you'll take us all with you. Is my death worth all of yours?"
"What do you want?" Fox hissed, his gun pointed at Maverick as his upper lip peeled back.
Maverick casually tossed Merkle's head away from him and a sickening thump sounded as it hit the ground a moment later. "I wanna piss on your lighthouse." He lowered his fly, taking out his goddamn dick and pissing on the fucking floor in front of us. As he was still holding that fucking grenade, all of us just had to wait for him to finish.
He sighed as he tucked himself away, transferring the grenade from one hand to the other and making us all shift nervously and raise our weapons higher.
"I never wanted this heap of shit anyway." Maverick shrugged. "I just like the taste of your men's blood. Do you three taste as sweet, I wonder?”
"If you want us dead, then throw it, motherfucker," I dared him and Maverick met my eye with his midnight black ones. There was something inherently wrong in him now. It was impossible to see the boy I’d once loved. Whatever had happened to him in prison had fucked him up good.
"How’s your catch these days, Chase?" Maverick asked, then threw the fucking grenade at me before diving over the goddamn ledge.
I dropped my gun with a yell of alarm, catching the grenade and throwing it off the balcony with shaking hands. The whole thing exploded in the air with a deafening bang that made us all drop down to our knees and cover our heads.
"Please tell me he just committed suicide," JJ grumbled as we pushed ourselves upright and hurried to look over the edge. Maverick was nowhere in sight, but a long rappelling rope hung all the way down to the ground where he'd jumped.
"Fuck!" Fox roared, scraping a hand through his hair as the wind tore around us. He'd orchestrated this whole fucking thing. Ruthlessly killed eight of our men. "He's dead," Fox promised, like he'd done so a thousand times before. And I knew that this only ended one way. It was Maverick or us. And it was time we made sure it wasn’t us.
W hen the boys stumbled back into the house in the early hours of the morning bloodstained and dark-eyed, I watched them in silence from the top of the stairs with my heart in my mouth.
I knew where they'd gone tonight, even if they hadn't wanted me to know. It was a turf war with Maverick's gang and I could tell from one look at them that they'd paid the price for it in blood.
Chase stalked across the kitchen and grabbed a bottle of rum from the cupboard before heading away again with a curse.
"Do you want me to look at it?" Fox asked, though I couldn't see him from my vantage point.
"Nah. I'm a big boy. A few stiff drinks and a smoke and I'll forget all about it," Chase replied dismissively.
"I'm going to wash the blood out of my hair," JJ said a moment later. "I can't sleep with the stench of death in the air anyway."
My heart leapt at that suggestion and I chewed on my bottom lip as I wondered who had been killed, my mind moving to Maverick, the one piece of my past I still hadn't laid eyes on since returning here. They were fighting his gang and had clearly been on the front lines themselves. Had he been there too? Was he somewhere washing blood from his skin or was there a possibility that I'd just lost any chance to see him ever again? My heart dipped at the idea and I was suddenly breathing far too heavily. I didn’t wanna admit I was panicking, but there were a bunch of kamikaze butterflies in my stomach right now who begged to differ.
I scurried away as JJ approached the stairs, slipping back into my room a moment before I heard him step onto the landing.
My mind scrambled with
the need for answers and I tried to decide what I was supposed to do. Should I just get back into bed and pretend I'd never heard them come home? Or let them assume I had and didn't care to find out whether any of them had been hurt or not?
My gut twisted at the mere suggestion of that and I was struck with the desire to check.
I pulled my door open just as JJ closed his and I hesitated, looking towards the stairs where the low murmur of Chase and Fox's voices carried to me. Between the two of them, I was certain Chase wouldn't welcome my concern and Fox would read too much into it. But JJ was different. I knew I should have been just as angry at him as the others, but somehow it was harder to maintain that rage with him. Plus, I trusted him to be straight with me. Or at least just outright refuse to give me an answer instead of placating me with half truths or complete lies.
I crossed the hall in my oversized red band tee which I was pretty sure actually belonged to J anyway and knocked softly on his door.
There was no response and as I leaned closer to the wood, the sound of running water called to me from beyond it. I pursed my lips, knowing I should probably turn back, talk to one of the others instead or at least wait for him to finish showering, but instead I twisted the handle and slipped inside.
JJ's room was dark, a single lamp switched on beside the open door to the bathroom. His curtains were drawn over the view of the mountains and the almond oil scent of him enveloped me as I pressed the door closed behind me and tried to decide what I should do.
The lights weren't on in the bathroom either and for a moment I was almost certain I heard a heavy sigh over the sound of running water.
I padded across the carpet on bare feet and paused in the glow of light from the lamp, my toes just touching the tiles beyond the door which led into the en-suite.
The way the door opened meant I couldn't see the shower from my position beside it. I could just turn back and leave, ignore the heavy pounding of my heart or the weight in my chest and ask him when he was finished. But I didn't leave.
Sinners' Playground Page 25
