by Hazel Parker
But now…with Emily going to possibly have my kid on the way…did I want my legacy to the kid to be that I’d died before he or she was born?
The question shouldn’t have affected me as much as it did. Seriously, it wasn’t going to fucking change anything. I had a goddamn mission, and that fact alone precluded anything else.
Even having a child on the way? Even having a woman that will be the mother of your child?
This was too much. I’d never, ever had second thoughts before. Now it seemed like I was having nothing but second thoughts. I legitimately didn’t know how to handle this situation. And that was saying something, considering all the shit I’d dealt with.
“Come on, Burke,” I said. “Get it together. Deal with this fucking shit later.”
There was a lot that I couldn’t believe about the last week or so. It felt like everything I knew about my life in the last week had flipped on its head, and now I didn’t really know what I thought I knew about myself. It was all too much to fucking handle at a time like this.
“You go and rescue those girls, you go and kill Snake, and then you go and see a therapist,” I said, words that burned. No, that was not going to happen. “Or you go see Emily and get this sorted.”
The instant those words came out of my mouth, it was like the truth. The good news…if you could call it that, I suppose, was that I hadn’t signed anything yet. I still had something like three and a half, maybe four weeks, depending on when the counter started to make something happen. I had time.
It felt like I was falling into the exact same trap that Liam and Sean had. But there were two big differences—one, I only had this thought in my head, not something in real life to affect me, and two, once we defeated Snake, we could legitimately retire. We could close DOM for good, go our own separate ways, and have plenty of money to make ends meet.
Wild? Sure. The future? Almost probably.
The thought gave me clarity. I could focus on the mission again.
And the one thing that seemed evident immediately was how tired I was. I needed to at least get a power nap in. The convoy wasn’t moving tonight—that had come up in our intel.
I decided to call it a night, albeit one with an early wake-up call. The sooner I got rid of Snake and got back to Emily and figure things out with the kid thing, the better off I’d be.
The Next Morning
I had the alarm set for half-past five.
In reality, I was wide awake well before that.
In the middle of missions like these, sleep became something of an option, something that my body decided to just put on pause and not deal with for some time. It wouldn’t be healthy to have for the long run, but in the short term, boy did it work wonders to not have to worry about things like needing naps or eight hours of paused activities.
As soon as the alarm rang out, I turned it off, as ready to hit the off button as I was to pull a trigger. I headed to the armory and armed myself to the teeth. Bulletproof armor. Submachine gun. Pistol and knife in case I fell into hand-to-hand combat. Helmet. I couldn’t have enough.
The only downside to this would be that I would be sweltering hot, slicker, and at more risk of dying from dehydration than I was from daring enemies, but I didn’t mind a little bit of heat. Better the heat from the sun than worrying if the heat from the bullets would fucking kill.
I ran one last time through all of the equipment set up and checked to see if I was forgetting anything. As best as I could tell, I had not. I was set.
I hurried over to the bunker’s garage, found a motorcycle, and hopped on the bike. The door slowly opened.
And as it did, Emily entered my head.
You can’t ignore these thoughts or they’re going to keep popping up.
And so, for exactly one minute, I let myself think of whatever the hell I wanted to with my future. I imagined the child being a little boy. I was attracted to the name Ryan. It seemed strong.
He could play football.
I imagined it being a little girl. I was attracted here to the name Anna. There was something beautiful but fierce about it. I imagined her growing up with her mother’s beauty and my determination. With that combination, there was nothing she couldn’t do.
And then I thought about Emily.
I thought about her seductive curves. I thought about her wearing nothing but a bathrobe when I had entered her place. I thought…
No, not just sex. I thought about her cheer, her lighthearted personality. How easy it was to make her smile. Fuck. What was—
My wrist buzzed.
A minute was up.
It was time to fucking go.
Because of the distance between me and the truck when I started, even if the truck hadn’t moved at all in the night, it would still be about an hour before I got there—and the truck would certainly have started moving at some point.
As I normally did, I drilled the mission briefing and goals in my head until it practically became second-hand memory for what it would entail. First, I would procure the truck by any means necessary. If that meant killing every armored man in the area, I would. If it meant everyone surrendered and was willing to put their face in a ditch, I would.
Next, I would get the girls to safety with an arranged police contact back in Tlaxcala who I knew wasn’t dirty.
And third, as needed, like I said, kill any cronies of Snake that made life difficult. And if I saw Snake, I had the order to kill him on sight, regardless of whatever other shit he may throw my way or whatever psychological tricks he may try.
This was, of course, far easier said than done.
But that was why I was in DOM. Anything easier was not for the regular guy.
The sun had gotten a few degrees above the horizon, starting to provide its usual heat, when the giant red truck finally came into view in the distant, rural lands of Mexico. There were only a couple of cars nearby it, and to the untrained eye, it might have just looked like a truck driving down the highway.
But I knew better.
The problem was also I didn’t know what else was on the other side of that truck. I could see the two cars behind it, sure, but if there were a dozen more in front of it that could turn on me in a heartbeat, well, let’s just say there was a massive difference between putting myself in the line of fire and lining up for a suicide mission. I wasn’t quite ready for the latter yet.
Ironically, there was an easier way to find out, and it involved doing something that would possibly be stupid.
I would speed past the truck.
Yes, it would make it look like I was aggressively approaching. But it was ironically far less suspicious for someone on a motorcycle to look impatient at a truck’s speed and pull forward than it would be for me to creep up and study the truck. I need to get ahead of the convoy.
I looked in my mirror. There was one Jeep in the far distance, but I didn’t think anything of it. I couldn’t see anything to raise my suspicions.
I looked forward and gunned the bike, going well over eighty miles per hour.
As anticipated, the cars behind the truck didn’t try and swing behind me. I was sure they had an eye on me, but as long as I looked the part, they wouldn’t do shit. I got to the front, and…
There was nothing.
I had a clear shot at the truck if I wanted.
Well, clear-ish. I was still within the line of fire of one of the cars, which had switched over to the other side of the truck, as if under the guise of passing.
I would have to keep speeding ahead for the moment.
And so I did, gunning it until I was out of view of all vehicles—and then again for another couple of minutes. I pulled myself off to the side of the road. I could handle two guard vehicles and a truck. This shit would get dangerous, but that was no big deal.
I laid low by the side of the road until the truck showed up. The instant it and the other two vehicles drove by, I hopped on my bike, revved it to life, and sped ahead, withdrawing my submachine gun
as I prepared to take out the enemies. But just as I did, I realized one huge fucking problem.
That one Jeep behind me?
It now had about four others. The fucking cartel. They must have called in reinforcements.
I had to act quick. I either had to try and take the truck before they all showed up, or I had to retreat.
“Fucking bullshit,” I muttered.
There was no way I could handle about five Jeeps’ worth of cartel henchmen. That was a good fucking way to guarantee my death. I was a DOM, but I wasn’t God.
I pulled off to the side of the road. I’d have to wait until Scott and Liam got in. I pulled over to the other side of the highway and made haste back to the bunker.
I probably shouldn’t have been surprised in the fucking slightest, though, when three of the cartel Jeeps also broke off and gave chase.
I looked back and held my machine gun hidden from view but ready to fire at a moment’s notice. I was trying to think of any fucking scenario where this wasn’t sketch as hell, but surprise, surprise, none came.
And sure enough, when the first few bullets whizzed by my body, just barely missing, I knew that it was time for fucking war.
I turned around and fired at the first truck. A lucky shot killed the driver and sent the van careening into a nearby ditch. Too bad that left two others still hot on my ass. I tried firing on it, but my aim wasn’t so good as to be able to hit a Jeep driver from several dozen feet away while also riding a motorcycle.
I had to take a risk. I slowed down.
They gained ground, but I gained closed ground. A hard thud landed in my back, near my goddamn kidney, and I thanked fuck that DOM had some of the best fucking body armor around. I lined up a shot and killed the driver, then killed another person inside before he could take a hold. I had to swerve out of the way to avoid the suddenly speeding and out-of-control Jeep, but that too wound up in a ditch.
That left just one. And it knew my game. With no more Jeeps to worry about, he could swerve and escape to his delight as he pleased. I couldn’t aim for the driver anymore.
But that didn’t mean it was its only fucking weak point.
When I ensured that I had a window, I slammed on the brakes of my bike. The force nearly jolted me off the damn thing, but I kept a tight enough grip on the handlebars I didn’t go anywhere. The Jeep roared ahead and also tried to slam on the brakes. But that played right into my game.
I laid into its tires and its exhaust pipe, trying to hit the gas tank. I didn’t quite succeed in that regard—real life was no fucking Hollywood with its epic explosions and shit—but the tires did give out. I sped past, laying down some suppressing fire to prevent the bastards from laying into me. I was free.
And, unfortunately, aside from killing a couple of vehicles full of cartel members—in other words, reducing their team size by maybe less than a tenth of a percent—I hadn’t done shit to progress the mission and now they knew we were on to them.
I got to the bunker a short while later. I needed all of DOM’s help.
As soon as I got inside, even before I’d removed everything that was making me sweat like a pig in Brazil, I grabbed one of the burner phones and called Scott.
“Liam and I just landed at the airport,” he said.
“You had better fucking get your asses over here as quickly as you can then,” I said, “because this ain’t a one-man crew. Snake probably knows we’re coming after him hard. I had to fucking fend off what felt like half the cartel.”
“Understood.”
I knew Scott wasn’t lying. He’d seen some shit.
But I had a feeling when it was all said and done, we’d all be seeing shit we never thought we’d encounter.
Chapter 11: Emily
“It all went well.”
I was in the room where Doctor Needham had just completed the transplant. It felt…normal and fine. I wasn’t sure what to expect, even though I had all the material given to me, but all things considered, hearing Dr. Needham’s words went a long way toward comforting me.
“You’re sure?” I said for what was probably the dozenth time since I arrived. Poor doc—she was really doing everything she could to reassure me, and my paranoia and anxiety from the day really weren’t helping matters.
“Yes,” Dr. Needham said with a smile. “We’ll do some follow-up appointments just to make sure. But you should be set.”
I took a breath. It was strange how a moment I had hyped up for so long in my head was finished in a process that had really not taken that long, not involved many excruciating steps, and in fact, mostly entailed me just lying on a table. I guess I’d envisioned it being some sort of epic challenge, but that had largely proven to only be metaphorical, not literal.
After I had rested and was given the okay to leave I called a cab. I was in such a rush to get back to Miami, get back to my life, get back to the world outside in which I would emerge not just as Emily Lorne, a professional woman, but as Emily Lorne, a professional woman and possible mother.
And when I got out of the doctor’s office and into the streets, I literally held out my arms in triumph and closed my eyes, letting the sun and its rays wash over me.
It was all set. It was done.
I might be a mother.
I was elated. I felt full of hope. I hopped into my waiting cab. This was the start of the next chapter in my life, and I couldn’t have felt more excited. What had started out as sheer panic at the prospect of having kids so late in life had now turned into something so joyous, so complete, so…fulfilled despite all my fears.
Yes, I knew that this wasn’t a guarantee yet. But for all intents and purposes…
I chose to believe this was now the case. To have something otherwise come against this would be too much to even consider as a possibility.
When I got to my apartment I almost called Kelly, but I reminded myself she was under some sort of stress and, more importantly, it wasn’t even seven in the morning over there yet. But I did text her, in all caps with some exclamation marks, that the transplant had happened. It read like a text a sixteen-year-old would send, but for what had just happened, I felt it was warranted.
To my surprise, Kelly responded almost immediately. Now I felt a little guilty for having woken her up, but at least it wasn’t a call. And besides, Kelly could call me if she wanted to celebrate the moment. I just didn’t want her to feel like she was an emotional babysitter of sorts for me these days.
In any case, though, I now had two weeks off—time I’d scheduled in advance to celebrate this moment—and nothing to do but kick back and relish the freedom that had come.
I grabbed a cool glass of water, squeezed some lemon in, and made myself one of my favorite breakfast dishes, avocado toast with peanut butter. It only sounded odd before I tried it.
I turned on Netflix and just found the first show that I could. I wound up watching Cobra Kai, a show that I’d heard about at the office. I had a vague idea of its continuation of Karate Kid, but mostly, it was just background noise to what was going on in my head.
The realization that I had everything I ever wanted.
Well…almost everything I ever wanted.
I didn’t have a man.
Burke.
My heart squeezed a bit at the thought of him. He’d made this possible…
And I still hadn’t heard from him. Still.
Suddenly, what had started out as one of the best days of my life was now threatening to dovetail. How the hell was I going to get Burke his fair share of the deal when I’d gotten everything I could have ever wanted and then some? It seemed unfair. I also needed to admit that although I couldn’t expect anything more from him I secretly wished for it. We had a sexual attraction that was undeniable and frankly getting harder to resist every time I saw him.
Liam was one thought. I’d already gotten Kelly to pressure him into giving Burke’s number to me. I didn’t want to use Kelly as an intermediary this time. I just wanted to speak dir
ectly to Liam, and luckily, from my time with him with Sean, I knew he and I had a good relationship.
But…
No. No thinking about Burke. It doesn’t even matter where he is. You can’t care about him anyway. You just care about shipping his car and money to him and getting all the paperwork signed.
Oh, how I wish that thought was true. I wished I didn’t care. I wished that all that happened was a stiff handshake, watching him getting in his car…with me in the front seat…that thick, calloused hand of his moving up my thigh…
Oh my God, Emily. Get it together!
So much for not caring. So much for forgetting about that asshole.
It hadn’t even been fifteen minutes back home, and already my plans for a grand two-week vacation were crumbling. Perhaps I should have asked for two weeks of overtime at work; at least then, I would have something else to focus on.
I picked up my phone. If Burke was going to haunt my mind, I figured the least I could do was try and call him. But I decided that this was going to be the last call—for real. I would leave a voicemail message and be done with it. If he wanted the money and the car, he’d have to call me back. I was putting the ball in his court.
I dialed. I had hoped that he’d pick up. I’d try and keep a stern face up while talking—
“Your call has been forwarded to an automatic voice messaging system.”
My heart had sunk to my gut before the word “forwarded.” The point had been made. Wherever Burke was, he did not want to talk to me. So be it.
But it would now be up to him to close that space.
The phone beeped, indicating I could speak to him.
“Hi, Burke, this is…Emily,” I said, hesitating only because I was unsure of what I wanted my tone to be. I decided to be as cold and formal as possible as if I was a lawyer delivering news. “I have completed the implantation. You will need to come and sign the documents as soon as you can if you wish to receive payment and the car.”
