by Eric Vall
“That was probably why she was so set on leaving Lebanon,” I said with a small smile.
“I hope so,” the woman said. “I hope she’s still there.”
“I’m sure she will be,” I said.
“We told your sister the same thing,” Paige whispered. “But we’re at Piper College. If you get into trouble or just want somewhere to stay, come find us.”
“Okay,” the girl agreed. “Thank you.”
“You can get maps from libraries,” Paige said.
“Oh, and check department stores for clothes,” Tara added.
“You shouldn’t have to worry about any of these druggie guys anymore,” I said.
“But there could still be other people out there,” Bailey said.
“That’s why you have guns, though,” Anna said. “Don’t be afraid to use them.”
“You’ll do fine,” I told the woman. “Just be careful. Don’t trust anybody but your own.”
“Right,” she agreed, then she squeezed my hand and got into the driver’s seat of one of the jeeps. She gave us a small wave, then both of them took off and headed south.
“Finally,” Brody said from behind us. “Time to get down to business.”
“We need a plan,” Paige said as she pulled a map out and laid it on the ground. “Port Kent is small, but there are two roads into it.”
“We could probably find some boats,” Bailey suggested.
“That might be too open,” I said. “We don’t want them to see us coming.”
“I’m not sure what you all think you’re doing,” Brody laughed. “But the plan has already been made.”
“We haven’t heard any plan yet,” I said.
“You’re about to,” he told me.
“We should do reconnaissance before anything else,” Paige said. “We need to know more about the place we’re attacking.”
“I know plenty,” Brody said. “All you need to do is go in shooting’.”
“Go in shooting?” I repeated. “To a place we’ve never seen before.”
“Don’t act so surprised, brother,” he chuckled.
“I’m starting to think you’ve been to this place before,” I said. “Because only an idiot would go into new territory with guns blazing.”
“Need to know basis,” Brody said. “I’m sure there’s a lot of shit that goes down on the Vermont side that you didn’t bother to tell me about. I was just returning the favor.”
“Let’s get this over with,” I said.
“Follow me,” Brody said, and he headed to his jeep.
The girls and I hopped into our own jeep and Brody tore off down the road and headed first north, then west. He drove like a mad man, but I kept up just fine.
“God, I want to fuckin’ hit him right in the dick,” Tara said as we raced after Brody.
“He’s so smug,” Anna added.
“I know!” Paige said. “Every time he smiles I just want to punch him in the face.”
“Also, he definitely was a higher up in this organization,” Anna said. “He knows exactly where he’s going right now, and he obviously knows the boss’ house.”
“Yeah,” Paige agreed. “It’s about an hour and a half drive, but at this rate, it’ll probably be less.”
“Do you guys think that the men we took out on the speedboats were guards for the boss’ house?” Bailey asked. “It never made sense to me why there were guys out on the lake, but if the boss lives right there then that clarifies it a little bit.”
“I think that’s definitely possible,” I said. “It seems like this boss doesn’t trust anybody, only a few of the guys have ever seen him. He wouldn’t just send regular soldiers out onto the water to guard his home.”
“Which means that Brody was trusted by him,” Anna said. “You think that’s why those guys came to the fort that one day?”
“He told us that they just came around to taunt them and stuff,” Paige said. “But they were probably there to try and take him out after he betrayed the boss.”
“Probably how he secured that Howitzer and all the other weapons as well,” I agreed.
“Are we really just going to go in there blind?” Bailey asked, and I saw her bite her lip in the rearview mirror.
“It could be a trap,” Tara said.
“Not likely,” Paige commented. “If it was a trap it would have been a lot sooner. We took out two outposts, if he wanted to trick us he wouldn’t have had us take out all those guys.”
“Unless this mob king wanted to clean house,” Tara said with a shrug.
“Those assholes were doing too much work on his behalf for him to want them out of the picture,” I said. “I doubt it’s a trap. I don’t like going in there blind, either, but right now we don’t have a choice.”
“We could just shoot Brody in the face,” Tara muttered.
“As much as I’d like that,” I chuckled. “There’s still some information I want to get out of him. For all we know, this might not be the last of this group.”
“Fuck, that’s true,” Tara agreed.
“I’m confident in your skills,” I said. “You all can handle whatever is thrown at you, just remember your training and trust your instincts. You’ll be alright.”
“Thanks,” Anna said. “If what the guy said is true then there’s only ten guards at the place anyways. That’s a piece of cake.”
“Don’t get too cocky,” I chuckled. “The boss is bound to have the best goons he has guarding this place.”
“Goons schmoons,” Tara scoffed. “We’re better.”
“I have no doubt about it,” I said with a smile.
The air was tense in the jeep as I sped along to keep up with Brody. I knew the girls were nervous about going in blind, but at the moment it was our best course of action. Brody wasn’t about to give up on his plan, and we needed to get this over with as quickly as possible. I didn’t want to drag this thing out any longer than necessary.
Brody knew the territory already, so if we paid attention to his movements and stayed behind him there shouldn’t be a problem. I wouldn’t put it past him to try and sacrifice someone on my team, particularly me, but I wouldn’t let that happen. If he wanted to lead this excursion then that was exactly what I’d let him do.
Finally, Brody pulled off and parked his jeep, and I pulled behind him. The last half hour or so of the drive had been remote areas with virtually nothing around. We were surrounded by large hills, mountains, and trees, but not much else. Now, we had pulled into the Port Kent campsite area. There was a small ranger station type place and a little house behind it that I assumed used to belong to the groundskeeper.
The road we had pulled off of led directly to the water, and I realized then just how incredibly tiny the town was.
After we parked, I instructed the girls to get their gear on before we did anything else.
I quickly threw on my own vest and helmet, then shouldered my rifle. I also made sure that I had plenty of spare ammunition, and I even grabbed an extra pistol. Both my tanto blade and my karambit were on my hip, and I was prepared for whatever the hell we were about to walk into. I made my way over to where Brody stood outside his jeep and smoked a cigarette.
“Well, don’t you look prepared,” he joked. “Is all that really necessary here? This isn’t the outpost, it’s a tiny town and we’re after one guy. Seems a bit excessive.”
“You’re sending us in blind,” I said. “We need all the protection we can get. We found more vests at the outpost, and we brought some along if you or your men wanted one.”
“I’ll take--” one of the men started, but Brody held up his hand and the guy closed his mouth.
“We’re fine,” he said, and he took another drag of his cigarette and blew the smoke out in my direction.
“Suit yourself,” I said with a shrug.
It was clear that Brody was irritated that I had kitted out for this, but seeing his face when one of his own men spoke up about wanting a vest, well, th
at was definitely worth the attitude.
We’d been through the same training, even been on several missions together back in the day, but somehow we handled this whole situation completely different from one another. I always erred on the side of caution. I thought it was a better show of skill to not get yourself into a bad situation than to have to get yourself out of one, but Brody didn’t seem to share the sentiment. Even if he did know the area well, he was an idiot to go in there unprotected. It would have been a dumb thing to do before the EMP, but afterward? There were no surgeons, no emergency flights to a hospital. If you were hit in the chest or the head you were dead. It was as simple as that. Even if you happened to take a shot to a major vein or artery, there was still most likely no saving you.
Part of me couldn’t believe that a Ranger could be so stupid, but the other part reminded myself that this was Brody and he was a piece of shit no matter how I looked at it. His ego made him think of himself as invincible, even though he knew he couldn’t have completed any of this shit without my team.
I’m sure he’d convinced himself that he’d manipulated us into working for him, but we didn’t work for anyone but ourselves. These assholes needed to be taken out with or without Brody’s team. We couldn’t have well armed drug addicts roaming the streets, that was a recipe for disaster.
Still, Brody wanted us here for a reason, and I couldn’t be sure what it was. If we’d done this on our own terms we would have done reconnaissance on the place and figured out what we needed to know before we went in, but Brody wanted to hide something, so he couldn’t allow that.
There was bound to be something in this house that told me why the hell he was so invested in this, and I was determined to find it.
“Ready,” Anna said as she led the girls up to the rest of the group.
“Well, don’t you all look nice,” Brody said.
“We look like we’re not gonna die if we take a bullet to the chest,” Tara said, and Brody’s jaw set with anger.
“Right, then,” he clapped. “We’re splitting up. You two with Alexander and Roman, and you two with Nick and Johnny. Connor here is with me.”
That sonofabitch knew I hated to be called by my first name, but I didn’t let him get the rise out of me that he’d hoped for. Instead, I just smiled and nodded.
He had put Anna and Bailey in the first group, and Tara and Paige in the second. I didn’t like that he split the girls up, but it was what I had done at the outposts in order to keep an eye on his men, so I couldn’t exactly complain right then. Besides, the girls could handle those guys easily if they had to, which I doubted they would. The men Brody brought with him were obviously terrified of him, but I had gotten no indication that they were assholes themselves. They had just been sucked into this plan because they felt they had no choice.
Still, I wouldn’t put it past them to try something if Brody instructed them to. It was amazing what someone would do under the threat of death or bodily harm.
“I have a map of the area,” Paige said as she laid it out on the hood. “Can you show us where we’re headed?”
“The place is here,” Brody said, and he pointed to the map. “One team to the left, the other to the right. Tav and I will come up the back.”
Even if Brody had heard where the boss lived from a guard, which we knew he hadn’t, he still wouldn’t have known exactly what house to go to. He had definitely been here before.
“Okay,” Anna said. “Guards?”
“What about them?” Brody asked.
“Where are they posted?” Bailey pushed.
“They’re around there somewhere,” Brody said with a shrug, and I felt my heart rate speed up as the urge to pistol-whip him suddenly came on very strong.
“You don’t know where the guards are?” Paige asked, and she looked at him like he was the dumbest person on the planet.
“There’s a fence,” Brody said through clenched teeth after a minute. He clearly didn’t like his intelligence being challenged. “You’ll find them right inside the fence in intervals.”
“Thanks,” Anna said. “That’s helpful.”
“Right,” he said. “Now, this is my territory. I’m done with all the bullshit. Let’s get this fuckin’ show on the road. No more questions, move out.”
Paige had pissed him off good, and I had to stifle back a laugh as I followed him across the road and toward a large grove of trees.
The kid we interrogated had been right, the town itself was surrounded with trees and mountains. The grove we were headed to was huge, and if Paige’s map was correct, then it would lead us directly to the fence that the kid had told us about.
Anna’s group walked with ours while Tara’s group went the other way so they could bring up the right.
“What’s the signal?” Anna asked as we walked.
“I said no more questions,” Brody snapped.
“I need to know the signal,” the redhead said flatly.
“What signal?” Brody sneered.
“Our signal to shoot,” she said.
“Why do you need a signal?” he asked. “You find your target and you fuckin’ shoot ‘em.”
“If everyone isn’t in position then that could give someone away,” Anna said seriously. “I’m not putting my team at risk.”
“I led teams,” Brody said. “I know a thing or two about putting a team at risk. Believe me, this isn’t it.”
“That’s fine,” Anna said with a shrug. “We’ll use our own.”
“Of course, you will,” Brody said with an eye roll, and he lit another cigarette.
I eyed him carefully as he brought the flame to the tip of the cancer stick. His hand shook slightly, and I thought about how much he’d been smoking the past few days.
Something was off with him. Or, more odd than usual.
I had barely seen him smoke in the time that I knew him before all this, and even the first time I saw him after the EMP he hadn’t smoked at all. When I had inquired about it the first time I saw him with one he had said that he only smoked on occasion, but over the past couple of days he’d been a regular chimney.
Whoever this boss guy was, he meant something to Brody. I just had to find out what.
We stopped in the trees, and Anna’s group continued on to bring up the left. I waited while Brody finished his cigarette. It was clear that he was shaken by something, though he tried to hide it. I could hear the faintest shake to his breathing, and I could see it in his hands.
Part of me wondered if the boss wasn’t a woman, but the kid we interrogated had said it was a man. Could they be related? A war buddy? How in the hell did Brody know this guy?
Brody started to walk through the trees toward where this house was supposed to be, and I followed carefully, my hand on my pistol the whole time.
Whoever this boss was, I was about to find out.
Chapter 15
After a few moments, we reached a large chain link fence with barbed wire across the top. It looked like a damn prison, except inside the fence was filled with various plants and trees that gave the appearance of a forest. The vegetation was everywhere, and it looked like someone had taken care to plant it all and keep up with it. Whoever lived here had been here for a while. The plants were trimmed and well maintained, and it looked like the place had been raked recently, I didn’t see a single leaf out of place.
The sky had gotten overcast as we walked, and the wind started to blow, which brought the coldness of the lake with it. A storm was coming, I could smell it.
I scanned the area but saw nobody. There were supposed to be ten guards at this place at least, so where were they?
“Let’s go,” Brody said, and he threw his jacket over the barbed wire, grabbed onto the fence, and climbed up to the top. “You comin?”
It’d been a while since I climbed a fence like that, and I would have preferred to have brought something to cut it with instead, but it was Brody’s show, so I looped my fingers through the fence and started
to climb.
Just as I hopped down on the other side I heard shots fired from the right and every fiber of my being wanted to run over there to check on the girls. They were rarely out of my sight when we went into battle, and I didn’t like them being with inexperienced guys who they’d have to take care of. The whole situation made me uncomfortable.
“Don’t you ever get tired of worrying about them?” Brody asked when he saw me staring off to the right.
“They’re my team,” I said. “I always worry about them.”
“Then you probably didn’t train them as well as you think you did,” he chuckled.
“And your men are trained better?” I asked with a cocked eyebrow.
“My men are trained as well as they need to be,” he replied, and the vein in his temple throbbed with anger. “But I don’t brag about how skilled they are, either.”
“I don’t brag,” I said calmly. “I just tell the truth.”
“Well, if they’re so skilled then I’m sure they can handle themselves,” Brody sneered. “Something tells me they’ll be just fine.”
The last sentence put me on edge. I knew he wasn’t afraid to go after me, but I hoped he wouldn’t be stupid enough to actually go after the girls. He had to know that I would tear him apart with my bare hands.
I took a deep breath to steady myself, then scanned the area again. I still didn’t see any guards, but another couple of shots sounded from our left.
“Where are the guards?” I asked Brody. He seemed to know a lot about this place, so I figured he should know that, too.
“Who’s to say,” he answered with a shrug. “If I had to guess I’d say they’re on the sides with the rest of our teammates.”
“Right,” I said through clenched teeth.
“Keep moving,” Brody ordered, and he raised his pistol.
I held my tongue and lifted my own pistol, though it was aimed at Brody more than anything else. He pushed aside some plant leaves and walked forward until I could just see the top half of a small, blue house. As we got closer to the place the plants became more colorful, there were a lot of flowers and small, colorful bushes, but I didn’t see any edible plants. With all this space and obviously healthy soil, why would you only plant flowers? The only reason I could think of was that whoever lived here didn’t need to plant vegetables, they had other sources for that.
