“They’re coming,” Iago says. “Right now, we’re buying time.”
“They’re attacking us at every angle,” the guy yells back.
“This is just a distraction,” I weigh in. “They’re breaking down your defenses, until they send the real guys in. Trust me, this is an understandable tactic.”
“We have bombs strategically placed all around the entrance. No one knows where we’ve placed them,” Iago says. “What Kaine is trying to do is get those out of the way as quickly as possible. Once most of them are gone, he’s coming in with his men to claim our compound. We’re far enough away from society that no one will see this coming, not even the police.”
I tell them the truth. “The Hell Squadron is coming in tomorrow. We just need to hold the Hunters off as long as we can. If we do that, the Hell Squadron can take them out from the mountains nearby. No doubt, Kaine will be coming in from that direction. We’ll rush them and sandwich them in. Then, we’ll take ‘em out.”
The men aren’t in good moods, and their confidence is dwindling. Still, they’re ready to fight. It’s about all they can do, trapped inside this compound like this.
“What do you need from us?” Caroline asks.
“What I need is some help. We need to rebuild the outside defenses as best as we can. The more obstacles, the better. If we do that, we can buy some time,” I say, heading out the front. “Come on. I’m going to need everyone in here’s help.”
When we walk outside, bullets ricochet nearby. I take aim and fire forward. Some of the men on the roof do the same and take out whatever stragglers are left.
Inside my bag of weapons is a few sticks of dynamite. I turn to the men who have followed me outside.
“Let’s line this dynamite along the front. If they come through, we’ll blow it,” I say. “I’m going to need you to cover my ass out there. I don’t trust all the front lines are gone.”
“I got you,” Jeffco says.
Caroline grips her pistol. “Me too.”
I take a deep breath and run to the front entrance. I hate that Caroline is stuck here with us. I hate she’s participating in this bloodshed with me. This isn’t her way. She doesn’t need to fight. It’s not her battle.
Still, she’s got a fire inside her that I never want to put out. I don’t make any attempt to argue with her. There’s been too much of that lately. I just hope for the best and hold my gun steady because both our lives depend on it right now.
I line up the sticks of dynamite carefully and run the line across the yard. I head back, tossing the line to one of the men on the roof.
“If you see any of them, break through, you light this up and send them to hell,” I tell him.
He nods and waits.
“What else do we have?” I ask.
“We don’t have anything else,” one of the men says. “All we got is some vehicles and a few more guns.”
“Shit,” I curse. “Okay, let’s get those cars running.”
“What are you going to do with them,” Caroline asks me.
I shrug and say, “We’re going to use them as a distraction.”
The guys get the cars near us, and I go to make sure they have a full tank of gas. They’re both about more than halfway, so we keep the engines off for the time being.
I hold a brick in the air. “Okay, folks. When they come in, you put one of these bricks here on the gas pedal. Send it straight at them with the brights on. We’re not aiming to kill them with this. It’s just a distraction. Anything that slows them down is good right now.”
“I’ve got an idea,” Jeffco says.
“What is it?” I ask him, waiting for his master plan.
“You all got some old tires?” he asks them.
The men nod.
“How about some nails and motor oil?”
They nod again.
He smiles, thinking some. “Okay, melt down that rubber. Throw in anything you can find that won’t explode. Cook it up. We’re going to need some large pots of this shit. If they get near the door, we’ll have the guys on the roof pour it down on them.”
“It’ll melt their bones,” someone says.
“Exactly,” he smiles.
“Jesus, you’re sick. You know that, right?” I laugh.
He shrugs. “Welcome to war,” he says.
As hours pass, we make sure we’re ready for the next round of attacks. Night has turned into day, and all I can do is hope and pray that the Hell Squadron is on their way.
Iago seems worried, but I have to remain in good spirits for Caroline. Still, I don’t want her to fight.
“I want you stay in the room,” I tell her. “Just hold tight in the corner of that closet. If anything happens, you have a gun. But I don’t want you fighting these men.”
“Don’t, Rowan,” she says. “I’ve been through enough. I’m helping out. I’m already too involved in all of this.”
“I’m not going to lose you,” I say. “I love you too much for that to happen. It’s safer for you to be in that closet.”
She finally budges, on the condition that she can glance out the window every now and then to see what’s going on.
“Fine,” I say. “But you need to be careful. Their aim will be a hell of a lot better.”
“Rowan?” She asks, as I’m leaving the room.
“Yeah?” I turn to her.
“You promise you’ll get out of this alive? You’ll come with me to Pennsylvania?”
“I promise you,” I say. “I think I’m just about over this lifestyle. I just want to make sure my gang has their place back when I leave for good.”
“Things will be better, right? We can get a place and fuck all day, and move on with our lives?”
I smile and look her up and down, remembering what all this fighting is for. Her. Not my gang, not Andy, not anyone else. I’m doing this all for her now. Keeping her safe is my top priority.
“Things will be better,” I say. “Things will be perfect.”
I head out the door, but I know there’s an air of uncertainty that surrounds all of us. Who the hell knows if things will be better? I sure don’t. All I can do is rely on hope. It’s about the best I can do right now.
“They’re coming!” Iago screams. “Get everything ready, now.”
I run out the front door, feeling my heartbeat against my chest. “No, it’s too early,” I find myself saying, despite the facts that face us all now. “They can’t be here yet.”
Jeffco grabs me and says, “Snap out of it. They’re here. We have to fight. Give it your all because we’re not coming back from this.”
I nod and grab a rifle that’s set on the weapons’ table.
I take aim at the open window, and once I see them appear through the front entrance, I feel my heart sink a few inches in my body.
“Here we go,” I mutter.
I shoot one down, but there’s at least a hundred more. I turn and look at our men. There’s probably forty. Maybe thirty-five. We’re fucked. We’re so fucked.
I shout, “Get those engines ready.”
The cars come barreling out at them, headlights blazing. One is set on fire. It’s distracting.
Thankfully, the vehicles take out a few of their men. However, it’s not enough to save the day.
I keep shooting, ‘cause Caroline’s life depends on it. For the first time in my life, I’m thinking about my future, and it’s not just me in that vision. She’s with me. We’ve got kids. We’ve got a house. We have a life together.
Bang. I shoot another down. Bang. One gets clipped in the arm. Bang. Another falls amidst the dust and explosions.
They’re getting closer now, so I run outside to try and pick off some more. At least another hundred come out behind the other guys, and then I see him.
Kaine.
It’s the bastard who started all of this bullshit. He comes in, riding on a shiny hog, submachine gun strapped to his chest, and he’s laughing. It makes me sick to my stomach.
As Kaine’s men come forward, pots of hot, melted rubber, oil, and anything else they could find are lifted up onto a pulley system.
“Now,” I shout.
The tar spills across the front lines of his men.
It’s not a pretty sight, and it’s something I won’t be forgetting for a while.
Meanwhile, Kaine pushes forward.
“Shit!” Jeffco curses. “This is getting ridiculous. I didn’t become a biker to get involved in heavy artillery.”
Iago turns to him and scoffs. “You think any of us did?”
Left and right, bullets wiz by our faces and bodies. This isn’t just some territorial scuffle. This is all out war.
When this ends, things will be different.
I don’t know how any of our men are going to come back from this. Things will be harder. I just hope the leaders can create a better set of rules, to keep people in check, ‘cause I’m not doing this shit anymore. I’m out.
This is it. My final war.
The Hunters press on.
Jeffco keeps whispering, “We’re fucked. We’re so fucked,” and it’s getting on my damn nerves because he’s hitting at the truth of the matter. We might actually be fucked.
We inch back into the house as Kaine’s men infiltrate the premises. “We have to surrender,” Iago says. “If we don’t, everyone might die.”
I don’t want to be responsible for that. I think of Caroline and how important that woman is to me. I don’t want to be responsible for losing her either.
“The Hell Squadron never came,” I say, shaking my head.
A small explosion goes off about 20 yards away. I drop my gun into my lap and sigh.
“They never fucking came,” I repeat.
“They lied to us,” Iago says. “I thought we could trust them. I’m sorry.”
“Fuckin’ Hillbillies,” Jeffco mutters.
Caroline steps out from the room and runs over to me, throwing her arms around my body. For the few seconds she’s around me, I feel warm again. I actually feel happy and good, and all that frilly type of crap you see in those romance movies.
I get a surge of energy. “We can’t give up,” I say.
Iago looks at me as if to say, “Come on, man. We gave it our all. Can’t we just admit that we lost this one?”
But in that second of doubt comes a triumphant sound. A horn is blown, and I hear the sound of high-caliber bullets shooting off from above us. I glance at the mountain and see a small army of bikers, picking off the Hunters, one by one.
“They came!” Caroline screams.
“Holy shit,” I whisper. “They actually came through.”
Another small group comes around the side of the mountain, riding in on their brightly colored bikes.
“It’s a fuckin’ miracle,” Jeffco says.
He laughs loudly, hoarse in the throat. I toss him a cigarette, and he lights it.
“Let’s fuck them up,” I tell them. I turn my head and kiss Caroline one more time. We all grab our guns and take aim.
The fight lasts another hour as the Hell Squadron quickly surrounds the compound. Kaine is near us, and he’s not laughing anymore. His face looks pained and confused, mixed with a definite amount of fear.
I look at him and he looks at me, and we both know the outcome of all this.
He will die.
I ditch my gun, switching it out for my blade. I run full speed at him. He takes his shot, but I dodge and dive behind one of the burning vehicles. He wastes his whole clip and screams with anger, “Face me, Rowan. Come out like a man.”
I jump out as he’s reloading his clip, and I run as fast as I fucking can. My throat is burning, my heart is pounding, and I have all the confidence in the world that I can end this right now.
“Kaine,” I command. “You’re mine.”
I run and extend the blade I have gripped tightly in my hand. I drive it into his leg. The inches slide in effortlessly.
He lurches forward and screams, grabbing me by the throat. He struggles to kill me.
Jeffco calls out, “Stop moving. I can’t get my aim on him!”
But I can’t stop moving. Once I do, his hand will crush my throat.
I manage to spin him onto his back. I twist the knife from side to side and his hand softens. I drive the blade out and try my best to stab his chest, but his hand blocks me from doing it. He pushes me off him.
The knife slides across the dirt.
I roll across the rubble and reach for the blade. He hits me, but it doesn’t stop me from taking my weapon.
“You killed Ash, you bastard,” I mutter. “Why?”
“Because The High Priests were getting too big to handle,” he says, groaning. He wipes the blood from his thigh, but more comes out. He must know that he’s dying.
“You were cocky,” he says. “We didn’t need that. I wanted to destroy you. I wanted to take your place.”
“We could have existed together,” I say, moving forward slightly. He takes two steps back and collapses.
“You had the best product,” he says. “There was no doubt about that. “You held the keys. It wasn’t fair to my men. We needed to take back what was owed to us. That police ambush was the last straw.”
“We paid extra for that product. Anyone could have bought it if they were willing to pay the money,” I tell him. “I had nothing to do with that ambush. It was bad fucking timing. That’s it. How many times do you need to be told that?”
“Tell it to my men. Tell it to all the men in my crew who feel powerless. We’re the outcasts. We’re the rejected. I want to claim what was always our right to have. I want to kill you and your little, pathetic girlfriend,” he says.
That’s the last straw.
“Don’t you ever talk about my girl,” I say, tackling him into the dirt. He screams pathetically, but I punch forward, knocking him in the jaw.
I roll off him, about to stab him in the fucking throat, when I look down at his body. He’s covered in blood.
His eyes are wide. His lips twitch, but his life is slowly fading out.
“Got him in my sights,” Jeffco announces.
Kain grins. “I’ll see you in hell.”
“Take the shot,” I say.
Jeffco fires, and it’s all over. Kaine is finished.
I fall to the ground, breathing deep. What has happened? How did we get to this? All this bloodshed was for nothing.
The Hell Squadron encloses on the Hunters, killing those that choose to fight. Some of them forfeit their weapons when they see that Kaine is nowhere to be found.
“Rowan!” I hear Caroline screaming, but the sound is muffled.
I close my eyes and wait for all of this to end. It’s over. It’s really over.
We won the fight.
29
Caroline
“Rowan, wake up,” I say, wiping the dirt from his face.
The sun is shining down on the devastation. “Baby, wake up. It’s over. Kaine is dead.”
He opens his eyes, but his face is expressionless. “He’s dead,” he says, tears in his eyes. “Caroline, I’m sorry for everything.”
“Why are you apologizing? You’re free. You’re alive,” I say, smiling.
Jeffco and Iago hover over the both of us.
“I’m alive?” I ask.
Jeffco lighst a cigarette and drops one onto Rowan’s body. “Smoke up. Enjoy the new day, brother,” he says.
Rowan grabs the cigarette, and Iago bends down to light it for him. “Fuck,” he sighs after a drag. “We really did it.”
“We did it.” Iago nods. “You should be celebrating. What’re you doing sleeping through the day?”
Sluggishly, Rowan crawls onto his feet and slicks his hair back. “Maybe we won, but that’s not really a cause for celebration. Too many of our men died.”
“Yeah, I know,” Iago says, solemnly.<
br />
“I need to talk to you two,” Rowan says.
“I know what you’re going to say,” Jeffco says. “So just say it. You want out. That was your last fight.”
Rowan nods. “I can’t afford to keep doing this the rest of my life. I’m—”
“He’s in love,” Jeffco interrupts.
I look up at them, and they don’t even think to laugh.
Jeffco clears his throat. “Well, I guess that suits you. You always were more of the emotional type. Deep down, at least. You were a great leader too.”
Iago sighs and offers him his hand. Rowan grabs it and brings him in for a hug. “I’m sorry I let so many people die,” Rowan says. “I didn’t want that to happen. I thought we could end this easier.”
“It ain’t your fault,” he says. “Kaine wanted us all dead. If it wasn’t for you, we’d all be strewn across this earth in a week’s time. You came up with a plan quickly. I owe you one.”
“Come to my wedding. Both of you. Be my best men,” Rowan says.
“Isn’t there only supposed to be one?” Jeffco asks, glancing at Iago competitively.
“At our wedding, there can be two,” I say.
“There’ll be booze there, right?” Jeffco asks.
“There will be a table full of booze,” Rowan laughs.
“Better get two tables,” he says. “Two tables, and I’ll be your best man. That’s my offer.”
“Deal,” Rowan says.
They embrace like brothers and sigh, knowing that there’s a lot more to do now that the war is over.
“Where’s the Hell Squadron?” I ask.
We all look at the mountains and notice their absence.
Rowan shrugs and chuckles. “I guess they decided things were back to normal. I’m just wondering where Kaine’s body is,” he says.
“What the hell?” Jeffco mutters. “He’s gone?”
We walk outside. In place of his body is a post with a small letter, blowing against the wind. It reads: The War is over. Let it be known across the four corners. The Hunters will never rise again.”
“Shit,” I whisper. “Well, alright then.”
We said goodbye to Iago, and there were many tears to shed.
His Hostage: A Dark Romance Page 15
