Apocalypse Assassins: The Complete Series

by D. Laine

  He finally stopped. In the silence that followed, no one spoke. No one moved. I was sure Marcus had stopped breathing. I knew they were all waiting for a response from me, but I didn’t have one.

  I was too stunned. My sandwich was a blurry blob through the tears that swelled in my eyes. I refused to look up. I refused to let Dylan—or any of them—see the war of emotions on my face.

  After several moments of heavy silence, I pushed to a stand. The others grumbled behind me as I walked away, but that didn’t slow my strides. Not even Jake’s voice calling out to me gave me pause. I ran down the stairs and through the empty hallway to my suite, the only place I knew I could hide and process the things Dylan had said.

  12

  DYLAN

  I tried to follow her. I needed to explain, because apparently my attempt at an explanation hadn’t gone as well as I had hoped. Jake slowed me down, muttering something about giving her some time to process. Then one of Spence’s ass-kissers stopped me at the door with a handwritten message from the boss.

  I glanced it over with a sigh. “I’m an asshole.”

  “You’re certainly consistent.” Jake nodded before taking the note from me.

  “Spence wants to see you before you leave,” the agent informed us.

  “Now?”

  “After you pack. But he wants you to make it fast.” The agent flashed me one of those authoritative looks they were known for, then marched off without another word.

  Likely sensing that I was close to exploding, Jake placed a hand on my shoulder to guide me through the door. He didn’t say a word until we stepped onto the sixth floor and were well on our way to our quarters.

  “A little distance from Thea will be good,” he suggested.

  “You really believe that?” I scoffed. “You? Her brother?”

  “Not from me. From you. She’s got a lot to think about.” He stopped to swipe his keycard at the door. “Give her some time to figure it all out.”

  I followed him into his suite. As always, my adjoining door was unlocked. I heard Jake telling Thea about our mission through her closed door while I swiped my bag, weapons, and some clothes. I returned to Jake’s room to pack at the same time he gave up on Thea responding.

  “And what if giving her time doesn’t work?” I asked him casually.

  “Then it doesn’t work.” He folded a pair of pants with a shrug. “You need to stop pushing her for . . .” He stopped to look up at me. “First, you need to figure out what it is you want. Are you motivated by mere attraction? Or is it more than that? Do you want a relationship? Or are you just looking to sleep with my sister?”

  “Seriously?” I gaped at him. “Just this morning, you suggested I might actually . . . you know.”

  Jake stuffed a handful of clothes into his bag with a shake of his head. “The fact that you can’t even finish that sentence has started to give me doubts. I don’t know what you want, but you need to figure it out soon. Because she’s going to ask those questions eventually, and you’re going to need to know the answers before you get anywhere with her.”

  Jake’s questions swirled around in my head as I numbly folded my clothes. When I thought I had an answer pinned down, another thought came along to mess it all up. My fear of commitment had me all fucked up, and I wondered if I sought the best of both worlds.

  I wanted Thea. Hell yeah, I wanted her. But she was a commitment kind of girl. I wasn’t looking for only sex from her, but could I be the real commitment kind of guy she needed?

  Jake was right—I did need to figure out what I was doing before I screwed it all up for good.

  “You would have made a hell of a therapist.”

  Jake grinned. “You mean, if it weren’t for the apocalypse?”

  “Of course. You’re not bad at the assassin business either, but I don’t anticipate we’ll have much job security once this is all over—”

  My thoughts evaporated at the sound of Thea’s door swinging open behind Jake. He spun around, and we both stared at her where she stood in the doorway.

  Her eyes zeroed in on me. “When?”

  Jake pivoted to shoot a curious glance in my direction. She had her walls up. He didn’t know what she was asking, but I did. And I had no definite answer.

  “I’ve asked myself that question a few times,” I admitted. I had yet to determine exactly when Thea had gone from being a job to being . . . something more.

  She slammed the door shut, and Jake’s mouth dropped open. Thea yanked the door open again, interrupting him before he could ask.

  “Before or after we slept together?”

  I sparred Jake a glance as his eyes rolled into the back of his head. My answer to Thea came instantly. “Before.”

  With a brisk nod, she disappeared behind the door again. She ripped it open a second later. “The dark room?”

  Even from the other side of Jake’s suite, I could see that she was holding her breath in anticipation of my response. But she had no reason to worry. Again, I knew the answer.

  “Before.”

  She concealed her relief with another brisk nod before hiding behind the door once again.

  In the silence that followed, Jake pondered, “Dark room?”

  “Don’t ask questions you don’t want to hear the answer to,” I suggested.

  I was ready when the door swung open a second later. I looked forward to her questions. For one, she was talking to me. Two, this little interrogation was helping me figure out the answers to my own questions in an entertaining, roundabout way.

  “How many other locals were there in Bozeman?” She emphasized the word “locals” with dramatically sarcastic air quotes.

  I grinned as I passed by Jake, slowly closing the distance that separated me from Thea. “I thought we went over this already.”

  Her brow lifted, letting me know her patience was running thin. When her eyes landed on my feet, I wisely stopped. Her glare said it all. Too close, too soon.

  “I told you then that there was no one else,” I reminded her gently.

  “And you still stand by that statement?”

  I nodded. “I do.”

  “What about Maria?”

  “Two weeks before I met you,” I answered honestly. “One and only time.”

  I watched the impact of my admission roll over her. Relief and satisfaction flickered in her eyes briefly before she shut her emotions off.

  She folded her arms across her chest. “The girls from the weight room?”

  I sucked on my lip in an effort to fight the huge grin threatening to break out across my face, because I now knew she had been jealous. “Never.”

  Her eyes narrowed slightly. Sensing I may lose the ground I had made, I called out to Jake for help.

  “Jake, your sister wants to know what I did with the Murray twins this morning.”

  Jake chuckled. “Before or after the three of you duct taped Ergot’s door shut?”

  “They dislike Tanner as much as I do,” I told Thea. “They also happen to be the reigning prank champs five years in a row, so I enlisted them to help me get Ergot. They’re fun girls to know, but I’ve never touched either of them.”

  Her arms dropped to her sides. “You taped his door shut?”

  “You don’t think he deserved it?”

  I knew from the faint smile she fought to conceal that she agreed with me. Even if she wouldn’t admit it. “I’m still mad at you.”

  “I know.”

  She heaved a deep breath, then lurched across the distance that remained between us. Her arms wrapped around my neck briefly—too briefly, as far as I was concerned. I barely had time to return her haste hug. My arms folded around her waist for only a second before she pulled out of my grasp. She moved on to Jake, and I watched his eyes widen in surprise when she gave him a squeeze.

  “Be careful,” she whispered. Moving away from Jake, she glanced at me. “Both of you.”

  Like two idiots, we both mutely nodded while she retreated to her
suite. Long after she closed the door behind her, I didn’t move. I stared at the wall with a goofy grin on my face.

  Finally, I had managed to say the right things. I felt the shift between us—for the better. I was nearly back in the game. Now I only needed to survive the next twelve hours to get the opportunity to play.

  I HAD a sense of déjà vu twenty minutes later when Spence dropped the keys to our new ride into my hand. I passed them over to Jake without hesitation. For the first time, I missed the old Hummer.

  “She’s in hangar five,” Spence told Jake and me. “Fully charged and ready to go.”

  “It’s not a Prius, is it?” I asked warily. “Because they’re great for the environment and all, but I don’t really see a couple of lethal assassins pulling up to a vessel haven in one of those weenies.”

  Spence flicked an annoyed glance at me before fiddling with the massive pile of reports scattered across his desk. “Agency-designed, agency-built, never-before-seen, one-of-a-kind vehicle made just for you assassins,” he informed me in a clipped tone. “We rolled them out two weeks ago. They get the job done in the ash. Now go. It’s a four-hour drive to Los Angeles. I suggest you start moving.”

  “Yes, sir.” Jake paused long enough to collect the file of intelligence that Spence held out to us. As we took the stairs to the surface level, he filled me in. “One vessel. Six tags. Building just outside the city limits. Satellite image here.”

  He shoved a paper over my shoulder, and I glanced at the street-level image of the building. Looked like a dump. Might have been nice before the vessel claimed it as his end-of-the-world hideout. The dead bodies sprawled on the sidewalk certainly didn’t help its curb appeal.

  “Got it.” I handed the image back to Jake.

  “Wow.” He whistled. “They even got us blueprints of the interior.”

  “As they should. They sit behind a desk with the sole purpose of making our jobs as easy as possible. We’re the ones doing the hard work.”

  “We’re the ones experienced at doing the hard work,” Jake reminded me while I requested access to the outside with the key card in my hand.

  I stared at the little red light beside the door until it changed to green. The door slid open with a swoosh, and we stepped into the Nevada desert—covered by a layer of ash. At least it wasn’t falling from the sky as hard as it had been. Now it resembled a light snow, only dry and messy.

  Two flyboys from Nellis nodded as we passed through the gate surrounding the entrance to the agency. I momentarily wondered if they were the same two who had dragged Thea off the day we arrived. Probably not. They swapped out relief more often than the CeeCees took coffee breaks.

  Another heavily armed flyboy stood outside the entrance to hangar five. After flashing him our assassin identification badges, he ushered us inside where an agent waited for us with a clipboard in his hand.

  I didn’t give a shit about him. One look at the rows of sleek black vehicles that filled the building and I was entranced.

  “Holy shit!” I barked out a laugh as I ran a hand over the smooth lines of the nearest car. Glancing at the agent, I asked, “You guys made these?”

  He nodded curtly. “They may not look as sturdy as the Hummers, but I assure you they are.”

  Resembling hip street cars with every available modification, they were the vision of a newly licensed seventeen-year-old boy’s wet dream. All that was missing was a hot girl in a bikini holding a flag to wave the start to a highly illegal street race.

  I kind of wanted to fight Jake for the keys now.

  “This one is fully charged for you,” the agent explained. “They have a five-thousand-mile battery life, so a roundtrip to L.A. won’t be a problem for you. There’s a built-in GPS. Just type in your coordinates and go. Tires are puncture-proof. Glass is shatter-proof. Exterior is reinforced by steel beams. Lucifer himself can’t harm you inside this vehicle.” He waved a hand, motioning for us to follow him toward the rear of the car. “Each comes loaded with the newest line of weapons in the trunk. Some can be a little tricky to use, so if you haven’t trained with them yet, I suggest sticking with what you know.”

  Though I was packed to capacity with enough deadly metal to strike fear in the heart of any vessel I encountered, his mention of new shiny weapons peaked my interest. I motioned to Jake, and he popped the trunk with the remote in his hand. It lifted with a soft hiss. For the second time in as many minutes, I was impressed.

  Two new models of assault rifles and an assortment of knives of all sizes filled most of the space alongside something that resembled a semi-automatic crossbow. Tucked inside a separate square compartment, I found the little balls of fire the Ringer twins had already introduced us to.

  Holding one of the balls up, I asked, “These all ready to go?”

  The agent glanced up. “Yes.”

  “And it drives in the ash?” Jake confirmed. “The engine—”

  “The engine details are classified,” he snapped. “But I can tell you it’s not a standard engine. It doesn’t use gas, or oil, or need a ventilation system, so yes, to answer your question, it can drive in the ash.”

  Jake and I shared a look. Some CeeCees were cocky sons of bitches, for no good reason, but this guy in particular didn’t seem to grasp his position on the food chain. Me, on the other hand? I had a good reason to be cocky, because I chewed weenies like him up for breakfast.

  He didn’t seem too concerned by the fact that I could kill him with my bare hands if I wanted to as he went back to writing on the clipboard surgically attached to his arm. “I believe that covers the basics. Any further intelligent questions?”

  “Yeah.” Jake flashed a wicked smile. “How good are your reflexes?”

  As it turned out, not good. The agent didn’t see Jake’s fist until it hit him in the face.

  Five minutes later, we were on the road and I stared at my partner in the driver’s seat with a grin that wasn’t going anywhere anytime soon.

  “What?” Jake asked without taking his eyes off the road.

  “I’ve never seen you lose your cool like that before,” I pointed out.

  “I didn’t lose my cool,” Jake argued. “He deserved a lesson.”

  “I agree. It’s just usually I’m the one handing out free lessons.”

  The fact that Jake had beat me to it made the whole thing even more special, despite the fact that it would likely earn us a week of kitchen duty when we got back to the base. No doubt the agent was crying to Spence about us right now.

  Or maybe we’d skate through without punishment. That was the advantage of being the boss man’s number one team. We got away with more shit because he needed us in the field. Even if we didn’t get off easy on this one, witnessing that agent’s head snapping back from the force of Jake’s hit was worth any punishment Spence dealt us.

  The agent wasn’t worth the worry. He was a nobody. The car he helped create, on the other hand?

  Un-fucking-believable. It drove fast and smooth. I had never experienced luxury until now.

  The tires glided over the ash in our way like an Olympic skater on ice. We stuck to the main roads as the GPS instructed—even if we could barely make out the lanes—but with these tires, getting off course wouldn’t have been an issue.

  The drive took a little less than four hours. We didn’t spot one tag until we entered the suburbs. There weren’t a lot—nothing like we had witnessed in northern Nevada last week—but there were enough to force me to sit up in my seat and pay attention. Despite the agent’s claim that the vehicle was tag- and vessel-proof, my fingers curled around the gun in my lap.

  My eyes followed one small cluster of tags huddled together on the side of the road as we passed. They didn’t move, didn’t flinch, didn’t show any indication that they noticed us.

  “That’s . . . strange,” Jake observed, flicking a glance in the rearview mirror.

  “They’re robots. Just like the other ones.”

  “So what’s their pur
pose?”

  I shook my head at the slow, ambling steps of another trio of tags ahead of us. “I have no idea.”

  The svelte voice that had gotten us this far directed Jake to take a left. A mile later, she announced our destination was approaching on the right. Fortunately, we were still very much outside the city limits.

  “There.” I pointed out the two-story building in the distance. Even with a sprinkle of falling ash in the air, it was easy to spot with the light shining from three windows in the distance.

  “They got power?” Jake mused as he eased off the accelerator.

  I flipped through the intel folder Spence had given us and pulled out the satellite images. I immediately zeroed in on the black square with wires running from it behind the building.

  “Generator,” I supplied. “In the parking lot.”

  Jake peered warily at the sky, which was quickly losing what little light we had. “It’s going to be completely dark soon.”

  “Not with these.” I whipped out our new high-tech, agency-issued eyewear capable of broadcasting a live feed to the agency, as well as the ability to give us night vision with the flick of a switch. “Taking out their generator will give us an advantage.”

  With a nod, Jake turned into an alley two blocks from the target building. After killing the engine, he reached into the back seat. With the press of a small red button, the leather bench folded in on itself and disappeared. In its place slid the arsenal of weapons from the trunk.

  “I hate to say it,” I started, “but we may have to give the CeeCees some credit after this.”

  “Let’s get out of here alive first,” Jake replied. “Then we’ll see.”

  Once Jake and I were loaded down with guns, knives, fireballs, and extra ammo, we exited the vehicle. I slipped on the eyepiece and pressed the button that should connect me to the agency. Two short beeps sounded near my ear from the built-in audio device. The clipped voice of a female agent quickly followed.