by Holly Hart
Hiding away from the Templars won’t help me get better; and it sure as heck won’t help the girls I left behind.
I don’t know what I can do about the women who shared my suffering.
But I’ve got to help them; whatever it takes.
13
Ridley
I hear a sound behind me: a succession of low grunts, a curse and the twang of metal. A jolt of adrenaline pumps into my veins and my heart rate skyrockets. I spin, weapon raised, only to see my twin brother squeezing through the gap in the fence. He doesn’t look like he’s having much fun. I attempt to choke back a laugh.
I don’t succeed.
“Hey brother,” I chuckle, keeping my voice low to stop it carrying. “Having fun?”
Mac looks up at me from the ground, dirt caking his face. “Give me a hand, arsehole. I’m stuck.”
Every part of me wants to leave him there to struggle. If it wasn’t for the fact that I dragged him down to the docks to help me knock heads together, I would have. Crouching low, I reluctantly close the space between us and extend my hand.
“Yer lucky,” I grunt, digging my legs into the soft earth and yanking my brother’s arm. “I’m still awake. Ye took long enough; I was beginning to think you weren’t coming.”
“Lucky my arse,” Mac mutters, as the metal fence squeezes him out. “You never said I was going to have to crawl through a damn assault course.”
I slap Mac on the back and grin. “It’s your own fat arse’s fault. Besides, chin up, brother. We’re going to have some fun.”
Mac looks around doubtfully. “Why the hell have you dragged me down here? What mess have you got yourself into this time?”
I touch a finger to my lips. “Keep quiet, will ye?”
“Okay, brother,” Mac grunts, folding forward in a mock bow. “At your command…”
I clip him around the ear. It’s one of the perks of being an older brother, I guess: even if it’s only by a few minutes.
“Did ye bring what I asked for?”
“Sure did. Bag’s on the other side of that fence. What’s up with the cloak-and-dagger?”
I ignore Mac’s question. I creep toward the fence, stick my arm through the small gap, and drag a black carryall through. It clinks ominously. I glance up at my younger brother and grin. “You done good.”
“I always do good,” he frowns. “It’s me yer talking about, after all. Seriously, Rid. It’s lunchtime on a Saturday. There’s a game on, and there’s a hundred things I’d rather be doing than crawling around in the dirt with you. So what the hell am I doing here?”
I jerk my head at the closest warehouse.
“See anything?” I whisper.
His quarrel already forgotten – passing as quickly as a summer storm – Mac inches forward, using the filthy tractor as cover.
“What am I looking for?” He grunts back. “Place is empty, and a shithole,” he adds for good measure.
“That’s where you’re wrong, brother. It’s a Templar safe house. Fuck knows what’s inside,” I grin. “You and I are going to find out. If yer game, tha’ is?”
Mac wrinkles his nose. “Declan know you’re doing this? How did you get mixed up with the Templars, anyway? I didn’t realize they’ve made it this far east.”
“Oh, they’ve made it, all right,” I growl without a scrap of humor in my voice. “And they are causing hell. It’s time for a little payback.”
If Mac notices that I didn’t exactly answer his question, he doesn’t say a thing. I’m not surprised. If there’s anyone in Boston who’s more game for a fight than me, it’s my twin brother.
“Sounds like a plan,” he smiles. “Speaking of: what exactly is the plan?”
I unzip the black carryall and pull out a couple of spare magazines for my pistol. I tuck them into my jeans pockets and toss a couple more over by Mac’s way. Then I reach for the key to the whole thing: a small plastic bottle filled with kerosene.
“This is,” I growl. “See any movement by the warehouse?”
Mac pauses for a good a few seconds before he replies. “No: nothing; the windows are boarded up, though. I can’t be sure whether someone’s inside, peeking out. But I don’t think so. Place doesn’t look like it sees much guarding.”
“Good enough for me,” I mutter, discarding the black rucksack in a pile of trash. “On three?”
“On three.”
I count down on my fingers, and the second I hold three in the air, Mac breaks into a run. I follow close behind, rushing for the cover of the warehouse’s closest wall, blood pumping in my ears. My boots squelch into the soft earth, kicking up clods either side. I don’t hear the sound of the dirt raining down. The seagulls above are making enough noise to cover our headlong rush, so I’m not worried about being heard.
I let out a quiet hiss as my back smashes against the warehouse. Pain flashes up as a white light on the back of my eyelids, and then it’s gone as quickly as it came.
“Quick, give me a hand,” I grunt, kicking a small collection of garbage and brush against some exposed wiring. Mac does as he’s ordered.
“They live?” He asks, glancing at the faded collection of wires. I just shrug.
“I guess we’re about to find out…”
I squeeze a healthy dose of kerosene onto the makeshift bonfire. In just a few seconds, Mac and I have put together enough flammable material to set a healthy fire.
Mac’s eyes sway back and forth as he inspects the warehouse. “You sure this is such a good idea? See all that wood?” He whispers, pointing at a huge, old pillar of wood built into the warehouse’s outer façade.
“It’s dry as a bone. There is no way this place is up to code. It probably even wasn’t the day it was built. It’ll go up like a tinderbox.”
I clap my brother on the shoulder. “That’s exactly what I’m hoping for.”
“Your funeral…” Mac mutters.
I wink at him. “Yours too: do you want to do the honors, or shall I?”
“Hell no,” Mac growls as he snatches a book of matches from my outstretched hand. “There’s no way I’m letting ye burn me to death. If it’s gonna happen, I’ll do it myself thank you very much.”
My brother strikes a match, and my nose prickles as a cloud of burning phosphorus explodes into the air. “Here goes nothing,” he mutters, his face black as thunder, and tosses the burning flame onto our makeshift bonfire.
The kerosene lights with a whoomph of rushing air and heat that knocks both Mac and I backward. “Time to play,” I mutter, releasing the safety on the Glock in my hands. Mac just grunts. I jerk on the nearest side door, and a row of ancient wheeled trash cans. “That way.”
I lead the way, pistol outstretched and Mac follows. We reach the trash cans not a second too soon.
“Fuck,” a heavily accented voice grunts from behind the side door.
I signal Mac to duck down, but he’s way ahead of me. He crouches low and makes his pistol ready to fire. I shake my head; he bares his teeth at me in return.
The man in the basketball jersey flies out of the small side door in the warehouse, attention focused only on the spitting conflagration of fire 20 yards ahead of him.
“Now,” I mutter to my brother, and we sprint as fast as we dare from the relative safety of the trash cans, and towards the door. I reach it just in time – before it swings closed, and jam my pistol bearing hand in between the frame and the door itself.
“Crap,” I swear as the splintered wood bites into me. But we’re in.
It takes a couple of seconds for my eyes to adjust to the gloom inside the empty brick warehouse. The only light is provided by a few shattered holes at the very top of the roof. But it’s little enough.
“What the hell is this place?” Mac grunts. “It smells like shit.”
Now that he’s pointed it out, I realize that he’s right. I don’t know where the hell we are, but whatever this place is, it smells like an abattoir.
“Follow me,” I hiss.
“Shoot anyone you see; anyone with a gun, anyway. But be careful, there might be civvies about.”
“Check and check,” Mac confirms. “I like this side of you, Rid. We should mess about like this more often.”
I ignore him. I move forward carefully, putting one boot after the other: pistol outstretched; finger stroking the trigger. I’m a good shot, I know I am. If anyone jumps out at me, they’re going to end up bleeding out on this filthy concrete floor.
“What are we looking for?” Mac whispers as we creep through the gloom. Huge, discarded pieces of machinery – cranes and forklifts – litter the area, looming out of the darkness like ships passing through the ocean by night.
We dance from crane to crane, hiding in the shadows. And then I see it.
“Is that,” Mac says in a stunned tone. “What I think it is? These people are sick.”
I blink twice to make sure my eyes aren’t feeding me false information. I want to believe they are. There’s a row of thin mattresses against the far wall of the warehouse – filthy, stained things. And above every single one there’s a metal bracket fastened to the wall.
“It’s a prison,” I growl, feeling sick.
Mac asks the question that’s on my lips. “So where are the prisoners?”
I realize that I’ve failed. We failed. And I’ve failed Frankie. The girls aren’t here. By the looks of things, this warehouse is just a pit stop. It makes sense – they take the girls from boats, or to boats, and hold them here until they are ready to move them on.
When I close my eyes, I can picture them. Rows of girls huddled against the wall, whimpering, weeping. Their cries bounce off the ceiling – a crescendo, like the relentless calling of seagulls.
“Smell that?” Mac mutters. “It’s the smoke.”
I nod. It’s hard to miss. Already, the scarce light streaming through the cracks in the room is bouncing off the clouds of smoke wafting through the warehouse.
“This place is about to go up,” I say. “Come on – let’s keep looking. I don’t want to burn a dozen girls to death because we didn’t check this place out properly.”
Mac casts me a strange look. Of course – I haven’t explained what’s going on here. He doesn’t know about Frankie, about how I got mixed up in this madness.
“You’re the boss,” he nods.
“And Mac,” I growl. There is murder in my tone.
“Yes, brother?”
“I meant what I said. You see that fuck in the basketball jersey; you put two in his chest. Got it?”
“Oh believe me,” Mac says, his voice rumbling with threat in the empty warehouse. “If I see that guy, I’m not to put an end to him.”
I jerk my head towards what once must have been the warehouse office, at the far end of the building. “Over there.”
The sound of our boots rings out against the concrete floor. We’ve given up being stealthy. If the Templar gangbanger comes after us, then he’s got a death wish. I make it no more than five or ten minutes before this place goes up in flames. I can’t see why any rational person would want to be inside when it does.
The office is walled off. I can’t see much through its windows. Every light is turned off. We both stand, side-by-side next to the door: a flimsy piece of wood. I’ve half a mind to just start firing, and ask questions later.
“Kick it in,” I growl.
Mac obliges.
He lifts up his boot and smashes it through the door, which splinters into shards. And then I let out a very deep breath.
“Jaysus,” I mutter, looking around with stunned thanks. The office looks like a high school laboratory. I know exactly what it is – a meth lab. White cases of chemicals are stacked five high, with bright orange chemical warnings emblazoned on the outside.
“Jesus is right,” Mac mutters. “We got to get out of here, Rid. This stuff is going to blow, and I don’t want to be here when it does.”
“No complaint here,” I reply, “time to run.”
My body dumps a couple of ounces of my favorite drug into my bloodstream: adrenaline. At least, the way my heart’s racing, it feels that way. I turn on a dime, following a couple of inches behind my brother. My eyes flicker left and right, up and down. I’ve never been in the military, but that don’t make me any less of a soldier. Not on days like this.
“Clear left,” Mac grunts.
A second later I return the favor; “Clear right.”
We sprint through the gloomy factory, pointing our pistols at anything and everything that looks like it might fire back. Our footsteps marry together like a thunder of applause: every time I’m tempted to slow down; to stop fighting; to stop running; a picture of Frankie fills my mind. Even this fake, imagined version of her is more perfect than I can believe truly exists.
The smell of smoke dances on my nostrils. I take half a second to glance backwards, and see the first flames beginning to streak across the warehouse’s filthy concrete floor. They are blue and gold – and very threatening.
“You might,” I grunt at my twin, my lungs heaving with exertion, “want to think about speeding it up there, brother. We’ve got a problem.”
“A problem,” Mac growls: “Of course it’s a fecking problem! It always is with you.”
He lowers his voice and mutters to himself – but easily loud enough for me to catch. “He sets the goddamn warehouse ablaze and calls it a problem, like he’s found the fucking church collection plate is a few bucks light. Problem my arse.”
I grin. Mac’s always had a thing for black humor. It doesn’t get much blacker than this. Whatever chemical the cartel members spilled on the warehouse’s concrete is quickening the flames, speeding them towards the bonfire of meth crates. If that lab blows, I don’t give either of us a snowflake’s chance in hell of surviving. The warehouse above us will crumble and topple down, squashing us like bugs.
That’s when everything falls apart.
Mac disappears round a corner, just as a bullet ricochets off the tarpaulin-covered crane a couple of yards in front of me. It could be my imagination, but I’m pretty sure I see a spark as the lead slug strikes the rusted metal.
On instinct, I throw myself to the ground. The concrete smashes against my knees, then my chest, driving the breath out of me. I still don’t have time to think. I roll behind the crane and spin around, panting heavily.
“Hey, gringo,” a voice calls out, echoing around the cavernous warehouse. “You chose the wrong guy to fuck with, my friend. My boss ain’t gonna be happy when he finds out how much money you cost him. Trust me, hombre, your ass is going to be the one he holds to the fire, not mine.”
Shit. This isn’t good.
I’m not worried about the fact the Templar soldier found us before we managed to slip away. However, I am worried about the streak of fire racing towards the volatile store of chemicals. It’s about twenty yards away, and closing – and this dumb punk doesn’t seem to have noticed. It’s one hell of a ticking clock.
“Come out; come out, wherever you are…” He calls.
I watch as the gangster, complete with basketball jersey, darts from cover to cover. He’s clearly a pro, no matter that his fashion sense reminds me of a teenage boy’s wet dream. But the gangster himself isn’t what has me worried. I’ve tangled with thugs like him more times than I can count, and always come out on top.
“Wrong address,” I shout out. “But I’ll be on me way, so I will. No harm, no foul – that sort of thing. How’s that for a deal?”
I glance around for any sign of Mac, but can’t see him. The sound of his footsteps has died away. I can’t figure out if he somehow made it out of the warehouse.
“Come on, gringo, you know that shit ain’t gonna fly,” the gangster shouts out. He’s trying to disguise it, but his voice is closer now: louder.
Bang.
Another bullet rattles off the metal crane, just a few feet from my head.
Bang.
A chunk of rubble detaches from the concrete floor i
n front of me, showering me with gray dust.
Bang.
“I can do this all day,” the thug calls out. His voice echoes around the warehouse, bouncing off its high, vaulted roof. “Can you?”
I don’t reply. I chew my lip, fingering my weapon while I try to figure a way out of this mess. I need an escape – any escape. But nothing’s jumping out. I’m well and truly stuck. I work through a long – and growing – list of major malfunctions in my head.
One: I’m stranded in the middle of this dark, empty warehouse. Two: a madman with a gun and a big mouth can’t seem to stop shooting at me. Three: Mac’s fucked off. Oh, and four: the damn thing’s about to blow.
Crap.
A low voice calls out. It’s a cowboy drawl that does not go well with my twin’s Irish accent. But I’ve never been more glad to hear my brother’s voice. “Need a hand, pardner?”
A wave of relief washes over me. I tip my head back. I can’t see Mac, but the knowledge he’s here is more than enough.
“You got a plan?” I call back in a low whisper.
“Plan?”
I can hear the barely disguised laughter in Mac’s voice. I grimace. I trust my brother, but sometimes he gives me every reason not to…
“… I wouldn’t call it a plan, exactly. You trust me, Rid?” Mac whispers back.
“Always,” I mutter, against my better judgment.
Mac doesn’t wait a second before he starts shooting. I glance around the crane, keeping my body pressed against the blue tarpaulin in order to avoid getting shot. The moment I see the gangster frozen – his attention split between me, and this new threat, I jerk my pistol up and fire.
Mac’s distraction gives me the half a second’s advantage I need. My bullet enters the baseball jersey-wearing, woman-abusing piece of crap in the hip, and he topples over. I don’t bother firing again.
“Time to go, bud,” I yell, glancing nervously at the pillar of fire now just a couple of feet from the laboratory door. “I think things are about to get pretty toasty in here.”