Eternal Refuge

by Annabelle McInnes

  Knight moved on, his big body swallowed by the darkness. The crunch of his boots over the cement allowed Euan to follow and before long, they were shoulder to shoulder. Man to man. Two males, realising that their future was not with themselves, but with the women that they loved.

  Chapter 24

  Euan

  They were creatures of the night. As each hour passed they stole souls and sent them to their maker. They were nightmares reincarnate, a force of justice and carnage. They were both man and shadow, phantoms in the dark, waiting for their victims like silent crusaders so they could feed on their essence, and amass their weapons. When the chorus of laughter and revelry began to die down, and the night settled into its longest hour, they had collected a small hoard of ammunition and had set it out in strategic locations. Every stockpile in line of sight of the fences, and the men that guarded it.

  They were close enough now to the compound that the strobe lights used to light the buildings was enough to illuminate their way. The generators rumbled to support them, somewhere, water dripped. Their breaths were slow and even. Euan’s shoulders were loose and his body thrummed with confidence. They were in the place they had strategised that would begin this farce. He turned to Knight. ‘Ready?’

  A grim look of determination met his and Knight gave him a jerk of his chin.

  He would feel no remorse for what was about to take place. Like he had granted Lenny’s wish all those months ago, he would bestow the gift of death onto those men that wished it now.

  He raised a rifle, peered through the scope with his single eye, and eased the air out of his lungs in one long exhale.

  Then, he pulled the trigger and one by one, shot the guards that lined the wire fence.

  The sound of the gunfire ricocheted off the concrete blockwork to reverberate through the industrial landscape. It was a horn to announce the beginning of battle. Euan’s victims gurgled as they hit the ground, thrashed as blood splattered the concrete at their feet. The bright strobe lights cast an orange glow over the puddles that bloomed out of convulsing bodies.

  When the men at the fence fell into the dust, swarms emerged from the building to aid their comrades. Weapons were aimed into the night, shots were fired with unlimited stolen ammunition. The rat-a-tat-tat of semi-automatics echoed around them. Euan pressed his spine to the bricks just as the cover at his shoulders disintegrated from the gunfire. He hunched his shoulders to avoid the bullets and ducked only just in time when a stray missile made of brick landed where he had hidden.

  Knight mirrored his actions. He avoided the bullets while also shooting his own. The sound of his rifle was lost in amongst the chaos of the gunfire, the screams of the dying, the orders and war-cries. The strobe lights and the wire fence were in their favour. If they could avoid the retaliation, Parker’s men were easy to see and shoot.

  A sense of calm came over Euan. His body was fluid as he and Knight dashed to their next hoard. The indecision that had plagued him previously had been replaced by a lightness in his chest, loose limbs and a steady pulse. In unison, they each picked up a handgun and shot carefully. Now they aimed not at the men, but at the machinery. The generators, the lights, and the fuel pumps. The rumble of engines spluttered while others died. The sky turned black as the strobe lights flickered off. The compound was thrown into shadow and darkness.

  A world Euan now enjoyed.

  It was chaos. It was mayhem. Men screamed, others cursed. The last bellowed for assistance. Water sprayed from the tanks to gush over the cement. The sounds of it mixed with the clunk and whine of generators that attempted to continue despite fatal injuries to their working parts. The scent of petrol stung Euan’s nose as they dashed between buildings, using each stockpile strategically to confuse and misdirect their enemy.

  The men of Parker’s compound couldn’t target them. By the time they realised the direction they were firing from and aimed their own weapons their way, both Euan and Knight were gone, already firing from their next location. They were apparitions in the night. Presence without form, non-corporal beings that shot fire and shed the lifeblood of their enemies.

  When one of the generators caught alight from a deliberate bullet, the fuel inside exploded. The booming soundwave curved up through the buildings with enough force to throw Euan backwards. He hit a brick wall hard, the breath knocked from his lungs that left him gasping. Around him, windows shattered and blockwork trembled. Knight grabbed him by the protective vest and forced him to take cover as bricks and mortar rained down.

  When the screams of those injured by the blast hit his ears, the grin that split his face was genuine. In the commotion, they were able to slip past the gate unnoticed. The guard that had resided there was slumped in his chair, his chest a macabre painting made with his own blood.

  Darkness was their friend, the shadows their companions as they avoided detection and followed tyre tracks in the earth until they slipped into the gaping mouth of the enormous main building, the one Kira had told them Parker would be in.

  Inside, the noises from the battle lessoned. Euan’s ears rang, he was lightheaded. His Glock was high even as his arms shook. When Knight grabbed his forearm, it was not for comfort or warning, but to keep himself upright.

  The eerie silence after all the pandemonium outside was unnerving.

  ‘Something’s not right,’ he whispered. ‘Where are they?’

  Euan couldn’t decipher much more other than they were in the foyer that Kira had mentioned. There was an openness to the air where the ceiling height expanded. The smoke from the explosions outside was faint. The wails of those injured lost to the rush of blood in his ears.

  Knight moved forward, the muzzle of his handgun followed the line of his sight. He shook his head as he walked.

  The scent of recently spilt blood reached Euan’s senses. Against his better instinct, he moved towards the dais with its makeshift throne. They may have overcome the worst of the battle, but now the true test of their fortitude was to come. Everything about this room made Euan’s heckles rise, even the tiny hairs on his forearms stood upright. His palms were slippery where he held his gun. His gaze darted from corner to corner, but like Knight, he saw nothing except open space and emptiness.

  At the dais, Euan moved in a circle and held his breath. When his boot crunched over something on the floor, he looked towards his toes.

  The white parchment caught the light from the flames outside. He knew what it was even before he knelt down to pick it up. The picture was torn, crumpled, stained wet with blood. But the pencil markings of a sleeping man and woman could still be seen through the mess.

  His voice was gruff as he said, ‘They have him.’

  Knight looked over his shoulder and saw what he held. There was something behind his eyes that Euan couldn’t read. ‘I don’t like this,’ he said.

  Euan had to agree. The silence was unnatural. There was a thickness that expanded inside his throat, a sense of dread that went beyond the expected. Apprehension laced the air. His eye followed the trail of blood that had dried onto the tiled floor. It disappeared into the darkness to be swallowed by the unknown. He pocketed the picture carefully against his heart, resumed his hold on his gun with two hands.

  Their intel was limited. Kira had been scared when she had been here, and the focus she had on her surroundings was not a priority. She may have been angry when he’d left, but she would not have concealed valuable information from him to keep him safe. But Euan didn’t need a map to tell him that there were infinite possibilities of where Nick might be.

  Knight took silent steps until he was at Euan’s side. His focus mirrored Euan’s, and three eyes stared into the shadows. ‘Do we risk it?’

  ‘I won’t fit in the air-conditioning ducts.’

  They both chuckled despite their dread.

  The moan that reached them then seemed to tear itself from the innards of the building. An echo of despair. It hit Euan in the chest with the force of a beast, full of torment, hur
t and fear. It tore, it thrashed, it rolled. All thoughts of humour fled. All thoughts period, evaporated. The dizziness was instant. His physical reaction to the wordless cry was so visceral that the taste in his mouth changed; iron, ash, rot.

  He surged forward towards the voice that called for him. A voice laced with anguish and pain.

  Nicky.

  Knight’s hand reached out to snatch him back. But he twisted out of the man’s hold. When strong arms banded around his chest, forced him to the ground, Euan cursed the man and the mother that bore him.

  But Knight would not relent. ‘Calm down,’ he hissed in Euan’s ear. ‘It’s what he wants.’

  The growl was involuntary. Where Euan had been able to block out the wails of those that lay dying outside, the sound of Nick’s pain created his own hell. Time slowed, his vision blurred. The tiles were cold under his cheek. Knight’s hold was the only thing that anchored him to reality.

  There was a crack, then a scream. Euan used brute strength to pull himself from Knight’s arms. On his feet, he stared down at the man who had saved him from a meat hook in a log cabin, who had found him in the woods, who had coerced him into considering leadership once this was all over.

  ‘I came to end this. If he wants me, he’ll get me.’

  ‘Then help me get up, you damn fool.’

  When Knight grasped his outstretched hand, Euan allowed a single breath to expand his lungs. Nothing would stop him on this path of destruction, but he was infinitely glad that Knight was at his side. In this moment, the man embodied his name. Matthew Knight was everything the stories had portrayed the men of his namesake to be. He was strong, he was noble, he was honourable. He was Valiant. Euan squeezed his hand before he let it go.

  They ran as fast as silence would allow. The painkillers Lily had given Euan to dull the ache in his feet had worn off and he bore the sting willingly with every single footfall. They simply followed the screams into the innards of the building with nothing to guide them but their wits.

  The plasterboard was pitted and scarred under their palms. The signs that articulated what once went on here were now useless bumps. Each marking was like brail as they followed the internal maze deeper and deeper into the blackness. His breathing was ragged, his limbs trembled, chills associated the heartbeat that rocked his ribcage. The cries for mercy became louder. They rattled around in his skull. Euan could process nothing except the distance between him and his Nick. He was close. He could feel it. He was so fucking close.

  Then in the darkness, there was a light.

  His eye snagged on the slither of gold under a closed doorway. Rational thought was lost to the void inside him. His primal instincts surged. When another cry was torn from the body that Euan owned through love, he lost what was left of his levelheadedness, of his humanity. He moved to charge—

  An arm as thick as a tree trunk snaked its way across his chest. When the other matched it and held, Euan couldn’t move without taking the other man with him. He hissed when Knight tightened his hold.

  ‘Easy,’ the word was in his ear.

  Glad for Knight’s support, Euan nodded and the man loosened his grip. They both flinched when a moan echoed off the walls.

  ‘Let me go in first.’

  Euan’s reply was vehement. ‘They’ll kill you.’

  Knight moved until he stood in front of him. He was a silhouette against the slither of light behind him. When his mangled lips twisted into a sinister sneer, his white teeth glinted. ‘I’d take the chance to kill him as readily as you would. But I’m sorry for what is to come next.’

  Too caught up in what lay behind that door, Euan focused on the first half of the statement, he understood that. Knight and those he loved, had also been damaged, killed by Parker and his minions. ‘I say we charge.’

  Knight’s grin widened even as his eyes lost their light. ‘To our deaths?’

  Euan shrugged. ‘Why not?’

  His good shoulder took the impact. Euan exploded into the light with his gun raised high and his eye ablaze.

  When the dust cleared, it was obvious they had been expected. They were surrounded by men that wore the same clothing as Euan. There were seven in total, they were armed. Sneers of triumph cut across their faces. As Euan stepped forward, gun raised high, they parted.

  It was then that Euan saw him.

  Christ Almighty, no.

  Euan had thought that finding Nicky hogtied on a rotting wooden floor would be the worst vision he would ever encounter. But nothing eclipsed the nightmare that was before him now.

  This time, the wail of anguish that echoed down the dark hallways came from his scarred lips.

  In a room that had once held meetings, Nick’s body was pulled taut on a makeshift tripod made out of pine and plastic. His hands and feet were secured to a crossbar that supported his weight. He was naked, gagged. Gashes, grazes and purple bruises marked his ankles and wrists. Bloody lacerations disfigured the skin at his hips and knees, elbows and knuckles. But it was nothing to the whip-wheels that opened the flesh at his bound legs, that curved up and around his ribcage, over his shoulders, that had eviscerated the muscle and skin from his back.

  They had flogged Nick with a bullwhip, just to see how much he would bleed.

  And scream.

  The ringing in Euan’s ears was the only sound to signify he was human. His muscles had turned to stone. He was shocked into a stupor that ruined any advantage he had gained in surprise. There was so much blood, there was so much pain. The walls were splattered with stripes of red and brown. They had been at this for hours.

  He took a step towards the man that carried his soul. Green eyes were glazed. He was unable to distinguish foe from friend through the men dressed in black. He didn’t recognise Euan until it was too late.

  The click of a primer at his temple had Euan pause. There was a cold kiss where steel met skin.

  ‘Lower the gun.’

  The sound of Knight’s voice almost killed him, the shock to his heart worse than any taser. His muscles seized purely on memory, instinct. There was a war that raged inside him. The two sides vied for victory. To save Nick, to kill Parker. But neither would see success, a usurper had overthrown the hierarchy and Euan was left with nothing. Betrayal tasted so terrible when it was fresh.

  He licked his lips but couldn’t tear his gaze away from the man that was strapped naked to a pole to be flogged. His head lolled, sagged on a listless neck. His blond hair was caked in blood. Crimson seeped from the wounds of his body to dribble down his bare legs and puddle onto the floor. His features could hardly be distinguished through the dried blood and the swelling.

  His Nick, his beautiful, beloved Nicky …

  He lowered his gun as he turned. His voice was the epitome of anguish when he asked, ‘Why?’

  From the shadows, a man emerged. Tall, blond, graceful. Lips stretched into a grin that would stop hearts. White teeth flashed in the fluorescent lighting, a dimple indented into a cheek. In his hand, he carried the whip.

  Parker West.

  Euan fought every instinct he had not to throw himself at him in a blaze of murder-suicide. Nick’s boots were on his feet, Nick’s fatigues wrapped his legs, Nick’s thermal, jacket and protective vest encased his chest. Nick’s knife was at his hip.

  Nick’s father’s gold watch was strapped to his wrist.

  Euan flinched.

  Parker’s reply to Euan’s question was smooth, honeyed. He spoke words that took time for Euan to comprehend, the blood that roared inside his head had stolen most of his faculties. ‘I have something that Matthew wants. He was willing to give me everything in exchange for it.’

  The neurons in Euan’s brain fired. They triggered a memory of a conversation only hours before.

  ‘There are no more easy decisions.’

  His eye was back on Knight. ‘What have you done?’

  It was Parker who answered. ‘This was the plan all along, McKay. Couldn’t you see? I knew about your house, I k
new about Mickey-O’s hotel. Your little blond fuckhole just happened to escape this compound with little more than a scratch? You think I gathered that intel up using the useless animals that drink too much out there? No.’

  Knight’s dark eyes were laced with resolve and regret. ‘I’m sorry.’

  He was too shocked to fight. Knight took the gun from his fingers and threw it aside. He couldn’t fathom the duplicity … he couldn’t understand how he had done it to Lily …

  Euan was now surrounded, outnumbered, but he would be damned if he went down without a fight. When they attempted to secure him, his fists flew. He attacked any that came too close. He was fast, agile, accurate. Adrenaline was his only ally. He’d just broken a nose when Nick’s voice croaked behind him.

  ‘Euan …’

  Momentarily distracted, Knight took the opportunity to jump him. They tumbled to the ground in a pile of thrashing limbs. The big man was one of the few who could beat him, and they both knew it.

  ‘If you don’t calm your shit down, they’ll kill him,’ Knight hissed in his ear as they grappled on the floor.

  ‘Fuck you,’ Euan replied with a roar and a well-placed fist.

  ‘Boys, boys,’ Parker interrupted. ‘That kind of action will be for later.’ His focus moved from Euan to Knight. ‘Tie that man up before I lose my temper.’

  The ropes that they used to lash his body were thick. They hogtied him on the floor even as he struggled and pulled against the bonds. He swore profanities, cursed them, roared and grunted when no more words would come.

  At a flick of Parker’s fingers, one of his followers wrapped another rope around his throat and lashed it onto the ties that kept his legs bent. It created a chokehold that would tighten as he struggled. Euan’s veins bulged, saliva burst from the corners of his mouth as he fought for breath. He was caught, trapped. Nick called his name.

  When he was subdued, Parker turned to Knight. ‘You’ve done a great job.’