Oliver gave me a nod, before turning back to Jayden. The two of them were trying to creep around the back, I think to help out Kyle, who was stuck in an awkward and not so safe position. Everyone had something to do except me, and I was not okay with that.
I caught a glint of metal then, a few yards away, against one of the abandoned looking buildings which had us boxed in here, a ladder leading up to a platform or rooftop terrace. The building was only two stories high, but that would be more than enough to give me a decent vantage point. If I made it to the ladder I’d be okay; it was on the backside of the building, and the only people who would see me were ones in the same position I was in right now.
Flicking the safety back on, I tucked my gun into my holster, and taking a deep breath forced down my fears and lifted myself off the ground, keeping my head as low as possible I ran, using whatever cover I could find.
“Charlie!” Jayden whisper-screamed after me.
I ignored him because there was no time left to do anything but sprint as fast as I could. The entire time I was waiting for bullets to rain into me. If the losers manning that massive machine gun caught sight of me, I was dead.
The building closed in and I found myself encased in the shadows, protected and safe.
Chapter 8
I pressed myself against the building, breathing rapid and hard. Keeping my head firmly against the rough brick, I faced the firefight to make sure no one had followed me. I remained like that for a few extended moments, my heart pattering away from fear and adrenalin.
Crappity crap. Had I seriously just gotten away with that? Hells yeah.
Another surge of adrenalin coursed through me and I felt both jacked up and tired as hell. If we managed to survive today, I was totally taking a nap. Naked. No clothes and no worries. That’s what my tired soul needed.
Checking my gun was still secure, I started to climb rapidly, scaling those rungs in seconds. They were a little rickety and rusted through in places, but nothing broke away as I ascended, which was a definite bonus.
Beams of the dying afternoon light hit me as I passed above the shadow of the building next to this one, and I knew I was almost at the rooftop. Up here I would be more exposed, but since I was way above the others, and hopefully no one knew I was coming up here, they wouldn’t be prepared.
Reaching the edge, I slowly pulled myself over, keeping my head down. The space up here was not huge, only about fifty feet across. I could see the remnants of garden beds, and an old sun lounger. Once upon a time this had been someone’s terrace, and now it was just a muck-load of dirt and desiccated bird crap.
I basically glued myself to the disgusting ground—bullets were the greater evil in this case—as I army crawled across to the edge which bordered the zone above the gunfight. Part of me was cursing the amount of time it had taken me to put my plan into action, and the other, much larger part, was praying and hoping that Ryder and the boys were okay, and that no one had been gravely hurt. Upon reaching the edge, I pressed closer to the small bricked-up wall, which provided a decent amount of coverage, and lifted my head to peer across and down. Shit! I was a little far south of where everyone was. Ducking back down, I scurried further along the wall before popping up again in a new spot.
Perfect.
This time I ended up right above the wreckage of humans and ash, my senses firing almost as rapidly as bullets as I tried to take in the entire scene. It took me no more than a few seconds to find Ryder; it was as if I just knew his energy. My heart actually stuttered as my eyes locked in on him and Blue Eyes … Lincoln, whatever his name was. They were trapped on the edge of the Deliverance’s area. Those freaks were keeping them at bay with the massive machine gun.
It looked like in the time I’d taken to get up here almost everyone on the evil side was dead. All that was left was the crazy old bitch, and three around the large gun.
The rapid fire of bullets cut off again, and this time I had the perfect view of them reloading another lot of ammo into the machine. I was distracted then by the two heroes slash dumbasses of the hour, Ryder and Lincoln, as they left their safe little area. The Deliverance hadn’t noticed yet, they were too busy trying to maneuver what looked like fifty tons of bullets into the gun.
Ryder was keeping low to the ground, and I heard pops—Sam and Kyle were now covering the boys from behind, which was good and bad. The bullets drew the attention of old bitch lady, and she noticed Ryder and Lincoln.
With a bark to one of her minions, they both pulled out smaller weapons and began spraying bullets at my man. Muthaeffer. Ryder may have been wearing a bulletproof vest, but nothing was protecting his head. Forgetting about staying unnoticed, I jumped up and took aim straight at her, standing firm like Markus had taught me.