“I think that can be accomplished,” Chen said with a nod.
“Given we’re stretching this out now, you got a way to keep the police out of the situation until we’re clear?” Maverick asked.
“Yes,” Chen said, offering nothing more. Well. There ya go.
“Fine,” Dare said. “We’ll play it your way. For now. But if things don’t go down like you said, we’re still doing this. So you keep up your end of the bargain, and we’ll keep up ours.”
THE SIGNAL FINALLY came at quarter after one.
“We’re about to be clear,” Chen called from where he’d been sitting in the driver’s seat of his car. “Get the word to your men. There might be a few Iron Cross left behind but it broke up about a half hour ago.”
“Doing it right now,” Dare called, his face already in his phone.
“Jesus,” Maverick said, shaking off the lethargy that hours of waiting had caused. Not hard, because the imminence of the fight fired up his adrenaline again. A few Iron Cross was worse than they’d hoped but better than if they’d gone in there hours before with the wrong intelligence. All around him, last-minute plans were being confirmed, and men were mounting up, checking their weapons, and starting their engines. He turned to Dare, gingerly straddling his ride. “D, for real. Be careful.” Maverick nailed him with a stare.
“I hear you,” he said.
Maverick grasped his cousin’s good shoulder. “I’m serious, Dare. It’s storming like a motherfucker, we’re about to ride into God knows what, and you have someone to go home to.” The sentiment made him think of Alexa, even though she wasn’t his. Still, he had promises to honor—promises he wouldn’t be able to keep if he got his ass killed tonight. And the thought of never seeing Alexa made him fucking ache. How had she gotten so far beneath his skin again in so few days? Or maybe she’d always been there, and he’d just been ignoring it.
“I hear you. And we all do. I’ll be careful.” Dare tugged his helmet on, the action clearly causing him pain.
Stubborn bastard. Family trait, though, wasn’t it?
Cursing under his breath, Maverick made for his own ride. The Night Rod came to life underneath him, the rumble of the engine sounding like an old friend saying hello.
Phoenix and Dare led them out, headlights dark, the echo of their collective engines drowning out the storm raging outside. And then they were out in it, rain lashing at them and pretty much instantly soaking through Maverick’s jeans and shirt. The visor on his helmet kept his eyes clear and hid his face, too, but the rain still limited his vision through the shield. His cut grew wet and heavy on his shoulders, but Mav didn’t mind. He liked the reminder of who he was and why they were doing this tonight.
Within a few minutes, they were in position in hiding places along the derelict street and around the edge of the waterfront compound, surveying the site and preparing to converge. The storm would no doubt prove a lifesaver, because there was plenty of evidence of unfriendlies on site. Four cars sat between his position and the building, and two Hummers sat close to a side entrance. More problematic, three men hung by the water at the back door of the long two-story building covered in old white siding. The remains of ancient signage under an old metal lamp revealed that the place had once housed some sort of shipping facility. The deluge obscured everything else.
Mav’s heart was a freight train in his chest as he positioned the semiautomatic he’d had stowed in his saddlebag. How ironic that this was one of the weapons they’d taken off the Church Gang weeks before and that the Iron Cross had more recently tried to twist their arms into selling to them. Fuckers. Time seemed to drag out as he glanced between his cell and the warehouse before him, waiting for Dare to give the signal.
His cell buzzed in his hand. Finally. Dare’s command simply read, MOVE IN.
Maverick took off, moving fast and low, pausing for cover where he could—at a fence, behind one of the cars. He was aware of the movement of the others only because he knew they were there. Otherwise, the rain was doing what they’d hoped and cloaking their approach as they tightened the noose around the building.
This was the part that was going to suck. Crossing the big open stretch between the last of the cars and the building. Surveying the wide expanse again, Maverick double-checked the position of the men by the water and found them still seemingly oblivious. Which meant, fuck it, time to go.
He cut around the bumper and broke into a sprint, weapon in hand and at the ready.
Boom.
Maverick paused, wondering—
BoomboomBOOM!
The shock wave of the explosion knocked Maverick back on his ass. He landed hard, his head cracking against the pavement and making his ears ring. A fireball rose to the sky as debris launched into the air, falling into the water and the parking lot all around him.
“Jesus Christ,” Maverick said, dodging a flaming board that landed too fucking close for comfort. Heart in his throat, his brain slowly came back online. He found the weapon he’d dropped and surveyed the scene like he was stepping out of a fog, just able to make out some of his brothers’ movement through the deluge. Oxygen-stealing heat roared off the blaze like an impenetrable wall, the fire engulfing nearly the whole structure, particularly the end closer to the water. Weapon in shaking hands, he retreated, wanting to return to the cover of the car until he could—
Automatic gunfire erupted, the sound just audible over the storm and the inferno. Maverick dove for the ground and caught a flash of motion near the Hummers. Survivors. Fleeing the building. And coming out shooting.
A hail of bullets sailed over his head, and Maverick soldier-crawled through the mud and grime and puddles to the closest car. Rounds ricocheted off the metal as he got closer, and he wasn’t sure if they were shooting at him or if it was just his own dumb bad luck. Fuck. This took tits up to a whole new level. Where were the others? Had any of their men made it to the building before the explosion? How many of them were caught out in the open like he’d been?