He clocks me on the back of my head, and I grind my teeth together.
“You’re brave for a man who has a gun to his brain,” he sneers.
I chuckle again hearing the chatter in my earpiece. “I know something you don’t know,” I tease darkly.
“Oh yeah, and that would be?” he sniggers.
“I’m not alone,” I tell him. The second it registers on his face, a collection of gunshots ring out and he falls to the ground. The rest of the men drop around us, each one with a bullet in their head.
“Took you lot long enough,” I snap counting through my team and making sure they’re all there.
“We fucked up. No time to discuss it now. I’ve called in clean up. We need to debrief and quick,” Darwin tells me something I already know.
“Back to the house. Clint, Brand, check Dean. See if he needs medical attention… or not.” They know what to do, and they know what I mean. If he’s dead, then he’ll be taken to the crematorium we have a contract with, and if he’s okay, then they’ll bring him back to the house and call the doctor we keep on the books. They both nod and grab Dean as I make my way to my motorbike, ready to set up a plan to get my girl back. Before I do, there’s a visit I need to make.
“Kane,” Doreen says, darting up from her bed and reaching for her gun.
“Don’t bother, I’ve already taken it.”
“Kane, whatever you’re thinking, don’t. You’ll bring a world of hurt down on yourself,” she warns.
I smile. “You think I care? My woman, the only one I’ve ever been in love with, the reason I do what I do, the one person I’ve tried to protect, has been kidnapped. Taken to be sold into the sex trade. Ask me if I care what devastation I leave in my wake, ask me if I care who I kill. Ask me if I care whether I die.” I snarl, venom coating every word.
She doesn’t say anything, but her worried eyes tell me everything I need to know.
“You already know that the answer to all those questions is no. I care about nothing but saving her. That’s the only fucking thing I care about, and whatever I need to do to make that happen.” I shrug. “So be it.”
“Why did you come here?” she asks, and for the first time in all the years I’ve known her, I can hear the fear in her voice.
“The information you provided was shit. It wasn’t nearly close enough to what we normally have. We went in there half blind, believing there were six. We were ambushed. Dean may be dead, and they’ve taken Via and her roommate, Helena. Derry, the boss, he knew who I was, knew we were coming.” I take a breath in and out trying to calm myself, then I lean forward so we’re nose to nose. “I want to know who sold us out,” I whisper, and Doreen swallows hard.
“It wasn’t me,” she murmurs, and instinctively I know she’s telling the truth.
“Then you’re going to help me figure out who.” She nods. “Then, when this shit is done, if I’m not dead, you will help clean up the mess I made and let me out so I can be with my girl in peace.” She nods again. “Finally, whichever members of my team want out, you will release them, too. It’s their lives, not yours. Understand?”
“Y-yes, Kane.”
“Isaac,” I grind out.
“I-Isaac.”
“Get the fuck up. You’re coming with me,” I tell her.
“Where have you been?” Darwin hisses.
“Getting someone,” I snap dragging Doreen forward and into the house.
“What the fuck is she doing here?” he asks.
“Debrief. Now!” I shout through the house while moving to stand behind my seat at the top of the table.
Everyone gathers, and I look to Clint. “Dean?” I ask.
“Bullet was through and through. In the shoulder. Doc’s upstairs with him now.” I nod and some of the tension releases.
I lay both palms flat on the table and lean forward trying to be the commander and not a man in love.
“Status is they took Olivia McKenna and Helena Todd.” I stare around the room at everyone. They wear varying degrees of concern on their faces, from those who know my Via—and what she means to me—to those who know we lost our marks tonight and don’t want innocent girls to be harmed. “Some of you know, some of you don’t, but for those who are unaware, Olivia is my cousin.” I swallow down the lie knowing she’s far more than my cousin, she’s my everything.
“Shit.”
“Fuck.”
“Oh God.”
Everyone seems to have something to say, and I slam my hand on the table making the few cups—that all look like they’re drifting in a sea of wood—tremble under my weight. “Enough!” I shout. They all go quiet, waiting for my next order. “It doesn’t matter who she is to me. All you need to know is that they took two innocents tonight. We should have prevented that, and we didn’t. I want to know what happened.” They look at each other. “One at a time. Shelly, you first.”
Shelly nods and looks at Victor. “We never had our argument because Liv turned up.” Her eyes move to meet mine. “We didn’t have a clear line of sight when they took her, we only knew something happened when you barrelled through the crowd, and we saw Arlo and King scrambling after you. We moved quickly. We could see Clint and Brand advancing toward the back of the hallway. A gun went off over the other side of the club, people started screaming and running for the front. As that
