Page 81 of Kings Fear No One
Guards like Brody, Amos, and Xavier were more personal security than anything. They were around to make sure the believers kept in line. Quick to slam the butt of their rifles into our guts if we so much as looked at them the wrong way, but they rarely did property checks. One or two a night was the most they bothered.
Little has changed as we jog across the barren land coming up on the warehouse. We’re footsteps away from reaching one of the back doors when a gunshot rings out in the night. Several more promptly follow.
“Shit!” Cash grumbles from behind me. “Not what we had planned. Somebody must’ve been seen!”
“No time like now,” I reply, my assault rifle ready as I swing my head at Bush.
He gets what I’m signaling and we tag team the door. Our body weight collides against the barrier and breaks it down.
The night spirals into violence and chaos like the night we invaded the first Chosen Saints compound. From the moment we barge through the door, we’re confronted with members of the family. Some of them innocents I recognize, like a gaunt and frightened Isadora who throws her hands up and begs us not to hurt her.
Then there’s others like Brody who I shoot point blank in the face. We make it room to room clearing the place, shooting anybody affiliated with Abraham and anybody that’s got a weapon who tries to fire on us.
Another man I don’t recognize but who dawns the robes of a saint shoots at us from where he’s taken cover behind a wall.
“Lay down your weapons and put your fucking hands up,” I command. “This is a raid and we’re here to shut this shit down. Tell us where Abraham is.”
“Or let’s skip the words altogether. Smoke bomb!” Ozzie unclips one of the many grenades he’s brought with him and tosses it toward the entryway where the guard is taking cover.
The grenade hisses as it rolls onto the ground and explodes into a thick cloud of smoke.
We press forward with our rifles trained to shoot first, ask questions later. The guy who shot at us from behind the wall meets a grisly fate as Cash takes him out with a single bullet. I’m still in the lead, scanning the area for the any sign of Abraham.
“I’ll clear the second floor, Cash.”
He nods and steps to follow me while the other two finish raiding our half of the first floor.
We dash up the steps and run into more terrified believers who tremble and sob as soon as they see us. I order them to kneel and keep their hands up.
Time is limited and the longer we take parsing through who’s a saint and who’s a believer, the greater the chance Abraham’ll escape or we’ll suffer a casualty. We’re still on his turf.
My heart pounds faster as I look toward the end of the hall and finally spot him. His white robe flicks out of view as he flees out of sight.
“Motherfucker!” I grunt, springing after him.
Not again.
I won’t let him escape a second time.
A couple hurried strides later, I chase him down another hall that’s lined with doors on either side. The instant he’s back in my line of sight, I’m firing off more bullets, narrowly missing.
He pivots into a room toward the end of the hall with a howl of pain.
Got him!
I close the gap, barreling down the rest of the hall and following him through the doorway.
The room’s small and cramped, clearly being used as a bedroom. The living conditions are almost as squalid as the cabins we’d been forced to live in, with a piss bucket in the corner and bedsheets so dirty, streaks of filth cover the fabric.
The window’s wide open on the far wall. I rush over to spot Abraham climbing down the fire escape, clutching at his thigh where I’ve shot him.
At the bottom, an unmarked SUV waits for him. Their emergency escape vehicle.
“Get the fuck back here!” I roar, squeezing the trigger of my rifle.
My shots land on the iron bars, inches away from Abraham. He glances up at me for a fleeting second, a glimmer in his icy eyes as he reaches the bottom rung and then drops. He lands on the roof of the SUV, rolling down along the front of the vehicle.
I open fire some more, half climbing out the window to leap down and follow.
