Page 71 of Dublin Beast

He missed Tag finding Laine, Sean saving Piper, and Brenny falling for Nora. He’s also going to miss the birth of his first grandbaby. We’re all so fucking pumped about becoming uncles. And it won’t be long now.

The wee one is due in January.

That’s another reason I need to wipe Siobhan off the playing field. Because while she’ll be out to take us all down, the poisoned tip of her spear will be pointed directly at Tag.

And that baby needs a da of its own.

The whirling thrum of the small drone’s rotors buzzes overhead, and I make my way back to the truck. “Battery change?”

“Aye.” Kieran lands the little machine on the paved road, picks it up and swaps out the battery with a new one.

I make myself useful and slot the spent battery into the charger while he gets the drone back into the air and back to the farmhouse.

We’ve done this enough times now that we’re damned efficient. We can get the drone here to swap batteries and back into position in under five minutes.

Maybe when we get home, we can hire ourselves out as a Dublin duo surveillance squad.

I’m thinking up a name for us when a flare of body heat is picked up on the edge of the screen. “Whoa, hold position. What the fuck is that?”

Kieran hovers the drone in place and comes to the back of the vehicle to have a look. I point to the screen. “Go back a bit. There was something in the trees you just passed.”

Kieran swings the drone back a few yards to where we stood the first day, hidden by the stand of trees at the far edge of the property.

“There. What is that?”

Kieran frowns, leaning closer to get a better look. “A deer, maybe? Hard to say from this angle.”

As much as I want to confirm who is in that farmhouse, my instincts tell me there is a more important issue at hand. “Reposition the drone. Let’s figure out what that is.”

Kieran does his thing and the view shifts from the trajectory of the Sentinel safe house to the large flare of orange and red at the edge of the screen. As the drone moves closer, the large blob of thermal heat reveals itself as something more.

The thermal blob divides and defines until we can make out six separate bodies kneeling in the trees.

“That’s a recon team.”

Kieran chuckles. “Maybe. Or a bunch of local hunters spotted a buck and are hunkered down to get the shot.”

It’s possible but my gut says no.

“Go higher. Give me a look at the entire area.”

Kieran follows my instruction and adjusts the drone again. The picture on the laptop screen zooms out and I point at three other teams above, below, and across the property from the first.

“Whoever they are, they’re locking the place down to move in.”

Kieran meets my gaze. “What do you want to do?”

I consider the options and possible outcomes. No matter how I slice it—there are only two of us.

“We’ll watch. If these fuckers attack, they’ll either fail and we’ll learn how good Sentinel is, or they’ll succeed and grab the person being protected. Maybe they’ll help us confirm it’s Siobhan.”

“And if it is, that gives us a good idea of who these fuckers are.”

Aye, it does.“Tag warned me the Mcguires were on the hunt. Given how reckless a full-scale attack is without proper recon, this could easily be them.”

The south side of Dublin is run by violent thugs who think cruelty and brute strength make them powerful.

Actually, I hope these are Mcguire men because getting themselves killed while trying to one-up me would make my day.

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