Page 72 of Hawk's Cry

Archangel is watching me. If he misinterprets my pose as pleasurable contemplation of the forthcoming take down of my supposed enemy, that’s on him.

“How many men have you got?” I ask him.

He studies me for a moment. “Enough.” He taps the drawing. “I’ll send in one team to cause a commotion at the main entrance. That way they’ll be looking in the wrong direction. They’ll all head down to the gate and be taken by surprise when we hit them where you suggest.”

I force my features to remain composed as they are, again calming myself with the thought Wizard would do exactly what I would. Mouse will be watching the monitors carefully and be on the lookout for a fake attack. Fuck knows, when there’s danger about, that man never sleeps.

“More security that end of the compound,” I warn him.

“So they’ll see us coming,” Archangel smirks, “and all come running, leaving their families unprotected. Don’t forget, they don’t even know to expect me.”

Oh, but they do. I stare across the desk at the man who tonight will take his last breath. The thought is a cheering one and makes me smile. “They don’t know what’s coming at all,” I agree.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Eli…

We’re back in the truck I arrived in, but now there are others following behind.

Archangel had picked my brains for how best to approach the compound. I took some joy in knowing we were in for a bumpy ride, taking the trucks as far into the forest as possible, then proceeding on foot. The men bitched about carrying loaded packs. In the end, Archangel relented and left some of the heavier artillery behind once he saw the terrain and understood just how far men would have to carry it. I revise my opinion about whether these men had ever served. Wannabe soldier boys just playing games, no way would they pass their fitness training as anything more than rifles, handguns and ammunition appear too heavy for them.

The discipline, I notice, also only extends to standing to attention and looking the part. Archangel took longer than I’d have expected getting them to move in something resembling formation. Once we got moving, several fell behind, and we were further delayed waiting for them to catch up.

As a kid I played in amongst these trees, as a teen I hunted for deer. I know the forest intimately. I could have been evil and taken them on a long, circular route but I’d tossed up tiring them out against getting this over and done with. Of course, the darkness also helps both sides. When dawn breaks, Archangel will see the trap he’s heading into. The sooner we get there, the quicker we can get this finished, and Archangel will cease taking in air. Liv will be free and we can go home.

This time, I make a silent promise to her, I won’t clock out. I’ll be right there beside her. Belatedly setting up the nursery, making sure everything’s ready for when the baby arrives. I’ll get a job and we’ll make a fresh start in Tucson. A sense of loss floods through me. I know they’ll let Liv and I stay while I get my head straight and we welcome the baby, but at some point we’ll have to strike out on our own. My fault. I fucked up. Club life is behind me. But we’ll make do with our small family, which might even grow in time, and I reckon we won’t be ostracised as previously, and maybe some of the brothers will stay friends.

There’s a thrashing behind me as yet again someone stumbles over a downed tree I automatically stepped over. My bad, I hadn’t warned anybody. Archangel had managed to find a small stock of night goggles from somewhere. I hadn’t wanted to ask him what for. But insufficient to equip all his men. Unlike the Devils who’d have helped each other, his men didn’t buddy up with the ones unlucky enough only to be guided by the light of the moon. I’m hoping on at least a twisted ankle or two to slow them down.

We reach the off-road racing track under which uncountable numbers of bodies are rotting. Road, an F.O.G. who transferred out years’ back, was a trial bike rider, and used this track to practice on. It will probably need to be extended yet again after tonight, or hopefully. I wonder how many will die tonight, or whether Archangel’s men will run when they realise their attack comes as no surprise. I wonder what welcome party Wizard has laid on, and trust it all goes to plan.

Shooting out my hand, I bring everyone to a halt.

“We’re at the fire break,” I tell them, speaking softly once they huddle around. “It’s a hundred feet of cleared ground. Need to go quietly and carefully from now on.”

“No cameras?” Archangel’s scanning around.

“No. As you saw, it’s not easy to get here this way.”

“Trip wires?”

“There. About ten feet in from the forest, and another ten feet before the fence. But as I said, they don’t work.”

“Watch out for the trip wires,” Archangel instructs anyway. “Quiet from now until we get to the fence.”

Archangel’s men are all dressed in black. I’m wearing blue denim jeans and a navy t-shirt. We’ll be difficult to see emerging out of the darkness. I make a mental note that we, they, should have more security out here. But I hadn’t lied and why we don’t is quite clear. Even motion sensor lights are likely to disturb people’s sleep when set off by a deer. We do normally have cameras though, and true to his word, Wizard has removed them.

Slowly we make our way across the hundred-foot-wide strip of cleared ground.

We’re on our way, Wizard. Can you see? Can you hear?

A shout, a call would get me dead, and worse, warn Archangel away. I remain restricted to shooting off the telepathic warning in my head.

What if I’m wrong? What if Wizard’s not as prepared as I expect him to be?

I’m a guide only. I’ve no weapon as Archangel doesn’t fully trust me.

I do hear a collective sigh of relief when we reach the six-foot fence. Archangel peers through the slats.

---