Page 45 of Complete Me
“You ready?”
“Yep,” I reply.
“You can hang back, I’ll go in.”
“Not a fuckin’ chance in hell, Cam.”
“You prepared for the worst?” His question grates on me, sharp and unyielding, but I know he’s not wrong to ask. I just can’t let my fucking mind go to that dark place. She’s alive. I can fucking feel it in my bones.
“Can we ever prepare for that shit? You know it as well as I do.”
“Together?”
“Together.”
And then his mask is put back in place as he spins on his heels. I take a second to pull my hair back in a bun, wanting it out of my face as the rain soaks it.
“Garage is on the southwest side of the park, but we don’t know how spread out they are. We’re going to clear every building as we work our way in. Malice, take half the group and go east, Sin, you take the other. Start on the west. Rogue and I will go center, we’ll meet in the middle at the garage. Kill anyone who so much as breathes, but do it as silently as you can. If you find innocents, get them to stay quiet. We’ll get them out after we recover Rogue’s woman.”
There’s a brief moment of collective agreement before Chaos speaks up again, pulling his gun from its holster and nodding for everyone to get through the fence. “Head out!”
Everyone moves quickly, half our members going left and the other right, while Chaos and I stick to the center, watching each other’s backs as we walk through the decaying land. Burned-out vehicles, crumbling buildings with busted-out windows, and trash littered everywhere make it all look more like a war zone than any part of Amberwood. It’s no wonder they chose this place.
The flashlights illuminate a path for us as we come up to the first building, a crumbling cement shack with no clearindication of what it was prior to its collapse. Chaos nods his head as he takes the lead, holding his gun low with a flashlight in front of him. I clear the sides, checking behind us one last time before following him in. I’m eerily calm, adrenaline finally taking over and allowing me to get through this with a level head as I follow him inside. There are only two rooms, and we clear them quickly, no sign of anyone being there in a long time.
Flicking our lights off, we creep through the deserted roads to the next building. I hear the soft murmur of voices floating on the wind and grab Chaos’ thick leather cut to pull him back, putting my pointer finger over my mouth to signal him to be quiet, then tapping my ear twice.
We listen, and the unmistakable grunt of someone turns my veins to ice. I follow the sound to the other side of the building, to find a burly man with a bloated gut and balding head brace himself against the wall with his pants around his knees, jerking his tiny dick in his fist.
I move quickly, pulling out my knife and getting the jump on him before he even has time to release his puny cock. I tower over him, covering his mouth and pressing the blade of the knife to his throat, just enough so that blood starts to pool.
“If you so much as breathe too loudly, I’ll slit your fuckin’ throat right here. Nod if you understand.”
The bastard nods in agreement, making this way too fucking easy. It’s clear they’re patching anybody with no real give a fuck about loyalty. Numbers don’t mean shit if you don’t have loyalty. Chaos moves in front of him, pressing a knife so low I can’t see where, but by the way the man jerks and whimpers, I’m guessing he’s just discovered how the pointy edge of a knife feels against your balls.
“Where’s the girl?”
So fucking slowly, I move my fingers off his mouth to let him talk.
“Wh-what girl?”
“The girl that was taken. Light brown hair, tiny thing. Where the fuck is she?”
“Prez wants her as his pet. They’re holdin’ her inside the garage.”
Exactly where we thought she’d be.
“How many are with her?”
“I dunno. A few? She’s a feisty one. Fucked up a few of ’em when they brought her in, so they’re watchin’ her close. You ain’t gonna fuck her. We don’t get ’em until Prez is done with ’em. He’s gotta loosen ’em up for us.”
I can’t listen to another word. I slit his throat from ear to ear quickly, blood gurgling from the thick open wound at his neck and spilling down his front. Chaos jerks away, shaking out his hand and giving me a look that says I’ll pay for that later.
“Let’s move,” I tell him, already following the building to get to her. My boots clomp through the mud, the rain barely a trickle now, and I do my best to stay quiet while walking as quickly as possible with Chaos hot on my tail.
Small floodlights beam overhead, and I feel it in my gut that she’s there. I’m so fucking close I can practically feel her warm body heat seeping into mine. I just need to get to her. Chaos’ comms go off in a low hum, Sin’s voice coming through the speaker.
“We’re clear. Took out a few stragglers. She’s inside the old garage. Looks like there’s a dozen or so scattered in there with a few hanging in the front.”
