Total pages in book: 87
Estimated words: 80902 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 405(@200wpm)___ 324(@250wpm)___ 270(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 80902 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 405(@200wpm)___ 324(@250wpm)___ 270(@300wpm)
“Well. Guess we better find out,” Sledge says.
21
HELLFIRE
Something’s gotten fucked and I wish I could say it was me.
General rides at the head of the pack, looking chill and relaxed on his ride, but I fucking know that old bastard. He’s pissed and I’m glad. This has gone on long enough.
Badger and his crew are like an open wound, festering in the club. He seemed like a great fit when he joined. Experienced, good in a fight, listened to direction, and he had contacts up north that brought in new business. Soon as he was promoted to officer, something shifted, though, so fucking slowly that I didn’t notice when the noose fell around my neck. But he’s been pulling it tight ever since, while being real fucking careful to keep his own nose clean.
I get why he’s got it out for the Eagles. He used to be a Pit Viper. I’d carry a fucking grudge too if they wiped my club out. Not that I miss them. No tears shed here. They were more trouble than they were worth, even if we picked up some of the surviving stragglers that seemed useful, Badger included.
Maybe that was a fucking mistake.
Like he can tell I’m thinking about him, Badger pulls up close, putting himself even with me like it’s a damn statement. He glances my way with a twisted grin that sets my teeth on edge. I flip him off, and he laughs, turning his attention back to the road and adjusting his visor to block the sun.
Three sharp cracks cut through the afternoon sky, one after another in quick succession.
My training kicks in before I even process that something’s happened, and fire burns across the back of my neck. General goes down hard, his bike suddenly leaning right and slamming over the highway divider into the center ditch.
Fuck!
Then it’s all chaos. I’m the first to stop, letting my bike hit the pavement as I throw myself off and jump over the divider to get to General. “Prez!”
He lies still, like a puppet with its strings cut, half under his bike. When I drop to my knees next to him, I already know it’s over, but that doesn’t stop me from checking.
“Motherfucker, wake up!”
I shake his shoulder, trying to rouse him, get any kind of reaction, even if it's pain, but there's nothing. We wrench the bike off him and get him rolled over. His eyes are wide open, glassy and unseeing. There's no rise and fall of his chest. I grab his wrist, but there's no pulse.
“Hellfire…” says Savage, one of the old timers. “Look at his head.”
Just above his ear is a perfect circle, straight through his fucking skull, leaking blood and who the fuck knows what else into his hair. It was over the instant I heard the shot. He was fucking executed, and whoever it was knew exactly what they were doing.
And they might still be out there. “Shooter! Stay low!”
But it’s dead fucking quiet. Whoever it was, they got exactly what they wanted. Our prez is dead.
“Shit, your neck,” Ghost hisses.
I touch where I felt the sting and my fingers come away red. Whoever hit General was going for a full fucking house. “God damn it!”
“Fuckers tried for me, too,” Badger growls. He gestures to his bike where one of the mirrors got blasted in half, the glass missing and the metal and plastic mangled. “Do you believe me now? Those fuckers act like their shit don’t stink but as soon as we got out of their front yard, they didn’t fucking hesitate.”
“How the fuck would they even have time to set that up?” But at the same time, they’re the only real threat we have at the moment.
Not that we don’t have enemies. Shit, we’re fucking mercenaries, there’s plenty of people who think we’re the scum of the fucking earth. If it shoots, explodes or generally fucks shit up, we’ve probably had our fingers on it, but our business relies on us staying neutral. A mercenary you can’t trust to do what you pay them for is a dead one.
“We don’t have fucking time for this,” Savage says. “Collect our—our dead and get back to base.”
I nod. We’re sitting ducks in this ditch. “Help me get him—”
“We should go back and fuck their shit up before they have time to prepare.” Badger smiles, showing all his teeth like a fucking lunatic. “This was a message, and you're reacting just the way they fucking want you to.”
“What’s the alternative? Leave General in the dirt while we charge into their ambush? Say it is the Eagles who set this up. You think they sent a gun out to do this and then pulled out the grill to have a fucking barbeque when we get there?”
“You're a fucking pussy. We’re not gonna let the Eagles get away with this.” Badger’s speaking loud enough to carry to the whole group, and from the angry grumbles, he isn’t the only one ready for blood.