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“Please, Cash. If you get me, Apollo, and Azrael out of here, I have a place you can all crash. You can get a legitimate job and the twins can go back to high school.”
Cash darted his eyes between him and the twins. And Echo saw it—the fear, but also the curiosity as the kid wondered if he was telling the truth or not.
“Cash…” Apollo whispered, and the pair stared at each other through the bars.
Was that a spark of something? Echo thought yes and played on it.
“Cash, get us out of here and you, Apollo, and Azrael can be together.”
After another moment, Cash didn’t agree to help them. Paralyzed by fear of Solomon did that to a person. Solomon had done the same fucking thing to him and was still doing it to Rogue and probably Fisher.
“I’ll be back,” Cash whispered and hurried from the cage area.
“All we can do now is hope he does the right thing,” Echo told the twins. Tears stood in Apollo’s eyes when he finally turned from Cash’s disappearing back.
“I’ve asked him before,” Azrael said with a sad shake of his head. “He won’t do it.”
“He didn’t do it before because we didn’t have help. He might,” Apollo whispered. “He might do it this time. Will you keep your word?”
“On my life,” Echo promised, gripping the bars so hard his hands hurt.
Hours passed and he really had to take a piss, so he used the bucket in his cell with his back turned to the kids. Shaking it off, he zipped up and glanced over to the boys’ cage.
“Do either of you know where this place is located?”
They shook their heads. So that meant although they had killed, it had been a controlled kill guided by Solomon. Or had Rogue moved up in rank?
“I hear a train whistle in the distance sometimes,” Apollo said, and then jolted to his feet when Cash reappeared and walked toward the cages.
With a huge bunch of keys clutched in his hand, Cash walked right over and handed them over through the bars.
Shit. This was going to take a while, plus the other cage. Echo tossed a glance at the narrow windows that ran along the top of the building.
Daylight was less than an hour away.
And that meant Rogue would be coming back.
Echo launched into action, trying one key after another, not giving a fuck that he was noisy as all hell. Cash anxiously waited, shifting back and forth on his feet and tossing glances over his shoulder. The twins were gripping their bars as if their lives depended on it.
Finally, Echo found the key that opened the cell door. Hurrying to the twins’ cage, he started jamming keys into the lock.
“Hurry, hurry,” Cash begged. “Rogue shows up before daylight sometimes.”
Fuck. And Rogue would probably come early because he was there.
“When I get them free, you stay on my ass. All of you. Stop when I stop and run when I run, you got that?” Echo shoved another key in the lock and it turned.
Panting, he jerked the door open and spun toward the wall of the warehouse. Even though there were sheets of heavy plastic hanging from poles as makeshift partitions and stacks of shit everywhere, he took them away from the open space and to the wall. It would be there along the shadows that they had a better chance of escape.
Remaining unseen was as easy as breathing for him, but being that stealthy with three kids in tow would be tough.
A door banged somewhere North of their position and Echo pulled them all into a huddle at the far wall. They wouldn’t be seen here in the dark, and here they were far beyond the light streaming over the cages. There was junk stacked here and plenty of places to hide.
“Stay quiet. Your lives depend on it,” he whispered. “Use those assassin skills and hide your eyes.”
All three boys immediately sank back and melted into the blackness as if they were one entity.
Rogue entered the warehouse, knocking heavy plastic out of his way. He took one look at the empty cages and cursed.
