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Which was why we were going to burn it down.
“What do you think?” I asked Rolan, keeping my voice low.
“No movement for a while. No lights on. No bikes out front.”
“Could be around back.”
He nodded. “Could be.”
“But we’re in position and ready to go.”
“We’re not turning back.” He met my gaze and his eyes were steady and hard. “You know that.”
I grunted in reply and the car lapsed into silence again.
I wasn’t afraid. That wasn’t why I hesitated. I lived with the fact that I might get shot or worse every day of my life, and it had stopped holding me back a long time ago. No, I worried because the alley seemed like too good of a target. Clifton knew me and he knew I liked to be aggressive, so there was a small part of me that thought this could be a trap—and if it was, they’d set it up perfectly.
Rolan was right though. I had the guys fired up and ready. They were in position and eager to get moving. I couldn’t stop this even if I wanted to, and so whether this was a trap or not, we were moving in.
“Send word. We’re going in ten.” I leaned back in my chair and watched the alley, eyes squinted against the night, trying to spot any movement that would give away a trap.
Nothing happened and ten minutes ticked past in tense silence. I could almost hear Leigh trying to talk me out of this, but I kept myself centered and focused on my goal. We were hitting Clifton tonight and hitting him hard.
When I was time, I wordlessly opened my door and stepped out into the night. Rolan and the twins came with me. Igor popped the trunk and took a large plastic cannister from the back, handed it to his brother, and took another. We began drifting across the street toward the bowling alley, keeping hunched forward and low. Nothing happened, no flashes of rifle fire, no booms and screams n the night. I saw the other teams move out, crossing the street further down at the far end of the alley, sprinting across the parking lot toward the structure.
I motioned for the twins to take point and Rolan brought up the rear. I jumped over a small concrete wall and landed on the pavement. Samuel’s team was the closet to the building, their guns out and glinting in the moonlight. Wind blew through nearby trees and I thought I smelled something strange, something metallic and sharp—and it took me a second to realize that it was motor oil.
I didn’t know why I could smell oil. That didn’t make any sense. The lot was empty and I didn’t see any stains on the ground. The smell was pungent, strong enough to linger in the empty lot. Weeds grew through cracks and I thought I saw a shopping cart abandoned near a tree.
Samuel and his guys reached the wall as the first gunshot rang out in the night.
It was a crack, sharp and terrible. I shouted and ran forward. I didn’t know where the gunfire came from, but I saw Samuel get hit and drop to the ground, blood spilling from a wound in his chest. More cracks, more bullets whizzed through the air and smashed into the ground. I grabbed Rolan and threw him against the wall.
“Open the doors!” I yelled.
He grunted and ran forward. More cracks, more shots, and I realized they were on the roof. I caught Ivan’s eye and pointed upward with my gun. He nodded and passed the info down as Rolan knelt in front of the front door and began to work his magic. The guy was incredible with a lock pick and I didn’t think there was a single door in the world that could stand up to him.
More cracks and shots, but the guys were all pressed against the wall. Bullets bounced off the pavement, ricocheting into the air. Rolan got one door open and kicked it in. Samuel’s team barreled ahead, leaving Samuel behind on the ground, gasping for air as his blood pumped from his veins. There was nothing they could do for him now, and I knew the guys would want revenge more than anything in the world. I felt a growl escape my lips as I followed my boys inside, gun up and ready to meet any resistance.
“Spread out,” I barked. “Find the stairs and cover the back. Ivan, Igor, spread the gasoline. We’re burning this fucker down.”
Ivan and Igor grinned at each other and began spreading gasoline from their red cans all over the rug and the tables. The shoe booth and register was straight ahead—the snack stand to the left and a little arcade to the right—and the alleys were beyond the shoe stand taking up the bulk of the building.
