“Really?” Kane sounds almost amused despite breathing hard. “You’re bringing a knife to this kind of fight? That’s your play?”
The guard doesn’t waste breath responding. He lunges with the blade in a surprisingly skilled thrust aimed at Kane’s gut. This guy has knife training, knows what he’s doing.
My guy is getting back up, blood running from his nose and a cut above his eye, and there’s murder in his expression. He comes at me again with a roar, just raw fury.
I let him get close, then I drop low, hook my arms around both his legs, and drive forward, sweeping his feet out from under him. He slams onto his back before he even realizes what hit him. I dart to his back and get him in a rear naked choke, my forearm across his throat, needing him to join his friend outsideand pass out. He thrusts, throwing punches at my head… fucking ass, but he’s weakening fast.
Kane leaps back from a swishing blade, but the edge catches his jacket and probably cuts into flesh. He doesn’t even flinch. He counters immediately with two brutal punches delivered in rapid succession, one to the throat and a second to the jaw. The guard makes a horrible choking sound, then his knees buckle and he drops like someone cut his strings, the knife clattering away across the tile.
I release my guy, who’s gone limp in my arms, and I drop him.
“You good?” Kane asks, breathing hard and holding his forearm where the knife cut him. Blood is seeping between his fingers, but it doesn’t look arterial.
“I’m upright,” I gasp, my ribs screaming where that first charge connected. “You?”
“Same. Cut’s not deep.”
Before we can catch our breath properly or assess our injuries, I hear more footsteps from the back of the house, heavy boots on hardwood, moving fast.
Someone is approaching, probably heard the fight.
“Fuck!” I pull my Taser from my belt, hands shaking slightly from adrenaline, and the second he rounds the corner from the hallway, I hit him center mass without hesitation.
The probes catch him in the chest, and he convulses, every muscle locking up, then drops to the floor, twitching.
“Fuck, I don’t have the energy for another fistfight right now,” I mutter, changing the cartridge on the Taser with fumbling fingers.
“You and me both.”
We drag all four unconscious bodies into the kitchen—they’re heavy as hell, dead weight—and zip-tie them together in a pile against the cabinets.
Kane is checking the criminals’ faces carefully now, pulling out his phone with his uninjured hand and opening our current active bounty list. He flips through photos methodically, comparing faces to the men we just took down.
His expression changes, eyes going wide. “Noel… they’re not random guys living here.”
“What do you mean?”
“They’re on our list.” He holds up his phone so I can see the screen. “Carl Brenner, fifty-grand bail on armed robbery. That bald guy is wanted for aggravated assault and attempted murder, seventy-five grand. The one with the black hair is wanted for drug trafficking, hundred grand. And this new one I’m sure is on the list too.”
I lean over to verify, and he’s absolutely right. They match our active cases. “Why the fuck would wanted criminals all be hiding in the same location? That’s the opposite of good strategy.”
Kane’s eyes go hard with understanding. “This house is collecting them. Someone’s gathering wanted criminals in one place on purpose.”
“A goddamn safe house for fugitives,” I breathe, the full picture becoming clear.
“Someone who benefits from having wanted criminals in their pocket,” Kane adds. “People who owe them everything, have nowhere else to go, and will do whatever they’re told because the alternative is prison.”
We search the rest of the house quickly and quietly, moving through rooms and finding no one else.
Bedrooms with mattresses thrown directly on bare floors. Minimal furniture, just what’s absolutely necessary. Empty food containers and trash piled in corners. The whole place smells like too many people living in too small a space without enough hygiene.
At the back of the house, there’s a door standing slightly ajar, cold air flowing through the gap.
We exchange a look, then carefully slip through to a backyard veranda. Outside, in a small corral maybe thirty feet from the back of the house, surrounded by a hastily constructed fence made of scrap lumber and wire, are our reindeer. They are pressed together nervously, stomping and shifting restlessly but alive. Thank fuck we found them.
“We’re at the right fucking place,” Kane whispers.
A loud bang echoes from inside the house, the sound of something heavy crashing and metal scraping.
