Page 85 of Resisted

“I’m on it,” I told Roth before snagging Bella’s hand. “We’ve got to climb up to the main flat surface. Boyce and Gage are already up there. I’ll follow behind to make sure you don’t fall.”

“When we get up there,” Roth started, his voice a low whisper, “I want you, Bella, and Gage to take the ruins of the warden’s house, the lighthouse, and plaza. Boyce, Rig, and I will go over the warehouse and water tower, Taras and his friend have got the theater. We’ll all meet at the cell house entrance. I suspect that’s where he’ll be.”

I looked at all the eyes on me, waiting for my reaction. “It makes sense. See you then.”

The minute my foot touched the dirt, I looked to my group and headed left, finding the nearest shelter to hunker down under to give me enough time to scope out their guards and the locations. From a quick glance, they didn’t have many on watch. That was their first mistake. Sure, an island could secure you from oncoming intruders, but only if you were smart enough to see them coming. With over a mile of land, one person couldn’t see everything, especially in this fog. Hell, they needed men five feet apart around the entire perimeter to protect against us.

The coast was clear on the dirt road that ran behind the theater building. “On three, I want you to run. Keep to the shadows. We will climb the slope behind the lighthouse and warden’s building.”

“Why can’t we take the path?” Bella’s voice was barely audible.

“We need to stay off the main roads as much as possible. If they’re housing Silas in the cell building, that’s where most of their manpower will be. We need to clear the surrounding areas before getting there, and walking that close on a main road is like offering ourselves up on a platter.”

“Oh.”

“Oh is right, sweetheart. I don’t want to be anyone’s meal today,” Gage added. “I’ve got the rear.”

“You’ve always got the rear,” I joked.

“I’m excellent at being the last one to slide home. Why ruin a good thing?”

“I really hope you two are talking missions,” Bella whispered.

I ignored her. “One. Two.”

“This is the first mission I’ve been on that requires clothes, sweetheart.” I could hear the laughter in Gage’s voice, and if we weren’t on an abandoned prison island in the middle of the fucking San Francisco Bay, I would probably punch him. Instead, I ignored him.

“Three.”

I reached my hand back, finding her fingers and latching on, then pulled her down the path as I ran hard to get to a covered location. I was fast and she struggled to keep up, but there was no way we could afford to be slow. If I needed to, I would carry her, but as if Gage had read my thoughts, he scooped her up, tossed her over his shoulder, and continued booking without slowing. When we reached a point where the trail ended and the road dipped into a ditch before the land rose, we stopped, hiding ourselves as we crouched in the ditch. Gage flung her forward before gently placing her on the ground between us.

“Where to first, boss?” Gage kept his eyes alert as he looked around.

I debated. The ruins of the warden’s old house was a shell of a structure with no meat on the bones, but there wasn’t much to hide behind besides the walls. The lighthouse was a greater threat, a bigger danger than the warden’s home, but that was only if they saw us.

I looked up, searching for any type of light to let me know that someone was inside and active, but nothing filtered through but the eerie darkness that mixed with the howling wind and fog to make my skin crawl. Nothing good ever came from darkness and wind. Nothing good that I could think of anyway, and I hoped that just this once, my assessment proved wrong and the dark and wind hid us all enough to allow our mission to succeed.

We should clear the lighthouse first, I knew, but the time it would take to clear the ruins would be minimal. Then we could feel safe as we entered the enclosed space. “Ruins. It should take five minutes, tops.”

“Got it,” Gage confirmed right before he urged Bella to stand, preparing her for the climb. I went first, letting Bella sandwich between us as Gage covered the back. The climb wasn’t hard if you were experienced, but it wasn’t the most pleasant either. The slope of the ground, covered in grass slick with dew from the misty fog, made each step forward slow. Precision was needed because with one wrong step, you could slide back down into the ditch.

Touching my feet on level ground again was a relief. I reached down, grabbing ahold of Bella’s bicep and dragging her up before Gage followed. We plastered ourselves against the mossy stone of the building’s shell, the cool dampness of the surface seeping into my shirt and chilling my skin. We weren’t there long, just enough time to get our weapons back in our hands and get moving. I went left, Gage right, and Bella, well she followed me closely, sticking to my back as we slinked along the outskirts of the building.

When I’d covered half the perimeter and Gage had covered the other half, we met back together along the wall in the exact spot we’d separated from. Then we climbed inside through one of the gaping openings into the center of the ruins. There wasn’t much but foundation and walls, and if someone had been planning to hide inside, they would have been uncovered nearly instantly. There was no roof to shelter the inside stones from the elements, no glass windows to protect. What once was a beautiful property now lay in shambles around me, just cracked and broken stone and the uncontrolled growth of moss.

“It’s clear,” Gage finally announced.

I used my chin to gesture toward the lighthouse. “We’ll circle around the back, while you keep to the nearest side. Meet up at the door.”

My weapons felt heavy in my hands as I moved toward the opening. I lifted my foot onto the crumbled stone and was just about to move when I froze. My stomach suddenly tightened with unease seconds before a bullet tore through my shoulder and my body was thrown back into Bella’s.

Chapter 36

SILAS

The painthat laced my shoulder tore me awake. Through my one good eye, I looked around and saw no one close by. In the distance, my impeccable hearing heard the sound of a shot fired, then nothing. I smirked, knowing they were coming, knowing the pain in my shoulder wasn’t my own, but one of my men. A shot so ill placed as that would only infuriate them and drive them harder.

“What the fuck are you smirking at?” The leader, who I’d learned was named Russ, used the back of his gun to hit me directly in my jaw. A new wave of blood filled my mouth, nothing I wasn’t used to over the last few days.

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