Page 6 of Venom's Sting

Rage gestures to me from one of the back tables and lifts two coffees into the air. I walk straight back and slide into the seat across from him and take a sip of the warm brew he gives me.

“Damn, that’s good bro,” I tell him, genuinely pleased with his choice in coffee.

“I told the barista to add two shots of expresso.”

“I can tell this is going to be my new favorite place,” I tell him brightly.

Rage always knows when I’m faking it though. It’s like this fucker is a mind reader. “You wanna stop pretending everything is okay, and tell me what’s bothering you?”

“I’m the one who fucked up the surveillance, if I hadn’t taken my eye off the ball we might have gotten some more intel.”

“What do you mean? We’ve all been working on that. How is it that you’re blaming yourself?”

“Remember that first day when we got our assignments?”

“Yes,” he responds. “You were to go out to the exit they were all using at that time.”

“It was exit 408. I got there and was distracted by a woman—”

“Whoa! Dude, seriously it’s time you got yourself laid,” Rage interrupts.

I shake my head, “No, it wasn’t like that. I saw this woman running for her life, that’s what distracted me. Long story short, some old codger in hunting gear shot my drone out of the sky. By the time I went back and got another drone, it was too late. They must have seen the drone get shot down and changed up their pattern.”

“Fuck, Ven. I bet Siege was pissed.”

“Not really. He understood,” I say.

“So what about the woman?” he asks.

“She was being chased by his dogs. She barely made it to the interstate and jumped in a car with some woman and they sped away.”

“Oh fuck. That is seriously messed up. So what’s the story? You find anything out?”

I take another sip of my coffee, before answering, “No. I checked the local newspapers but there was nothing listed regarding crimes or attempted kidnappings. And no police reports made. We got Brent, who works at the local cop shop to see what he could find, there was a wellness check made to that address later on that day, but nothing untoward found. I’m guessing it just looked worse than it was.”

“I’m assuming he’s the one that shot your drone out of the sky, right?” Rage asks.

I nod, totally hating myself for getting distracted by a situation, “I got involved in something that wasn’t my concern, and inadvertently alerted them that they were being spied on.”

“I don’t know about anyone else but something like that would have been distracting to me as well. I would have chosen saving a woman’s life over tracking that van, if it came right down to it.”

“That was my train of thought at the time. I can’t imagine what was going on in that situation, but I’ve lain awake worrying about her more than once.”

“Yeah, I hope she’s okay too. It sucks that your favorite drone got destroyed. That was the one with the cool zoom lens, right?”

“Yeah, I spent months tinkering with that thing. It was the smoothest flying drone in my entire collection.”

“Well, if you built it once, you can build it again, maybe even better.”

“Working on it now, I wanna incorporate thermal imaging. When we rescued Haze’s old lady, I had to get Talon to scope the place out with his infrared goggles and send me the images. Hopefully if this baby works, then we got enhanced eyes in the sky.”

“Wish I had your brains when it comes to things like that. I can hardly get my computer and tablet to sync.”

Gleefully draining the last of my coffee from the cup, I tell him. “I wish I had your talent for saving people’s lives. You’re invaluable to the club, especially now Doc’s semi-retired.”

“At least the old coot still rides with us, they don’t make ‘em like that anymore. I’ve got him to thank for introducing me to you guys. After leaving the military and taking a job in EMS I was still lost—at least my battlefield surgery skills aren’t going to waste.”

I shoot him a quick grin. “Bet you ended up with more than you bargained for there, didn’t you, my friend?”

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