Page 63 of Centurion

“This is Alpha. All teams are accounted for and in position.” They’d decided to separate the compound operation into a subset of the main mission, and Jewell would be running that portion. The swarming of the two-block area could take a lotlonger than what the Shadows were doing. Ethan and Brando were working the electric shut-offs in all locations and any response to their assigned locations. Ethan and Brando had two each. He had the two in London, Ethan had Australia and DC, and Brando had Paris and Madrid. They’d gone over the assignments at least fifteen times in the last hour.

“I copy. Con to all personnel, we are ready. Standby.” He turned to Gabriel. “We have thirty seconds before I start the countdown.”

“Give me the mic.”

Con hit a few keys and nodded. “This is Saint. The Council has coded our primary target in this mission. Be safe. Whatever it takes.”

There was radio silence, but Con knew every last one of them said the ending of that phrase in their head.

Con took over the comms again. He took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and willed all his thoughts of Gabby out of his brain, at least until the mission was underway. He couldn’t mess it up. He looked at the time and started his countdown.

“Launch in thirty.” He called out the countdown with each tick off the timer. With one second remaining, he said the magic words, “All operators go, go, go.”

Con’s eyes were glued to the screen. The lights in Europe went out. He glanced twice at Gabby’s screen, but the plumes of red on the upper map caught his attention. “Sites one and three are confirmed.” Con checked them off his board. “Two, five, confirmed.” He stared at the last site. Even one place to launch those missiles from was too many. The last red plume erupted, and he let out a breath. “All sites confirmed. All operators check in when at safety point.” Which meant when they were out of Russia. Some of those sites were many hours deep into the country, so it would be a long night waiting for everyone to check-in.

He turned off his mic and snapped his attention to the houses on the lower screen. The incursion happening on Jewell’s screen was nothing but a bunch of red dots. He knew each was a team member and that Alpha and Jewell had the mission in hand. He leaned forward with his elbows on his knees. “Please, God,” he whispered.

“That has been my prayer since the day she entered the program and for every mission we perform across the globe.”

“That’s a lot of praying,” Con said and glanced up at him.

Gabriel sat down beside him and mimicked his position. “More than you can possibly imagine.” They stared at the video feeds of the houses the Shadows were now currently searching. Con clasped his hands together tightly, keeping himself from opening a channel and asking Gabby if she was okay. He had to trust in her training.

Dressedin black and wearing a stocking cap over her face, Gabby was through the door not more than fifteen seconds after the power went out. The tools she used to open the door were shoved into one of her many pockets. She slid through the kitchen and made a turn in the hallway.

A loud crash of something upstairs stilled her in her place. A slew of British-accented cuss words made their way down the stairwell. Occupied. The surveillance of the place had no traffic to or from the residence in the time they’d been watching. The lights appeared to be on timers as they turned on and off at the same time every night. She slid against the wall. “It’s not the box, all the other houses are out, too.” The speaker had to be at the top of the stairs. Gabby made a dash for a roll-top desk thatsat near the entrance of the hallway. She backed behind it and waited.

“I don’t care. Check the damn electricity.”

Gabby blinked and tightened. That accent was Russian. She was just about to whisper into her comms when she heard someone stomping down the wooden stairs. The man was mumbling about the task. Gabby pushed back against the wall when she saw a light in the hall. She watched as the man, holding his cell phone, headed toward the back of the house.

Carefully, she stood up, pulled her katana from its sheath at her back, and followed the man down the hall. When he stopped to open a door, she launched onto his back, pulled his jaw backward, and used the katana to sever his arteries and windpipe. The man crumpled under her, and she dropped soundlessly to the floor, holding his head as he wilted to the carpet. She made sure the head didn’t bounce off the floor, then returned to her hiding position.

About a minute later, a third voice called down the stairs. “Harry? Oi, Harry? What the bullocks is going on?”

Gabby calmed her breath and glanced down at her katana. She put it back into its sheath, closed her eyes, and focused her senses on what was happening. The disgruntled argument upstairs ended, and the sound of steps coming down the stairs opened her eyes. She pushed back into her tiny corner and watched as the same type of light illuminated the hallway. She didn’t wait. When the man passed, she slid out of her corner and moved. Using the garrot fitted in the waist of her black pants, she used the weighted end like a whip and slung the garrot, wrapping it around the man’s neck. Without hesitation, she grabbed the weighed end and, with all her strength, pulled it tight.

The man was a beast, and he spun. A lamp tumbled and crashed to the floor. Gabby pulled the man backward. Hestumbled to his knees, still clawing at the garrot. She jammed her knee into his back and sawed through his neck in four sharp tugs.

The crash of footsteps running down the stairs turned her. The man had a gun in his hand and fired without turning around. He was yelling in Russian into his phone. Gabby sprinted after the man and launched off the stairs, flying and crashing onto his back. They spun and grappled. She used every evasive maneuver she’d ever learned, but the man was strong and quick. She moved to grab her katana, and that was when he nailed her to the floor under his weight. Through her stocking cap, she could see him. It was Abrasha. His hands circled her throat, and the bastard smiled down at her. “It has been a week since I killed a woman.”

Gabby struggled to get her leg out from under the man’s weight, and black spots started to dance in front of her eyes. She bent her leg and snapped the heel off her boot. With a flick of her finger, the razor-sharp dagger extended. With her vision tunneling, she stabbed the fucker with it.

He released his grip and moved for her knife. Gasping for air, she had enough training to know to stab him again, that time in the shoulder as he lunged to take the dagger from her. She lifted her other leg, disrupting his balance and sending him toward her hand with the knife in it. When he was off her leg, she snapped the other heel and extended it as he tried to pull the knife out of her other hand. Gabby lifted with a guttural scream and slammed the dagger into the fucker’s back. He lunged forward and rolled.

She wasn’t anticipating the fist he sent into her face. As she flew backward, he lunged to his feet. Gabby jolted to her knees and threw the dagger in her hand. The blade flew true but low, landing firmly in the muscle of the right cheek of the man’s ass. He screamed and grabbed at the dagger. “You’remine, motherfucker.” The words were choked out, but she didn’t fucking care. She withdrew her katana and jerked to her feet just as a black SUV skidded up. A gun extended from the window, and Gabby dove to her right, behind the driver who held the gun. She rolled as bullets hit the ground near her.

“He got away,” she croaked, unsure if Con had heard them.

Her father’s voice came over her earpiece. “No, he didn’t. Con alerted the perimeter and they had him stopped.”

A barrage of automatic weapons sounded from down the street. Gabby slipped back into the darkness at the edge of the house. She coughed and tried to ease the pain and choking sensation. “What happened?” she asked as she walked to the back of the house. Her breathing would give anyone her position, but she needed to vacate the area before the police showed up. They’d made a hell of a lot of noise, and neighbors were great at calling for help. She walked down the back alleyway and headed to her vehicle.

“He got through the barricade. The UK police are in pursuit.” Con was on the comms that time. “Are you all right?”

“I will be.” She took off her mask and pocketed it, putting her hair up in a high ponytail. “I stabbed him two or maybe three times. Back, shoulder, and I buried a dagger in his ass. There are two targets dead in the house.”

“Centurion, you get the only house that’s occupied, and you shoved a dagger up the target’s ass? How’s that fair? You get all the fun.” That voice was one she knew. Reaper’s laughed comments brought more remarks from the rest of the peanut gallery on the comms.

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