Page 74 of Crimson Tears

Nessa and I were happy with our life. We had found peace and passion together, for each other as well as our work.

Now, it feels like all of that could change on a dime.

???

By the time I make it to the large steel structure, sweat dripping from my brow and exhaustion threatening to have me toppling over the side of the mountain, a road comes into view along with a car I know very well.

“Father,” Alexi says as he gets out of the vehicle. Evie, Lev, and Damien follow.

“Where is Nessa? Cillian?” Evie asks in a rush, looking around and behind me.

“Back…” I can’t get the words out, my throat is so dry. Without having to ask, Lev throws me a bottle of water from the car, and I gulp it greedily, falling to my knees to rest in the dirt. The second I can get the words out, they practically burst from me.

“Fifteen miles, southwest. There is a bunker holding them. Two stories underground.”

Evie looks at Lev as Alexi grabs me another water and what looks like a nutrition bar. I try to shove them away, but he pins me with a stare I know all too well.

I grab the bar and hastily eat it while Lev pulls up something on his computer.

“How long has it been?” I ask Evie.

“Nearly six days. We didn’t think to look in the Ukraine because of the war. We assumed it would be too hard to cross borders.”

I nod in agreement. They must know people in high places to get us here. Thankfully, we do too.

“Oh fuck,” Lev says, rushing to the back of the car with his laptop in hand as he pops the trunk. A full LED display opens up and he plugs his computer in, his fingers typing frantically on the keys.

“Did you knock out the power?” Lev asks me.

“Cillian did.”

Lev shakes his head, pulling up some screen with a lot of green numbers and weird lines.

“I know how they have been one step ahead of us. The power going out crashed some of their defense systems. But this all makes sense now.”

His eyes stay on the screen, a revelation hitting him that none of us seem to understand.

Damien approaches him from behind, putting a hand on his back. “Babe, dumb it down for us.”

The way they look at each other, with so much love, scares me. It makes me question if I really could go through with keeping Cillian in Nessa’s life because I never see myself looking at him the same way Damien looks at Lev.

“Oh right, shit,” Lev says with a laugh, turning to us. “They have tech that has been seeking out my drones. Any time a scanning device appears within a mile of their perimeters, they are notified. Which is how they must have known we were watching them.”

“But they don’t know who we are, just that they are being watched?” Evie asks.

“Exactly.”

Alexi claps Lev on the shoulder. “So, how would we proceed here?”

Lev nods, turning back to his computer while talking. “I can disable it for now, but we will have to be careful from now on. I can’t rely on the drones to seek out the kids. We are going to have to do this the old-fashioned way.”

Damien’s fist pumps the air.

“Woooohooo,” he shouts.

Alexi shakes his head, and I look at Evie who just rolls her eyes. “He is excited to beat the shit out of people,” she explains.

“We need to get off the road,” Lev announces. “This is the main path that goes in the direction you were referencing. If they are sending more men in, they will be coming this way.”

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