Page 21 of Crimson Tears

This was a waste. A total feckin’ waste.

“We have the two guards,” Boris says over the comms, sounding pissed as ever.

Perfect, maybe we can at least get information out of them.

Boris directs me over the comms to the destination, and all too soon I’m face to face with the assholes who likely let a shipment of kids be moved from here.

“Today is not your day, motherfeckers,” I say, my face feeling flushed as both the heat and my anger begin to rise to new heights.

Nessa and Boris stand over the two men bound by their feet. I don’t even look at them though. They can be mad about deviating from the plan later, now is not the time. Instead, I focus on getting answers.

“I suggest you start talking. Now!” I aim my weapon at one of their heads and watch as they both flinch. “I’ll only ask you this once. If I do not hear what I want, someone’s brainswill be painting the pavement before you can even think about blinking.”

“Cillian,” Nessa says soothingly, as if trying to calm a wild animal. “Let’s touch base first, then we can proceed from there.”

I clench my jaw and harden my stare at her. It physically hurts me to look into her eyes, but I do.

“We don’t have time. I want to know what they knownow.” I direct my attention back to the men and say in my deadliest tone, enunciating every word clearly and slowly.

“Where are the kids?”

Both of the men sneer at me, but one of them cracks, shaking his head nervously.

“We really don’t know much other than they came to get them about six hours ago.”

“Do you know where they were headed?” I demand, almost to the point of praying to some kind of gods for answers.

“No. There’s only one road out of here, but from there they could have gone anywhere.”

I close my eyes.

We were so fecking close. If we had just moved in last night, this would all have been a different story.

“We got a call,” the other man says arrogantly. “The boss thought they were being watched and wanted to get the property moved before anyone could steal it.” He scoffs. “Good thing they were prepared.”

I glance towards Nessa then to Boris. Then I shoot the asshole in the head.

“What the fuck was that for, Kid?”

Boris asks, stepping back even though he’s already splattered with blood. I would love to say I wasn’t purposely hoping that I would get to kill the one in front of him, but like I said, it must be my lucky day.

“He didn’t say what I wanted to hear,” I answer flatly, like it’s the most obvious thing in the worldbecause it really is.

The other guy is shaking, holding his bound hands up in front of his face as if that would stop my bullet from burying itself between his eyes.

“What else do you know?” I ask.

“I don’t know where, b-but I overheard something about a training camp up north.”

Tears spill over as he struggles to get the words out. I feel like I deserve an award for not killing him right here and now.

“The name Reign came up, b-but it didn’t seem like that was the final destination, m-maybe a stopping point?”

I lower my weapon because that was actually helpful.

“I’m calling the team,” Nessa says, phone already to her ear before I can object. Holstering my gun, I stare down at the man, wishing I could kill him too. But I wait like a trained dog because I know I’ve already pushed my luck a bit for the day.

Nessa updates Evie on the information we were able to gather, and I look anywhere but at her and Boris. I pretend that I’m scanning the perimeter, but we all know these are the only men here today.

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