Page 19 of Bought
“Do we ever talk?” He flashes that roguish grin at me, fully aware of his youthful good looks. “Lately, we end up yelling.”
“Only because you won’t agree with me,” I argue. “I think you like the sound of your voice echoing in this shithole.”
“If you’d just do what I say, we’d have no reason to argue,” he counters. “And we wouldn’t have to disturb the rats living here.”
We start civil enough, but soon enough, we end up loudly disagreeing over a high-value, high-risk shipment the Morettis are expecting. Blaze wants us to ‘intercept it.’
We need the cash, but I’m not sure it’s worth facing the blowback if they find out we’re the ones who stole it. I prefer to play it safe,at least until we figure out how the Morettis have been able to predict our every move.
Blaze aims to make a bold statement and leave a lasting impression. He storms off to his corner cave, muttering about “old men who won’t take risks.”
“Since we’re the only two here, I’m pretty sure you’re talking about me,” I holler back. I sit in the empty loading bay, gazing out at the cracked concrete and the puddles from the last rain.
I can’t seem to focus on anything but glimpses of her from last night.
I almost miss the sound—a hiss of tires just beyond the chain-link fence, a low, eager engine idling. Heart in my throat, I move to the cracked metal door, looking out.
“Blaze. We have company.”
I hear the scrape of his carton against the floor as he stands.
There’s a car I don’t recognize pulling up about a building’s width away from our door. It’s a black Caddy, late-model, shining like an oil spill, even in the dull light. I take a closer look. The windows are tinted darker than the law permits.
“Blaze! Take cover!” I slam the door shut, locking it.
The sound of the first round firing temporarily petrifies me. I am transported back to another day, another time, a different shot. The world erupts with a crashing sound of glass and noise, as the high windows shatter and shards of glass shower down.
Bullets rip through the thin steel walls of the warehouse, sending metal shrapnel whistling past my head. For a split second, I see muzzle flashes like camera bulbs.
Blaze is already crouched behind my desk, gun in hand, eyes wide but steady.
“They’re early,” he says, mostly to himself. “I thought we’d have another few weeks in this dump before the dogs sniffed us out.”
“Stay down,” I bark, but he’s ahead of me, crawling across the floor to the far corner where hidden explosives are layered behind a stack of forgotten legal boxes.
I dig for my gun, ripping the tape from the underside of the desk, feeling the satisfying weight of the weapon in my arms. The gunfire doesn’t stop—it's getting louder and closer.
“Fuck.”
They’re firing full-auto; something with serious stopping power.The bullets chew through the desk, splintering wood and ricocheting off steel supports.
I pop up and fire three shots through what’s left of a window, hearing the satisfying crack of glass and the heavy thunk of a body hitting car metal.
I duck as a fresh volley of bullets shreds the chair where I sat only minutes ago.
Blaze is a shadow, darting between covers, ripping the top off a grenade. He tosses it out to the street. I cover my ears, but they ring all the same as I feel the explosion in my chest.
As suddenly as it started, the shooting stops. Silence crashes down, heavy and complete. For a moment, neither of us moves. I exhale, the rush of adrenaline making my hands shake.
“You good?” I ask, voice raw.
He nods, checking the angle of his arm where a sliver of glass has sliced a neat line above his wrist. “Only a scratch.”
“Same.” I look down at my own pant leg, soaked in blood, but the wound is superficial.
“We need to get out of here. Now,” Blaze says.
“We agree on that, at least.”
