Played by Cara Dee

Eleven

Playing the waiting game in a house that was primarily a hiding spot did something to people. With drones and surveillance in place, they only went near the brothel at night when they could take cover in the darkness. By day, there wasn’t much to do to pass time. They lost track of the times they’d done inventory and cleaned their guns. Darius and Ryan got irritable and took it out on each other. River became a statue. He barely spoke—he just observed and took notes. Reese used their modest backyard to see how many push-ups he could do, how many laps he could swim underwater, how long he could stand on his fucking head.

Gray and Niko coached each other through their own workouts in the yard—when they weren’t eating their way through the house.

It amazed Darius how much Gray could eat.

Pizza for dinner? Great. The knucklehead would scarf down an entire pie and then dive for the garlic knots and buffalo wings. And an hour later, you’d find him in the kitchen popping a bag of chips.

Then he’d give Darius shit for eating a cheeseburger without any vegetables…

“Darius, did you hear back from Willow?” Alicia hollered from the bedroom.

“Not yet!” Darius grabbed a beer from the fridge and trailed out onto the patio.

Today would put them all to the test. It was the day of Alfred Lange’s birthday party at the Venetian, and everyone was restless. Ready to go, ready to just fucking do something.

The week had been too long.

It’d gotten cramped too. Now that everyone was here, privacy was a fantasy. Every morning Darius and Gray woke up, there was someone sitting at the desk five feet away going through footage and audio.

Darius stepped out onto the patio and sat down across from River with a heavy sigh. His neck was stiff from last night’s work, where he’d essentially lain flat on his stomach in the desert, just waiting to see if anyone showed up.

No one had.

Ryan and Gray were in the pool, which wasn’t the best idea. For the knucklehead, anyway.

“Gray, you’re supposed to be fishing with my pop right now,” Darius said. “Coming home with a tan won’t look great.”

“I beg to differ—I’ll look hot,” he grumbled. “I can’t do anything fun! I can’t sit in the sun, I can’t see my own kids, I can’t go sight-see.” He rolled off the pool float and into the water, then made his way to the ladder.

Darius felt for him, but all those fun things had to wait. This wasn’t a vacation.

Although, it sure as hell felt like a vacation to watch Gray climb out of the pool, glistening wet, wearing nothing but boxer briefs. Jesus Christ, his body was something else. Darius took a swig of his beer and couldn’t really look away.

“So let me get this straight,” Gray said, grabbing a towel off the edge of the pool. “We’re not doing a damn thing tonight. Nothing at all. This party is gonna go down, and we won’t do anything.”

“Nothing,” Darius confirmed. “It’s not worth the risk of exposure. That place will have cameras all over.”

Gray dragged the towel over his body and squinted due to the sun. “Just seems like a waste.”

“That don’t mean we’re not workin’ in the background.” Ryan spoke up from the pool in a drowsy voice. “We’ve got Alicia and Squeezy pulling headshots from every camera feed they can hack in to, and unlike you, I’m working on my tan.”

Darius chuckled.

Gray scowled at Ry, not that he noticed anything. “Maybe you should work on your abs instead.”

“Oh-ho!” Darius laughed—hard—and knew just how much that remark stung his brother.

Ryan blew out a breath. “I will not tolerate abuse against the elderly, boy.”

“I didn’t hear you for all the Pringles in your mouth, Gramps.”

“Darius! Are you gonna let him speak to me like that?”

“God yes.” Darius smiled into his beer bottle as Gray stalked over to him with a satisfied little grin.

* * *

The night between Sunday and Monday brought a palpable shift in the atmosphere around the house. The men were no longer bored and restless, just exhausted and determined. With more and more suspected auction attendees showing up in town, the team suddenly had a lot to do.

Darius and Gray had pushed their bed closer to the wall to make more space by the desk. The wall was plastered with printouts from security cameras around Vegas, mainly the airport and car rental services. So far, forty men and women.

“I think we can take this one down.” Darius tapped a pen to one of the printouts, then took a step back to survey the wall.

“Just because they checked in to another hotel?” Elliott asked.

River spoke up, seated on the edge of the bed. “No, but because they don’t fit the profile anymore. Now we know they’ve rented a two-seater convertible, there’s the hotel as mentioned—they’re staying at the Tropicana—the wife hasn’t left the penny slots all night, and they have golf booked in for tomorrow morning at eight. Doesn’t exactly strike me as a couple in town to pick up a human slave.”

Elliott showed his palms. “Hey, no one’s happier than me to eliminate another prospect. But we know these guys are careful. Not all of them fit the profile of wealthy sleazebag. They blend in.”

They both had valid points, but Darius took down the printout anyway. The couple wasn’t on Willow’s list of suspects; she’d only added the footage because the husband was gonna play golf at the same course where Alfred’s son was a member. And so were hundreds of others.

“Darius.”

Darius looked over his shoulder, finding Gray in the doorway.

“You gotta get some sleep, hon,” Gray told him. “You’ve been up all night.”

Darius nodded with a dip of his chin, knowing the kid was right. “Five more minutes.” It would be enough to talk to the guys a little bit before he got some shut-eye in another room. Once Gray ducked out again, Darius addressed the others. River, Elliott, Alicia, and Reese. “Right now, we have eighteen confirmations.” Eighteen faces that Willow and Ally had found in their citywide camera search, eighteen faces that were on Squeezy’s list of the twenty-seven suspects, eighteen dots connected. “That means we’re missing at least nine—and hopefully we have them here on the wall. While I get some rest, keep digging. Keep watching the feed from the rental place, keep listening to the audio from the Mercedes, and keep checking in on Alfred’s son.” AJ had been on the move earlier today; in fact, he’d driven halfway toward the old brothel before he’d turned back for some reason.

“We got this, buddy. Get some sleep,” Reese said. “We’ll wake you up if we need you.”

Darius nodded. “Same goes if Willow calls. She’s trying to get into some chat server AJ’s on.”

“Got it. Go.” Elliott clapped Darius on the back.

Alicia piped up without looking away from her laptop. “Remember to eat. We’re so close. If any of you fucks up tonight because you forgot to go the bathroom or something, I will end you all.”

Darius snorted a tired laugh and walked out of the bedroom.

* * *

He woke up a few hours later to Ryan yelling, “And don’t forget to shave afterward!”

Darius threw an arm over his face, sleep clinging heavily to his senses, and felt how easy it would be to fall back asleep. Hell, he could slip into a coma for all he cared. He was so fucking tired.

“Baby?” he heard Gray murmur. “I wish I didn’t have to wake you up, but we’re gonna have our final rundown of everything in five minutes.”

That tightened Darius’s stomach and tore him from sleep.

Final rundown.

In just a few hours, they’d surround that old brothel and storm the place. It was what they’d trained for, prepared for, the past several weeks.

“Did you talk to the boys?” he asked drowsily.

“I did.” Gray came over and sat down on the edge of the bed. Ryan’s bed, originally. “They’re gonna have a movie night with Erin.”

That was good. They’d be distracted—not to mention safe in Aunt Erin’s house.

Darius hummed when he felt Gray’s fingers in his hair.

“Why do we have to shave?” Gray wondered.

Darius yawned. “To make sure the gas masks are airtight.”

“Ah. That makes sense.”

“Mm.” Darius scrubbed at his face, then pushed himself up reluctantly and kissed Gray’s shoulder. “I’mma take a leak. I’ll meet you in the living room.”

“Okay. Gimme one of your sleepy kisses first.”

“Sleepy kisses?” Darius lifted his head and smiled tiredly, curious.

Gray smiled too, and he leaned in until their lips met. “Yeah, when you kiss me all lazy-like.”

Darius wasn’t sure what constituted sleepy and lazy, so he just went with it. He slid the tip of his tongue alongside Gray’s, then deepened the kiss and cupped his cheek. It was their last quiet moment when it was just the two of them. The last moment before they risked it all.

“Yup, that’ll do it.” Gray swallowed and exhaled unsteadily. “Please be careful today. Remember that you’re a father. We have kids to come home to.”

Darius nodded with a dip of his chin, despite that he couldn’t comply. When he was careful, he hesitated and second-guessed his decisions. His actions were slowed down, essentially turning him into a target. He had to do the opposite. He had to go into combat with the mind-set of having absolutely nothing to lose. That was when he was unpredictable to the enemy. That was when he was lethal.

They parted ways briefly so Darius could go to the bathroom and freshen up. In the meantime, everyone else gathered in the living room.

Darius straightened after washing his face, and he caught sight of his reflection in the mirror as a drop of water fell from his nose. He recognized the look in his eyes. He’d seen it before every mission. Determination, focus, assertiveness—and just a pinch of fear that he kept hidden from the world. A fear that never let him forget that this might be the assignment that sent him home in a body bag.

Which was just an empty figure of speech in his world. Private military contractors disappeared. If he were killed tonight, he’d be buried in the desert.

He dried off before leaving the bathroom and joining the others. Alicia and Dante stood in front of the flat-screen, waiting for him, while the others occupied the couches and chairs.

“Before Darius takes over, I just quickly want to cover the steps for the recovery,” Ally said. “River, Reese, Gray, and Nikolaj—you will be waiting three klicks away in the trucks Boone provided, and you’ll stay there until we give you the signal. At which point, the threats will have been neutralized in one way or another. Any questions?”

“Uh, yeah.” Gray lifted his eyebrows. “What if we never get the signal? We’ll need a backup plan for if shit hits the fan.”

Darius cleared his throat. “We can’t afford to fail, and you’re not coming near danger. End of discussion.” He moved on, ignoring Gray’s flash of anger, and started at the beginning. “Given that we require the cover of darkness to stay hidden, we’ll wait behind the ridge two hundred yards away, no matter what happens at the brothel. I don’t care if we see someone topside shoot a victim in the head, we’re staying put until it’s dark. It’s the only way we can advance without risking detection.” He hadn’t exaggerated to Gray. They had one shot. Just one. Failure wasn’t an option, so everyone had to follow the rules. “As y’all know, we’ll have Squeezy and Alicia in our ears. Squeezy will track us through the cameras on our helmets, and Alicia will stay back here and cover our backs through the surveillance we’re running topside.” That included following the trackers planted on the fourteen vehicles they’d had in their sights all week.

Dante was next. “Once everyone has arrived at the auction and it’s dark, Darius and I will move in with Ryan and Elliott right behind us and Tariq on the tail.” He paused. “Presuming there’s a lobby or front area in the compound, heavy security is to be expected, and they’ll have their guns aimed as soon as we breach the door. We’ll remove the most immediate threat and take control of that area before we continue. Tariq will stay at the entrance and keep us posted.”

After that…it was anyone’s guess. Judging by the soil samples, the compound was at least 200 by 100 feet, or—as Gray would say—a little larger than a hockey rink. Who knew what area would be next? Several corridors, maybe? Or would it lead straight into a showroom where the auctions were held? They didn’t know.

“Depending on how many directions there are to go, we’ll either stay together as one unit or split into two,” Darius continued. “In case we gotta split up, Elliott will go with me, and Ryan will cover Dante.”

“We’ll set up cameras along the way too,” Dante added.

That one was a new addition, something Darius had protested at first. He got the reasoning behind the idea; it was good to have an extra pair of eyes—Willow’s—so she could report back and see what was going on in every hallway, nook, and cranny. But it’d seemed like a hassle, a time-consuming one, until she’d explained that each camera was the size of a golf ball and had an adhesive suction cup at the bottom. All they had to do was slap it on the wall, and if the texture didn’t allow for the suction cup to stick, the glue would be backup. So Darius agreed in the end, and Willow had overnighted them to the house.

“It’s important everyone pays attention tonight,” Alicia stressed. “There will obviously be a lot we can’t predict after our entry, and we still have many unanswered questions. We don’t know if Alfred’s wife will be there—or his son, for that matter—we don’t know how many victims we’ll encounter, or how long it’s going to take to eliminate the threats. So don’t speak unless you have to—don’t clog the line with random comments and jokes. I’m looking at you, Ryan.”

Darius grinned, and many of the others laughed.

Ryan did a double take at her and was instantly offended. “What the fuck, woman? Do you know how quiet and still you gotta be as a sniper? This is where I fucking shine.”

Ally merely waved him off and continued. “Anyway. Darius and Dante will lead you through the combat. Recovery and rescue are next, and then I enter the picture. Reese, you will come pick me up, and we will deliver the carbon monoxide, which will be released in the air vents.”

Darius caught River’s frown from where he sat on the armrest of Reese’s chair, and it wasn’t the first time it’d happened. Whenever the carbon monoxide was mentioned, River’s expression revealed just a hint of objection. But it was too late to discuss it. Alicia had ordered a new armored door and was confident they’d have the time to replace the one they were gonna destroy. Willow had offered her two cents, too, and believed they would pull it off.

Checking his watch, Darius couldn’t help but zone out a little. He could run through their plan in his sleep at this point, and he was antsy to get it over with.

When he got home, he wanted to sleep for a week, only waking up here and there to hear Gray, Jayden, and Justin laugh at some movie they were watching in bed. It’d become the best fucking background sound, the boys giggling their rears off at cartoons in the morning. Only reason Darius actually considered installing a TV in his and Gray’s bedroom.

He let out a breath and rubbed a kink out of his neck.

It was time to shut off thoughts of family life. Today, family didn’t exist.

* * *

The sun was just starting to set when Darius and the combat unit dumped their gear in the bed of the heavy-duty truck they’d borrowed from Boone’s source. Darius didn’t look back. He knew Gray was standing in the living room window with a worried expression.

He scrubbed a hand over his clean-shaven jaw and waited as Ryan and Tariq piled into the back seat. Dante would drive, Elliott took the passenger’s side, and—

“Quinn.”

Darius turned toward the door and spotted River coming out.

“We can’t exactly fly in with a Warthog, but y’all still have the option to call in CAS if you need it,” River said, extending his hand. “Desperate times, desperate measures. You ain’t alone.”

Darius shook his hand firmly and nodded once. “I appreciate it.” More than he could express. River and Reese had agreed to help out in the background, so for them to say they’d step up and be backup—or close air support—meant the world. But it couldn’t come to that. If everything went south, Darius would rather die than involve Gray, and there wasn’t a chance in hell River and Reese would be able to hold the knucklehead back.

River withdrew his hand, clapped Darius on the shoulder, gave it a quick squeeze, then trailed back into the house.

Darius took a breath and got into the truck next to Tariq.

“All right, we’re on the move,” Dante said and started the engine. “Let’s hit the desert.”

Christ. If there was one landscape Darius was sick of, it was the motherfucking desert.

It was an uneventful ride along the quickest route out of Henderson and into the burned nothingness where only shrubs and the occasional Joshua tree rose from the ground. Vegas glittered in the distance, airplanes and helicopters hovering around the skyline, with a sky behind that shifted in orange and purple.

Before long, all signs of life had vanished, and Dante turned onto the road that stretched between Vegas and some little unincorporated community nobody had heard of. And right in between the two was an old brothel about to collapse.

Dante drove past it.

Half a mile later, he slowed down and drove off the road. With the windows rolled down, they heard the hard crunch of sand and rocks under the tires.

The burden of having brought everyone to this place tonight weighed heavily on Darius, but it worked in his favor too. He’d always worked better under pressure. When a lot was at stake, his focus turned razor-sharp.

Once they were behind the ridge, the first part of their plan was complete. They were out of sight and hadn’t seen a car for miles.

“Surprised I didn’t see any of Squeezy’s drones in the air,” Ryan mused.

She was waiting for the darkness too.

It would be pitch black within the hour.

Dante stopped the vehicle when they’d traced their way back to the brothel, only now with a fifty-foot-high hill and a generous stretch of desert between them. It would be a workout to get past because of the giant boulders, cacti, and loose rocks. Then there was the fun fact of Ryan having a knack for attracting predators, and they didn’t have the time to deal with a rattlesnake bite tonight.

It was all too familiar to Darius. Mere months ago, he and Gray had hidden behind a ridge much like this one, waiting for the fall of darkness before they investigated the little house where Jackie had been kept against his will.

Ironically followed by Ryan providing backup and stepping on a goddamn rattlesnake…

The absolute silence around the men now was their only companion as they climbed out of the truck and started pulling their gear from the cargo bed.

Everyone was dressed the same, in long-sleeved tees and utility pants the color of the desert, and Kevlar vests slightly darker and a bit greener. They filled their side pockets with canisters, mags, drugs, the cameras—

“Where’re my zip ties?” Elliott patted his pockets, then dug into his duffel in the truck bed. “Never mind, found them.”

Darius took a step back from the scene and lit up a smoke.

He rolled his neck and breathed deeply.

Giggly glimpses of Jayden and Justin flitted past in his mind, and he clenched his jaw and rid himself of the images.

He took a pull from his smoke, lifting his gaze to Ryan, and refocused. Everyone would have a medic kit strapped to their person, just the most useful stuff—to stop bleeding, to create a sling, and surgical glue to close wounds—but Ry’s kit, that Tariq was currently fastening to Ry’s back, held more than the bare minimum. Just in case. The pouch was only about two inches thick, yet large enough to cover most of Ryan’s Kevlar vest.

“Sometimes I wonder how many bodies are buried under these grounds,” Elliott murmured.

Hundreds, Darius guessed.

“Hopefully we’ll add approximately forty to that number tonight,” Dante replied. Then he shifted his stare to Darius. “I haven’t thanked you yet for calling me, but I’m glad I’m here. No matter the outcome, this is worth fighting for.”

And dying for?

Tariq nodded in somber agreement. “They’ve raped, murdered, tortured, and enslaved. They do not deserve to see another dawn.”

“We’ll be their fucking apocalypse,” Ryan said firmly.

A quiet “hear, hear” rang out among the guys, Darius included. The men were right. Dante was right. No matter the outcome, this was a war worth fighting.

After finishing his smoke, Darius pocketed it and continued gearing up. He strapped his combat knife around his thigh, his boot knife went into the sheath along the side of his boot, a karambit was attached to his vest, and he clipped a small folding knife to his belt at the base of his spine.

Two handguns and one pump-action shotgun for combat purposes. The latter belonged to Ryan and would help them breach any doors they might encounter inside the compound.

Speaking of things that won’t leave evidence behind… Military-grade buckshot ain’t one of them.

“It’s a treat to see you in full combat gear, big brother.” Ry smirked.

Darius waved off a hint of queasiness that surfaced inside him and mustered a smirk. Yeah, his work had rarely required this kind of equipment. Jeans, Henley, and leather jacket had been his standard outfit. Sometimes a suit if he worked security for someone up in the ranks—or undercover. It depended on the gig. But full combat? Twice in his whole career.

He retrieved his ear protection next and activated the headset, figuring Willow was waiting for them to get online.

“DQ online and standing by,” he said, adjusting the headphones.

Ry grinned. “That’s my brother, Dairy Queen.”

Jesus. Must’ve been thirty years since he’d last been called that. It’d always been Ryan and Ethan.

“Took you long enough,” he heard Willow respond in his ear. “The first guest just arrived at the compound. I’ll keep you guys posted. Alicia just went to the bathroom.”

Noted. Darius smiled faintly.

“RQ online and standing by.” Ryan was next. “How are you, baby girl?”

Then Elliott. “Jones online and standing by.”

That made Willow clam up, and Ryan wasn’t going to get a response. Willow did all right with reporting events and talking at an invisible crowd, but conversations were out of the question.

“The Fly online and standing by,” Tariq said.

Dante was last. “D online and standing by.”

“Two more cars approaching about a quarter of a mile out,” Willow stated.

Darius had a feeling they’d all hear the faint sound of Willow tapping on keys throughout the night. At least when it was quiet around them.

“The good news is that the door to the compound opens from the outside,” Willow muttered to herself. “The first guest—the man was on the list, and he brought his security. They opened the door on their own. No key or anything.”

That was interesting. Darius and Ryan exchanged a pensive look, because they’d all been wondering. Ever since they’d installed their own surveillance of the compound’s entrance, they’d only ever seen people—the same two people, in fact, presumably in charge of preparations—enter using two keys.

An unlocked door meant there were most likely guards right on the other side, keeping watch and making sure only invited guests came through.

It was Tariq’s initial visit and Willow’s drones that had uncovered the entrance and allowed further investigation. Surrounded by decaying floorboards, rubble, and dust, they’d found a set of stairs underneath an old door that looked as if it’d just been thrown onto the floor. They knew better, of course. It was a decent tactic. Hiding in plain sight. But no more than decent. After all, they’d found it fairly quickly. All it took was enough curiosity to go through the entire downstairs and not be afraid to look underneath things.

On the other hand, Boone hadn’t found it. He’d actually been out here. At some point, they’d tracked Alfred’s son to this spot. But if one was expecting something else, the search stopped. Casey and Boone had thought they were going to stumble across a place that wasn’t on the brink of collapse. So once Boone came out to investigate and he’d found everything in shambles, he’d written it off. He hadn’t gone into one of the back rooms and lifted the aging green door that lay haphazardly on the floor.

That door was gone now. Or rather, it’d been stacked against the wall early this morning. But that was it. There was a hole in the ground, a visible hole, but nothing else. The guests tonight weren’t arriving to a red carpet, so to speak.

“Next arrival. Hold,” Willow said.

“Alicia back online,” Ally filed in with. “Two guests in the first car. Willow, can you follow their movements? I want to see where the car that dropped off the first guest is now.”

“It seems several are arriving now,” Willow continued. “Three more cars on the horizon.”

“Yeah, trackers show they’re all on their way,” Ally replied. “First one, let’s see… Okay, it’s back at the Venetian, and I don’t think we can do anything about the drivers.”

Darius glanced up from the ground, having forgotten his immediate surroundings while paying attention to the women. The drivers didn’t bother him in the grand scheme of things. It was unlikely they knew too much of what was going on anyway. In his experience, they operated under “Don’t ask questions, keep your head down, collect your pay.”

He walked over to the truck again. It was getting darker by the minute, with big clouds rolling in. He checked the camera on his helmet and made sure it was switched on and attached properly one last time.

The others followed suit as Willow reported what she saw on the feed. She couldn’t get facial recognition on all of them, but several others got crossed off the list. A few guests brought both spouses and security, so the team was already looking at a higher death toll than expected.

They’d cross that bridge later. Maybe not all of them had to die. Darius didn’t want blood on his hands that shouldn’t be there. And since they wouldn’t be showing their faces, they would have the luxury of being able to decide that down the road.

After attaching his gas mask to his belt and sticking a balaclava into one of his pockets, Darius deemed himself ready to proceed to the next step of the plan.

“I have two of my drones in the air now,” Willow announced. “ETA sixty seconds.”

Ryan grabbed his night vision goggles, as well as his night vision binoculars, and Elliott’s helmet was equipped with a monocular scope that picked up the faintest heat signals.

They would lead the way over the ridge.

“D, you have the C-4?” Darius asked to make sure.

“Yup.” Dante shouldered a backpack with a grunt and said he was ready to go.

They were all ready.