Crooked Crows by Elena Lawson

The Rover chewedgravel as Grey pulled out of the driveway and bumped onto the road leading down past Briar Hall and into Thorn Valley. The tension in the front seat enough to form a physical weight on my chest. Meanwhile, Rook picked something out of his teeth with a switchblade in the back, lounging over the entire bank of seats like we were headed to a fucking picnic instead of a meet with our would-be enemies.

Sometimes I envied him. His ease in high-tension situations. He’d always been more at home in chaos than in calm. It was immobility, idleness, that was his kryptonite. My jaw flexed as I thumbed a quick message to Dies.

Corvus: On our way.

His reply was immediate.

Diesel: ETA 12.

We’d hang back if we looked like we’d arrive before him, better to pull in all together. And since Diesel refused to ride with us, this was the best we had. Dies would park near the old warehouse, but not right at it. Just in case anyone fucked with the Rover. Having two getaway vehicles wasn’t the worst idea, but I didn’t like the idea of him riding alone.

I wished he’d at least brought Pinkie or Cash. Or, hell, both of them, but I could understand the reason he didn’t, too. Diesel had control over his men, but vengeance could sometimes outweigh sense when push came to shove. I couldn’t say I wouldn’t go absolutely fucking feral if anything happened to my brothers or Diesel. Heads would roll. And I wouldn’t be waiting to find out for certain who was at fault and who wasn’t.

My back stiffened as the phantom scent of Ava Jade passed under my nose, my lips parting to taste it. I concealed a soft groan with a clearing of my throat as I shut my eyes, cock twitching in my jeans as last night’s encounter replayed in my mind. Fuck, she’d smelled so good. Fresh and soft like spring moss and sandalwood, but also sharp, like some kind of strong herb. A poison that lingered in my memory longer than anything else.

Damn.

I shook my head, trying to dislodge the ghost of her from my thoughts. I needed to focus.

“Five minutes,” Grey warned as we turned off Freemont Street and onto Clove Drive, leaving Thorn Valley.

I polished off the last of my coffee, setting the metal mug down with a thud back into the cupholder. Still, the scent of her lingered, distracting me. Like a stain left branded on the inside of my skull.

The feel of her tight little cunt squeezing my fingers, hungry for me even though she tried so hard to fight it.

The moment she lost that fight.

Her expression as she came, her muscled body hard and soft in all the right places.

I didn’t sleep at all last night.

Not even for a fucking second.

I was afraid of what I’d see when I shut my eyes.

“Fuck,” I muttered, inching my window down for some fresh air. Praying it would wash away the stain of her long enough for me to focus on this. On tonight.

“What’s eating you?” Rook asked from the backseat.

A snarl curled my upper lip. What was eating me? Rook had been smug as fuck since we left the Crow’s Nest, like he had a secret he was happy to keep all to himself. It made me wonder, not for the first time, what happened between him and Ava Jade in the street last night.

“We’re here,” Grey said.

I sat up straighter, squinting out into the gloom. The sleepy town was all but uninhabited these days, but here, just outside of it, it really was no man’s land.

An old industrial area that housed only rickety old buildings and warehouses left to desiccate on a pockmarked gray paved road. Grey rolled to a slow crawl up the street. The area we wanted was at the very end. Another half a mile up the road into the dark.

“Where’s Diesel?”

As if on cue, headlights bounded behind us, and I drew my weapon, finger on the safety. Rook did the same and Grey lifted his from the back of his pants to lie flat on his lap. We had a few higher-powered weapons already hidden strategically at the meet point. Just in case. But if their plan was to box us in on the road, this was all we had.

The uneven canter of my pulse steadied, settling into the focused rhythm of a hunter. My vision sharpened, and I blew out a slow breath, watching the approach of the car until I recognized the distinct shape of the headlights. Saw a flash of red paint.

“It’s him,” I said. “keep going.”

“Anything on cams?” Grey asked, and Rook tapped on a small tablet screen in the back, bringing up the feed of the area. It showed a view of the rear yard of the largest warehouse, where the meeting would take place. Diesel had the camera well hidden, and it hadn’t sent a notification of movement, so I had to assume the Aces hadn’t arrived yet.

“No, nothing,” Rook replied, and I heard the swish of liquid in metal as he took a nip from his flask.

“Hey,” I warned. “Not too much.”

“Fuck off, Corv. I’m fine.”

Heat licked across my back, but I didn’t push him. He’d been in a way since last night. I wasn’t sure if he slept, either.

That girl was going to get us all killed.

Destroy us from the inside.

She was everything I worried she would be and then some. And yet, I couldn’t imagine letting her escape our reach. If she ran, I knew my beast would hunt her. Drag her back. Make her mine.

“Let me see,” I growled, twisting an arm to the backseat for the tablet, scraping her from my bones.

He dropped it into my palm and leaned back, draping an arm over the seatbacks, letting his hand hang down into the trunk space.

The screen showed a wide-angled view of the lot behind the old warehouse at the very end of the road. Stacks of old tires lined the edge nearest the tree line, wrapping around the bulk of the yard. Stacked haphazardly, some piles having fallen over, leaving an obstacle course of tires strewn over the dirt and gravel.

An old bobcat and some other equipment withered in the yard. Broken and rusted. The bobcat closest to the southern side was where our extra firepower was hidden. It was where we’d approach the yard and make our stand and would provide the best cover and quickest escape should we need to use it. Meanwhile, the Aces would be mostly hedged in by the mountains of old tires on the other side.

They wouldn’t like it, but if they had nothing to hide and wanted to clear their names from Diesel St. Crow’s shit-list, then they wouldn’t have a problem with it.

Dies veered off to park near the front of the warehouse while we went off road, bouncing over a cement piling and onto the overgrown grass between two warehouses, driving right to the yard at the back.

Grey spun the Rover around in a sharp U, letting the back end fishtail out so we were parked just ten or so meters from where the meet would take place, the Rover positioned for a fast and easy exit.

“Good here?” Grey asked to confirm, and I gave him a nod. He could’ve had a career as a professional driver if the life hadn’t claimed him first. As it was, I wouldn’t trust another soul in that seat. Not even myself.

“Shit.” I hopped out of the Rover and gripped my gun with both hands, glaring as the unmistakable shape of Diesel rounded the edge of the warehouse, walking toward us alone. “What the fuck, Dies, you were supposed to wait for us to come get you.”

“It’s fine,” he said with a wave of his hand, his face coming into view as he stepped from the shadows and into the moonlight. “They aren’t here yet.”

I grit my teeth but didn’t argue. It was no use with him.

He stalked past me, running a hand over his beard, rings glinting in the light.

“You set up a spotlight?” I asked as he went to double-check the bobcat, showing us where the guns were hidden in the rusted metal bucket.

He nodded. “It’s on a timer. Should be on any—”

The light clicked on, expanding to shed its glow over the yard.

“—second,” Dies finished. “It’s not as bright as I thought, shit.”

“It’s fine,” I assured him. We could do this just as well in the dark, but the light would keep anyone from trying to draw on us while concealed in the shadows. Plus, Diesel liked to look in the eyes of those he met with. He said the truth was always written there, no matter what words fell from their mouths.

Rook and Grey did a quick sweep of the neighboring warehouse yard, keeping tight, guns up and ready.

“Clear,” Grey announced as they made their way back, Rook tossing something up and catching it in his palm. I thought it was a rock, but as they came back into the light, I cursed.

“Rook, we said no fucking grenades.”

He wrinkled his brow at me like he had no idea what I was talking about.

“Don’t look at me like that. We talked about this.”

“It’s just one,” he argued, tossing it up again and catching it. The pull-pin rattling.

Diesel laughed, clapping Rook on the shoulder as he came to stand with us, and my jaw flexed, frustration rolling down my back. A crooked grin pulled at one corner of Rook’s mouth, but it faded when he lifted his gaze back to me.

“Killjoy,” he muttered and pocketed the grenade, lifting a cigarette to his lips.

Unbelievable.

The unmistakable sound of a vehicle’s approach filtered into my ears, and I lifted a hand, signaling for silence as I listened.

“They’re coming,” I told them. “One car. A van maybe. A max of maybe eight Aces.”

“Just like we thought,” Diesel replied, drawing his weapon to click the safety off only to return it back to the sling across his chest beneath his leather jacket. “Get into position, boys.”

We did the same, readying our weapons and getting into position near the old bobcat, but not directly behind it. Close enough that we could dive for the automatic rifles in a pinch.

Headlight passed by the gap between warehouses and the roll of tires stopped on the other side, out of sight.

I cursed Diesel’s lack of foresight in not installing a cam on the roadside, too. I’d have liked even a thirty-second advantage of knowing how many there were before they made their way to the yard.

Diesel seemed to notice his mistake, too, a frown turning down the edge of his mouth for an instant before his all-business mask was tacked back into place. The unfeeling face of the founding Saint.

The crunch of boots over dry dirt sounded at the opposite end of the warehouse as the Aces made their way down the alley toward the yard.

Movement in my periphery drew my attention for a heartbeat and I stilled, my hand twitching toward my gun, my mind racing with possibilities of an ambush. My brows lowered as I registered what it was. A reflection in the crooked mirror on the rusted-out bobcat, reflecting the image of the Rover parked at our backs.

The breath was robbed from my lungs as the shadow of legs appeared beneath the chassis.

Shit.

The softest click of a door closing told me the fucker was inside the Rover. Maybe the whole time.

I hedged closer to Dies, ready to give him an elbow and a signal to the threat at our backs when she crept out from behind the sleek black SUV and darted for the tree line.

No.

Fury and dread coiled in my chest, burning and sinking and heavy.

My little sparrow didn’t make a sound as she flew to the trees, concealing herself in their darkness. My eyes jerked to the guys, to Dies, to the Aces piling into the yard across from us.

No one else noticed her.

There was jack shit I could do.

If she was discovered spying, she’d be killed. Or at the very least interrogated to within an inch of her life. My pulse throbbed in my temple and the muscles of my neck stiffened, burning.

Stupid fucking woman.

What the hell was she thinking?

I should have known. Her smell. Her scent had been all over the goddamned Rover, and I chalked it up to another sleepless night. Convinced myself she was driving me insane when all the while the little viper was hidden away in the trunk.

Stupid.

So so dangerously stupid.

Diesel elbowed me, and I blinked, refocusing my attention to where it should be. Squarely at the seven men standing opposite us in the yard.

“Welcome,” Diesel said, lifting his arms, the warm welcome serving the dual purpose of showing them that he wasn’t holding his weapon and telling them that he wouldn’t use it so long as they didn’t give him a reason to. “I think we all know why we’re here, so let’s get to it, shall we?”