Chapter 17
I didn’t have time to signal anyone, and no one else saw him. He had a gun, and I watched in shock and horror as he knelt down behind it to take aim at one of my guys. A shot rang out, and I saw one of our newest members take a nasty fall. A couple of guys riding near him were obviously shaken by the incident, as they lost control of their bikes as well.
Then, shots rang out from another direction, from the parking garage some of our members had just pulled out of. I saw a couple more bikes go down as we were ambushed. The guys had no chance to get out of the way. We were just getting picked off left and right.
Then, shots rang out behind me, and I pulled the bike back underneath the awning, knowing anything they were shooting could have easily pierced the thin sheet metal over me. I pulled a bandana out of my back pocket and tied it around my mouth and nose. I ditched the bike and ran inside the building, listening to the hail of bullets raining down mercilessly outside.
I pulled out my phone and texted Andre back at HQ.
Ambushed! Under fire right now.
Send backup? he texted back.
No. Hunker down, I told him. I’ll text you when we’re safe.
A moment later, Dante rode up to the building and ducked inside with me. The air wasn’t as heavy and rank as it had been earlier when we first arrived.
“How many down?” I asked him.
“I don’t know. I saw five, maybe six go down before I circled around to come back for you,” he said.
“That was dumb. You should have gone back to HQ and waited for me. Andre knows I’m here.” I held up my phone.
“Gage was right behind me, but I think he went the other way around. We were trying to scope out how many shooters there were,” Dante continued.
Just then, Gage pulled up and coasted into the parking lot in front of the building. Just before he reached the awning, though, he sprang back from his bike and flipped over behind it, sending it crashing into our bikes while he lay limp and lifeless on the ground right in front of us.
“Oh fuck this,” Dante growled, bringing his rifle around. “There are two to the left, one on top of the building next door, and the other across the street from him. There are at least three to the right, two in the parking deck and one on top of the building across from it,” he added as he stepped outside.
It took me a minute to realize what he was telling me. I was still staring down at Gage’s fallen body. I couldn’t believe how quickly it had happened. One second, he was on his way back in to see us, to join up with us and regroup before making a move to get us out of this mess. And in that same second, he was on his back, his body bent at an unnatural angle. The next moment, his bike was being carried by momentum alone into our bikes parked under the awning.
Then, Dante was on his way outside to stand over him with his gun drawn, trying to take out the shooters, knowing damn well they would have taken him out just as easily as they had Gage. And I was just standing there, dumbfounded, staring at the body on the ground and the man standing over him playing hero. There was no telling how many other guys were down on the pavement outside.
Dante started shooting. The rat-a-tat-tat-tat of his gun snapped me out of my trance and brought me back into the moment, forcing me to realize my right hand man was standing his stupid ass out in the open firing back at these assholes who were trying to kill us. I couldn’t let him do that alone.
I joined Dante outside, both of us standing over our fallen brother as if protecting him from further injury or insult. We stood back to back and fired on the men shooting back at us. I got the shooter on top of the building across from the parking deck and turned my gun on the two men shooting at us from the garage. I got one of them and the other ducked back into the darkness.
Dante stopped shooting behind me, and I glanced over my shoulder to see him turning around.
“Got both of them,” he said with a proud smile.
“Yeah, I got two of them on the other side, but one of the guys in the parking garage looks like he left.”
About that time, we heard the screech of car tires from the far side of the parking deck.
“Well, at least he’ll be able to tell Fang what happened here,” I said.
“Yeah, tell him that we took four of his men out, and that there are still at least two of us left,” Dante said.
We walked around the side of the building and saw the street littered with bikes and bodies. We had come down here at least twenty deep, and it looked like almost all of our members were present and accounted for on the road.
I turned and looked at our motorcycles, mangled underneath Gage’s bike. I shook my head and pushed my gun back over my shoulder.