Chapter 52
Rhys
If I doubted what kind of impact I made on the O’Rourkes in the short time I was a guard for Eoghan, I was dead wrong.
The blacktop soars beneath us. Rotors scream overhead as Kieran O’Rourke’s helicopter banks hard, and we tilt with it as it slices through the frozen Hudson Valley air. I grip the harness straps, my heart slamming against my ribs.
“Fallon,” I whisper to the convoy of black SUVs racing down the highway below us. Sleek, identical, and in perfect formation. “I’m coming.”
The only problem is, I don’t know which one Fallon is in, and that part is killing me.
“Heat signatures are scrambled,” Balor O’Rourke shouts over the headset from his command center back in Astoria. “They’ve got blockers running.”
Of course they do.
Lachlan, the Lachlan O’Rourke, stands braced in the open side door like a damn war lord, wind flapping the tail of his long black cashmere coat.
His voice cuts sharply through the comms. “The Bratva loves decoys and sacrifices. There is no doubt that Kosta Volkov is in charge down there. He would have insisted on being in the last car. And your woman will be with him.”
My jaw tightens. “How do you know that?”
“Because my wife is Bratva,” he bites back, eyes scanning the dark ribbon of highway asphalt bordered by dirty snow. “And I’m tight with the Koslov Enforcer. Been on rides like these, moving cargo.”
“My girlfriend isn’t cargo,” I bark, then raise the intercom to my mouth to update my brother. “Trace, we don’t have a visual on Fallon. Lachlan thinks she’s in the last car.”
Below us, driving an armored SUV packed with explosives racing north to catch up with Black’s line of cars, Trace responds through the radio, “The O’Rourkes fought against the Bratva, we haven’t. I would trust Lachlan, but it’s your call, Rhys.”
My stomach knots so hard I nearly double over. I can’t pick wrong. If I do, Fallon dies.
All I have is Lachlan’s intuition. The man has so many scars and should have died several times, according to Griffin, who used to be his second-in-command. I have to trust his instincts.
I swing toward him. “You’re sure, Lachlan? Car three?”
“It’s the call I’d make.” Lachlan meets my eyes. “If it were my wife down there.”
There’s no doubt, no hesitation.
“Then that’s enough for me.” I press the comm button hard. “Trace. Blow the first two cars, we’ll drive the last car off the road. Move now.”
“Aye,” Trace says, and the line goes silent.
It’s an excruciating ten minutes wondering if I made the right call, but then the road below erupts.