“Wasn’t plannin to, fucker,” I muttered.
“Smartass—” His voice cut off. I thought the line had gone dead, some secret blessin, but there were muffles in the background.
“Have fun, Arlen! I’ll be here, round, depressed, and cheering you on.” Cali’s voice boomed through the speaker loud and clear, making me smile.
“Call me when you get to Plymouth,” Romero snapped. The phone made an elongated beep and then cut off.
“Let’s go,” Grimm said, taking me by the hand.
“Where exactly are we goin, and why will there be acolytes?”
“You know where we’re going. We’re going to kill shit, girl. And wherever that is, Rome is sending us some manpower,” Cobra answered.
The surrealism of the situation was quick to sink into my mind. We were really doin this. I had wished it, I had told Grimm, and now it was happenin.
“Who has a pre-game conversation before they go to kill people?” I asked, tryna distract myself from my inner thoughts as we made our back towards the parking deck.
“People getting ready for a game, and you’re on the winning team now, sis,” Cobra grinned.
“Sis?” I asked. “So I’m no longer the random chick who was probably going to die?”
I was joking; we’d long surpassed that, but he’d said somethin along the lines of that to me upon the first kill I’d seen them do inside an old church. Such good times.
I could see he was legit excited about doin this, to the point the man was nearly bouncing on his toes.
“How does Romero know we’ll need acolytes for…whatever you just said?”
“Romero is always twelve steps ahead, and never shows his full hand. He more than likely knows exactly what’s going on by now, has a bloodbath pile accumulating, and is waiting on us to make our move,” Grimm said.
“Sounds much too stressful. Speakin of, how’s the baby?”
“Baby S is fine,” Grimm answered.
Lawd, I didn’t think the whole baby S, a.k.a., baby Savage would stick. That kid was going to be a ruthless little fucker.
A loud bang echoed from somewhere in the building. We stopped and loo
ked at one another, none of us saying a word.
Then, at the same damn time, Cobra and Grimm each pointed in the direction behind us. Clearly, they’d heard somethin extra that I couldn’t.
“They probably had a look out, and seeing as how not a single one of them exited this hospital, he went for help,” Cobra said quietly.
“Venom,” Grimm explained at my look of confusion. “The name of the gang with snake tattoos.”
“For real? That’s what they came up with? Venom is a really stupid fuckin name,” I quipped.
“Yeah,” Grimm laughed. “It is.”
“You ready?” Cobra asked me suddenly.
“For what?” I asked at the same time Grimm said, “Take this,” and passed me a pearl white switch blade he’d just removed from one of his back pockets.
“We’re gonna take this staircase on the next left, go down the stairs, exit on the next level, go down the hall, circle back up, and haul ass to the parking garage,” Cobra explained.
I had to walk myself through what he was saying twice in my head before I had it down pat. How the hell did they all think on their feet so fast?
“Why the hell would we run? I thought the Savages didn’t get scared?”