The Finish (The Eliminator Series Book 12), Mike Ryan [summer reading list .txt] 📗

it doesn’t give you a long enough time to escape if that’s what you need.”

“Well, whatever the case, we gotta get in closer.”

Thrower continued looking around. “Wait a minute. There’s our entry point.” He pointed to the side window. “There’s a window over there, boarded up. We make our way to it. Once we get there, we can slide our way in.”

Jacobs was good with that and immediately took off running. Gunner went along with him. Thrower waited about five seconds, then followed. They each made it to the boarded-up window without incident. Sticking to the wall, they maneuvered their way to the front of the building. After peeking his head around the corner and seeing nothing, Jacobs ducked low and proceeded to the front door.

Once he got there, he was surprised to see that it was slightly open. He pushed it open further, and Gunner raced in. Jacobs and Thrower remained by the door for a few seconds, waiting for an alert from Gunner. It didn’t take long for them to hear it. Gunner let out a growling sound, indicating that there was something there that he didn’t like.

Jacobs and Thrower rushed in. Jacobs found a light switch and flicked it on. Though maybe the darkness would have been an advantage if someone knew they were there, it wouldn’t be too much of an advantage. And it would allow him to see what he was shooting at.

Gunner continued growling, so Jacobs and Thrower rushed over to where his voice was coming from. Then they saw it. Gunner was standing there, growling at the men that were lying on the floor. There was blood everywhere.

Jacobs and Thrower moved in closer to inspect the bodies that were there. The bodies were almost thrown on top of each other. As they got closer, there was one positioned on top of the others. His face was unmistakable, even if it was covered in blood from the hole that was through it.

After looking at the face, Thrower glanced at his friend to get his reaction. “Wilson Ames.”

Jacobs was almost in shock. He briefly looked at Thrower, but quickly put his eyes back on Ames, staring at what was left of him. There was never any joy in seeing someone dead, but maybe there was some small sense of relief that was going through Jacobs at the moment. It meant one less person he had to worry about. One less person that he had to deal with. And he was one step closer to getting a life back.

“These are all his men,” Thrower said.

“Not all. A few of these guys I don’t recognize. Ames had five or six more, though, I think.”

“What do you think happened here?”

Jacobs looked all around, not sure himself. Then he thought of the meeting. He looked back at the bodies. “Maybe they found out about the meeting, too. Came here to put an end to things.”

“Well, they sure did put an end to things. Themselves.”

Jacobs looked at the walls, the floors, seeing the blood splattered all around. “Or maybe this was a trap.”

“For who?”

Jacobs shrugged. “Whoever came. What if Mallette intentionally put word out that he was having a meeting here tonight, hoping that either Ames or I would stop by? Then when whoever showed up… he pounced.”

“Could be. Pretty good plan. He’d know that if word was out there he was gonna be here… nobody would be able to pass that up.”

Jacobs nodded. “And that was what he was counting on.”

Thrower put his hand on a few of the bodies. “These guys are still warm. This didn’t happen that long ago. Hour or two at the most.”

“Just think, if we had gotten here sooner… it might have been us.”

They continued walking around the building, just to see if there were any more bodies around. But there weren’t. Everyone had been placed in the middle of the main room. After clearing the rest of the building, they came back around to where the bodies were.

“What do you think the meaning of that is?” Thrower asked. “Placing them on top of each other like that. Ames on top.”

“Who knows? Maybe it’s some message from Mallette. Maybe it’s just his way of placing the leader of his enemy on top of the pile? Could be anything from that twisted mind of his.”

Thrower put his hand on Jacobs’ shoulder. “Well, it’s one less person we need to worry about.”

“Yeah.”

“Just think, Mallette took out our enemies for us. First Butch, now Ames.”

Jacobs nodded. “Yeah. Too bad he doesn’t take himself out next.”

“Don’t think we’ll be that lucky. But it still helps us out, him doing this work for us. Now there’s nothing in our way between him and us.”

Jacobs stared at Ames’ lifeless body. He couldn’t help but think back to how it all started. “Yeah. It’s back to how it was in the beginning. Just him and me. There’s nobody else left. But this time… one of us isn’t going to be around to see tomorrow.”

8

As soon as Jacobs and Thrower got back to the house, they let Franks know what happened. Though they said it wasn’t necessary, he came right over. Tiffany was waiting by the door to let Franks in as soon as he got there.

Franks barged right in, not even waiting for anyone else to talk. “Man, this is crazy, man, crazy. Crazy.”

Jacobs and Thrower were now sitting on the couch, trying to relax a little. Even though they hadn’t seen any action, they still were on edge after anticipating they were going to see some. Seeing the mood that Franks was in, they both just let him go and get it all out before they chimed in.

“To think, we were this close on them,” Franks said. “This close. Almost there on Mallette. Almost. Of course, you could also say he was this close on us, too. But that’s neither here nor there, you know?”

Jacobs and Thrower just looked at each other, knowing their friend wasn’t done yet.

“Now I