Hitman vs Hitman - L.A. Witt Page 0,79

place he himself had scoped out for sniper access. It hadn’t been a good spot at all for a sniper unwilling to hit civilians. For one who was willing?

Okay, time to get out of here.

He hurried back to the van and took off, sweaty hands gripping the wheel for dear life.

It was time to move on to Plan B. More like Plan C plus D, with a dash of Plan G thrown in. They’d had multiple scenarios worked out just in case things had gone south. They’d planned for every foreseeable way this could end in disaster. Signal jammers had always been a possibility. And God knew Victor had been on the list of potential suspects from the start.

Ricardo just hadn’t expected all this to go down so fast. For Victor to not only be the hitman who was after them, but for him to be today’s “liaison” and have multiple people waiting in the wings with a damned poison dart so they could drug August and take him. It had been so fucking fast and clean, and…

And he needed to look ahead. Make a plan. Get August back, damn it.

Driving faster, Ricardo breathed as slowly and deeply as he could, trying to will his heart to slow down and pull his thoughts into order. He had to assess the situation so he could react, and he had to do it fast. If there was one thing he could be sure of now, it was that August was alive, but that wasn’t as comforting a thought as it should’ve been. Victor was notorious for drawing things out with his marks, and Ricardo had a feeling this wasn’t a contract. Victor wasn’t targeting him and August on someone else’s say-so—he was cleaning house after he’d fucked up. No deadline. No ticking clock. All the time in the world to make sure August regretted refusing the Rawlins job and not getting killed on the bogus Baldwin job.

Ricardo shuddered. If Victor figured out August and Ricardo were working together, he’d rain all kinds of hell on August in order to find Ricardo. August was strong enough and stubborn enough that he could probably keep his trap shut longer than most, but Ricardo wasn’t taking that for granted. Even if he didn’t think August could stay quiet, Ricardo couldn’t let him suffer protracted torture at the hands of Victor and his minions.

Ricardo was safely away from the park now, so he pulled over, and while the engine idled, he checked the burner phone. There was no signal on the first tracker, but that was no shock. Victor had probably found that tracker and destroyed it, which Ricardo had anticipated.

Just as he’d hoped, though, no one had found the second tracker, and Victor had shut off the jammer. Now a blue dot cut a steady path through downtown.

Ricardo exhaled. Okay. He had a lock on August.

It was tempting to gun the engine, peel out, and burn rubber after them. More than he’d ever been in his life, he wanted—needed—to kick down doors and go in guns blazing.

But Victor was a professional. He was as smart as he was sadistic, plus he had God knew how many mercs at his beck and call, which meant Ricardo had to play this carefully. Maybe that meant subjecting August to more of Victor’s cruelty, but that was the unavoidable price of tilting the odds in favor of survival.

He couldn’t kick down Victor’s door. Not yet.

But I won’t let you stay in that place a minute longer than I have to, August.

He gripped the wheel tighter.

I’m coming for you.

And Victor? You’re a dead man.

In the name of efficiency, Ricardo loaded up the stolen van with everything he thought he might need from his second storage unit. Several guns of varying calibers. Extra magazines. A few different grades of explosives. Lock picks. A battering ram he’d stolen from the police while they’d been busy with a drug bust. A serrated knife he’d traded a blowjob for back when his team of Green Berets had spent a night drinking with some spetsnaz guys. He’d be fucked if he got pulled over and someone decided to search him, but it was a risk he’d have to take.

With everything duly covered in the back of the van, he checked the burner phone for the blue dot. It hadn’t moved in almost an hour, though the signal was faint; August was probably in a basement or something similar.

Ricardo drove toward the dot. He’d hoped it