Page 53 of The Bratva's Bounty
Smugly, Arseny crossed his arms and leaned against the armored truck. "Oh, Stepan here was just telling me how he wished he had earplugs in the office because of how much noise you made—"
"Blaph blah bla aaah!" Bao interjected with his nonsensical sounds while covering his ears. "New rule when working with B-Boy: no bedroom talk. Ido notwant or need to know who y'all screw on your time off, nor do I want any details about such activities." Spinning around on his heel, Bao glared at me accusingly. "Especially if it has to do anything about my sister."
We all laughed at Bao and dismissed him with playful comments in response. "Okay, all that aside, we need to get serious." Stepan pulled everyone back together with a few loud claps. "We don't have all night, and I'm sure all of us want some sleep tonight."
Recollecting myself, I straightened out and became serious. "Everything still like we planned initially? How's the enemy looking? Do we have a head count? Any changes to the layouts we've seen on surveillance?" My playful voice from before flattened to a stern one as I kicked my ass into business mode. "And everyone on our side is accounted for and ready?" One quick glance, andit looked like everyone was prepared and ready to roll out, but maybe last-minute prep was needed.
Letting out a deep breath, Bao tapped away at his tablet for a second before turning it around to show all of us a satellite view of the area we were set to attack. "The only change so far is the new cargo shipments that arrived hours ago. Other than that, it seems like the number of enemies is still roughly the same, about thirty of them, give or take a body or two." Bao slowly moved the screen around to show us the area along with the dropped pins of highly probable locations of guards.
"Alright, so we stick with the plan before. Two snipers up in the two towers and three ground teams," Stepan decided firmly, looking at everyone for any kind of objection.
When none came his way, Stepan continued, "I'll take one of the towers. Arseny and Greg will take the Alpha Team, Hanna will take the Beta Team, and Lev will take the Delta Team." Taking the tablet from Bao, Stepan circled certain areas before showing us the screen. "These are going to be our entry and exit points. Alpha Team will advance with everyone else but break off to storm and secure the back while Beta and Delta will deal with the front."
Studying the map for a minute, I reviewed Stepan's plan and played it out in my mind. Without a word, I took the tablet from Bao to play around with the satellite map. "Bratok, that won't work. There's a side entrance that needs to be covered, too," I pointed out, flashing the screen to Stepan. "It's not much of an escape, but they have some boats there they can run to."
"They won't have enough time to utilize that side escape," Stepan stated with a bit of doubt in his eyes.
"That might be true, but what if they do? Or what if somehow reinforcements come through that side?" I retorted with a skeptical look. "Team Beta can head straight for the front to secure and breech, but Team Delta is going to side before meeting back up with Beta inside," I told Stepan flatly.
I wasn't asking to alter the plan; I was altering it whether Stepan liked it or not. Something about that side exit and the docks tugged at my gut. Yes, it could be nothing like Stepan put it, but I didn't want to risk it. Besides, there would be no harm intaking the extra caution of securing that side door, in my opinion.
Stepan and I stared at each other in intense silence as we argued with each other through our hardened eyes. "Fine," he relented after a while with a soft scoff. His head did a quick sweep through our men. "Anyone else have anything to add or change?"
His question was met with quiet denial and shakes of some heads. No one really ever dared to go against Stepan's plans, but I didn't give a shit. If I was involved along with my men, then I wanted to do what I felt was right. Also, Stepan was my brother, so I really didn't give a single damn about it. If he had an issue with me, then we could work it out at home.
It wasn't as if I altered the plan to give my older brother a harder time. Contrary to what happened just now, I rarely made headstrong decisions like that without conversing with Stepan about it. If it weren't for my intuition, then things would've remained the same.
Something about that damn dock…
I couldn't get it off my mind as I made last-minute equipment checks. It felt like one of those creepy houses at the end of the street that gave off a bad energy. "Hey, is there something you're not telling us?" Greg inquired with a suspicious look, making me want to punch the cop in the face.
Irritated as to why I couldn't place a finger on the gut feeling, I huffed and shook my head. "No, it's just one of those gut feelings." I deadpanned, scowling softly at Greg when his expression didn't change.
If it wasn't Angel's brother or one of our trusted people, then his expression would have earned him a broken nose from my fist. To be fair, I did talk bad about Angel for a good while when she first came into the family, and Greg, being the protective older brother, didn't like that one bit. Angel held nothing against me, but I guess Greg did.
"Knock it off, you two. We're all buddies here." Arseny's awkward chuckle twisted the tense air between Greg and me. "Come on, whatever it is you two are fibbing about, let it go. Water under the bridge and shit." My younger brother's hands gripped each of our shoulders in a deadly manner.
Leaning in close to us with an empty smile, he threatened us, "I will make The Joker jealous of the smiles I will carve into your face if you two don't play nice tonight." The playful edge to his charming voice dropped almost completely, making the pitch of his voice lower to his natural one.
Shockingly, I wasn't the crazy one of the family. I might be the most physically violent and angry, but in terms of most deadly and dangerous, I definitely didn't come close to holding the title. Alexei and Arseny, the youngest of our family, were to be the most feared out of all of us, and everyone else would say the same if asked.
With Nikolai, Stepan, and I, the end was clear. With the twins? A person would be lucky to be killed within a week. The two were wickedly twisted—true sadists. Even if they were the least involved in the Bratva, they made their marks when they did partake in any activities.
Damn psychopaths.
Shoving at Arseny, I grumbled my compliance under my breath and rolled my eyes at him before going over to the armored truck assigned to my team. "Alright, boys, let's make this quick, violent, and bloody," I told them with a crazed grin before slamming the door shut and signaling for the driver to go.
The drive took about ten minutes, and it took us less than five to get into position. "Delta in position," I informed everyone over my earpiece.
"I need another minute, climbing the tower." Stepan's voice scratched through my earpiece.
"B-Boy needs a minute, too. I'm still setting the drones up," Bao piped up, making me roll my eyes.
"Bao, for the last fucking time, axe the nickname before I axe your tongue," Hanna snarked with a groan.
Moments later, everyone checked back in with their ready status. Once Stepan got confirmation from everyone a second time, he gave the order to go.
My team and I moved as planned. Starting at the southeast end, we swept our way up to the main building and broke off to the side door by the private docks where some boats idled. I stuck a hand out to feel the boats as we passed them.