Page 76 of Was I Ever Free

Faith. I need to have faith.

“I want to help,” I say without much forethought. “I need to see that he is okay.”

All I know is I must be of some kind of help. I cannot stay here and just wait while everyone else does the heavy lifting.

“No,” Connor says flatly. He lets me go, turning on his heels toward the door.

My heart sinks.

“Connor,” I hear Lenix say behind me. He whips around at the sound of her voice. “We’rebothhelping and that’s the end of it.”

My eyebrows lift in surprise, thinking Lenix would have been adamant about me staying out of danger. But there is something in her expression that I recognize… of being in a similar situation not long ago, and knowing that somehow I need this too.

Both sets of eyes narrow as they stare back at each other, while Lenix slowly crosses her arms clearly unimpressed by Connor’s intimidation, quietly standing her ground.

“If anything happens to you—” he says slowly.

“Don’t you trust me?” Lenix interjects.

I can tell she has just won this little stand-off by the way Connor groans out loud, looking up at the sky, swiping his palm over his mustache. He mutters something to himself while pulling a metal case out of his coat pocket. He yanks a joint out of it and lights it before his gaze lands back on his wife.

“Fine,” he says, then points to us both, two fingers still holding the joint in his hand. “You can help Kenzie with the diversion.”

* * *

Eight hours later,we are driving up to a large rubber factory near Denver. If Kenzie had not shared the plan with us, I would immediately doubt how we would even find Bastian in such a place. According to a long-time informant, this place has been the Gravediggers’ best-kept secret ever since the factory shut down over a decade ago. He also told Kenzie that they mostly use the north wing, leaving the rest abandoned. That is where we are heading.

It is the dead of night when Kenzie finally parks the black Sprinter van. Connor, Barker, and a few other men from the Black Plague have been here for a few hours staking out the place. They made sure the diversion could work and eliminated potential threats, like jamming the surveillance cameras that line the property—although I am not quite sure what that means or how it would work.

Kenzie pulls out his phone and sends out a few texts, the van silent as we wait for the okay. Lenix, who is sitting beside me, finds my hand and laces our fingers together. She squeezes my palm three times and gives me a quick knowing look.

“Alright lasses, you remember the plan?” Kenzie confirms, turning around to look at us both.

I am about to respond, having memorized every step when Lenix beats me to the punch, “Blow shit up,” she deadpans.

Kenzie guffaws, sending her a wink, muttering something about how he now understands why Connor is so obsessed with her.

I realize I am smiling at their interaction, and drop it as soon as I am aware of what I am doing. The image of Bastian locked up somewhere in there, so close but still so unattainable, leaves me feeling ashamed that I can even smile at a time like this.

“Okay wait here,” Kenzie says before silently climbing out of the car. Staying in the van was part of the deal we made with Connor. Kenzie would place the bombs and we would detonate them. I would have agreed to anything if only to have the chance to be here when Bastian is rescued.

What if he is dead?

I squeeze my eyes shut, trying not to let that thought etch itself in my mind like it, unfortunately, has for the past five days.

He is alive. He is alive. He is alive.

I repeat the words over and over while I watch Kenzie’s silhouette stealthily crouch down near the parked cars leaving deadly crumbs as he goes. The cars are parked close enough to create a diversion, but far enough not to damage the integrity of the building.

I count my breaths—one, two, three, four—as I watch Kenzie jog back to the van. He starts the engine, putting it in reverse, taking us outside of the blast radius before giving us the okay. Lenix carefully places the detonator in my palm and I swallow hard. She gives me a small nod, and my heart takes a leap. I press the detonator without any lingering guilty conscience, determined to do my small part in saving Bastian.

The explosion is louder than I could have ever expected. The reverberation makes the van rock even from this distance. I let out a shocked gasp, my eyes glued to the large flames billowing out from the wrecked cars, one even having flipped onto its roof. We hear shouting, and then a slew of men run out to see what the commotion is about.

This time I do smile, knowing somewhere around the north end, Connor and the others are making their way into the building.

39

Aloud explosion above me.