Chapter 11:restless
1108 Words
It has been 4 days since Adam arrived at Oxtown, Raina has not been picking up her calls and not replying to hundreds of messages he had sent.
He could not help but sense something was wrong, and the more he tried to ignore it, the stronger it got.
His wolf had become more restless, and his instinct sharpened more than normal. “What could be happening,” he had thought many times with no answer.
“Focus” he said to himself as he climbed the stairs of the clock tower.
He stood on top of the clock tower, watching the hustle and bustle going on in the city park. His eyes locked on the target as he brought out a pack of cigarettes from his inside pocket
He lit a cigarette, his eyes still locked on the target, his evil smile that never reached his eye glued to his face as he smoked.
He lay on top of a wooden beam just below the bell, his rifle set on a custom tripod.
Adam didn’t need rangefinders anymore. His eyes had adapted. His instincts, sharpened by the wolf within, sensed the space between them and every heartbeat in that crowd.
He waited, muscles coiled, but still. His pupils narrowed when the man stepped into the open.
He breathed once. Let it out slowly.
And let the shot fly.
He didn’t wait for screams. Didn’t flinch at the chaos. Emotion was for later — if ever.
He had trained himself never to confirm emotionally, but functionally, the moment the bullet hit the target, he disappeared.
********
“Confirmed, target down” Adam said. He stood by the window as he let out the smoke from his cigarette.
“Boss,” a thick, powerful voice called from behind. “Yes,” Adam answered slowly as he turned to look at one of his top pack members.
“He's alive,” the man said with a low voice as if unsure of what he said. “What!” Adam blurted out “That is not possible,” he continued as he moved to the table to put down his cigarette.
“Ermm… I know, boss, but the information reaching, he is alive, boss,”
“Where?” Adam asked angrily. “At the hospital, the bullet landed on his shoulder instead,” the man answered.
Adam chuckled, but his anger could still be felt, “Get out” he said in a low voice but with command.
“Wtf” he said as he smashed the glass of liquor on the corner of the desk against the wall.
“I never missed, omg what is on,” he thought, pacing from one corner to another, as he unbuttoned his shirt out of frustration before putting his two hands on his waist.
“He picked up his phone and dialled Raina's number, but it went straight to voicemail. He tried again and again until he finally gave up and settled for another voicemail joining the hundred he had sent.
“Hi, I'm so fvcking worried about you and it's messing with my head seriously, why are you not returning my text, or text messages please say something Rain, please, I will really appreciate it, just give me something to know you are fine.” He said fast but pitifully.
************
Adam stood in a dark alley across the town general hospital. He watched the entrance through binoculars as heavy rain poured down and flooded the street.
He could not wrap his head around the fact that he missed his shot. The bullet had somehow passed his shoulder, missing the heart by an inch.
He then managed to control his wolf hearing, making him hear everything going on in the hospital perfectly and among the many voices. He finally heard where his target was.
The target, a top corrupt politician, was recovering under arm watch in a private ward with a sealed elevator and a security station on the floor.
Adam knew what this meant. He had to go inside.
Adam approached the rear entrance disguised as an overnight MRI technician, complete with a forged badge, surgical mask, and ID tag reading “Wolfe Andrew.”
He timed the door rotation — a cleaning crew entered at 01:47. Wolfe slid in behind them, silent, unnoticed.
Inside, he moved like a shadow, the scent of ozone thick in the air. No gun, just a tranquillizer dart pen and a folded blueprint in his pocket.
The elevator didn’t go to Level 7 without a keycard. So he exited on level 6, climbed a maintenance shaft, and pulled himself silently into the hallway above.
Room 704 was at the end of the corridor, with a guard outside, seated, bored, scrolling on his phone.
Adam moved and dropped silently behind him, slid the dart pen into his neck, and caught his body before it fell, then dragged him into the janitor’s closet.
He slipped into the room like a whisper.
The client lay on the hospital bed, IV dripping in his arm, one shoulder bandaged in white. He was half-conscious, muttering something as he sighted Adam. His pistol sat on the nightstand, just out of reach.
The second guard was in the corner chair, dozing off. Aiden took three silent steps forward, and—
Crack. The floorboard creaked.
The guard woke, but it was too late.
Adam lunged, driving a collapsible baton into his throat. The man collapsed silently, gasping. No gunfire. No alarms.
The man blinked, startled, “mercy” he managed to speak, but Adam was already there, pressing a silenced pistol to his sternum.
“This is mercy,” Adam said coldly.
He pulled the trigger once.
No drama. No noise. Just finality.
Adam exited the same way he came, now wearing the guard’s overcoat and ID badge. He passed through the emergency stairwell, out the laundry chute, and into a waiting garbage truck that had made its last pickup at 1:45 AM.
Adam stood by the hospital's service exit, the garbage chute just feet away. The job was done. The target was dead. No alarms had been raised. His heartbeat had returned to baseline.
He should have left.
But then it hit him. A scent.
“Raina,” his inner wolf called out.
He could be mistaken. He tried to convince himself but not with Raina, not when he had been reminiscing everything about her since he met her.
It is fresh, not from memories. “She's here,” he said in a whisper as he turned, abandoning the exit route, following the fragile trail in the air and his wolf Instinct.
- Writer
