12 Minutes (#2 in Military series)

Chapter 20

Chapter 20

"The drone located the truck," Strong's voice came over the laptop speakers, "It's approximately ten miles north of your location. Good luck."

Carlos grinned as he gave a slow nod of respect to their Commander from behind Marc. He turned and shared a look with Twitch who was as equally impressed with their leader's disregard of orders.

"Thank you sir," Marc nodded, closing the laptop down when the connection was severed.

"We're gonna have to get moving," Jules told them, "That Truro bloke will be sending a task force to that location and God knows what will happen when they get there."

"I agree. Hasan, Kazeem?" Marc looked to them in the corner, "You go back and get the vehicles."

"Got it," Kazeem turned, grabbed Hasan's sleeve and dragged him out of the building as he began to protest at being ordered about.

"Hey Marc," Carlos purred casually, "They have some pretty sweet weapons here that they just left behind. It would be a shame if some kids stumbled across it."

Julia looked at Carlos from the corner of her eye, her lips twitching into a smile.

Carlos gave her a wink whilst internally he felt a deep sigh of relief to see her smile again, even if it was only for a few moments.

But then he remembered what he was keeping from her and what she was going through so he looked back to Marc abruptly, "What'd you say?"

"Go for it," Marc nodded, "I think we're gonna need everything we can get our hands on."

"I have an idea for that," Jules chuckled darkly.

Carlos, Twitch and Marc all shared a worried look between themselves before Marc reluctantly agreed.

"Give me ten minutes," Julia held her hands up, her fingers spread wide so that each digit indicated a minute before she turned around and high-tailed it out of the building.

Carlos arched an eyebrow at Marc.

"I don't wanna know," Marc sighed, "I've learnt it's easier that way."

Carlos chuckled, "I'm gonna go and round up those weapons."

Marc followed Carlos towards the door when he realised that Twitch wasn't following.

Hanging back, Marc waited until Carlos was outside before he turned to Twitch, "Everything alright?"

Twitch was stood beside the laptop, running his fingers over the documents which lay beside it, "Hmm?"

Marc frowned a little, "You okay?"

"Oh, yeah," Twitch nodded, "I was just gonna check through these one last time to make sure we didn't miss anything."

"Okay," Marc nodded slowly, watching him closely. Nothing in what Twitch said made him nervous but as he took a step back he saw the extra twitch in his jaw making the corner of his lips quiver.

After their years together he had gotten to know Twitch and the cause of his nickname very well and as he spied that small change in his face a small amount of concern grew inside Marc's chest.

Not pressing him on it, Marc turned and left. They didn't have long to linger so he made a mental note to ask him about it later.

Pretending to shift through pieces of paper, Twitch waited until Marc had left before he laid the papers down and hurried to the other side of the room.