Chapter 5

Abel kneeled against the tree, and the cold wind ran up the hills, shaking the dead leaves off. The night had cloaked him, allowing him to be shielded by it for a while. He had done this a thousand times before. He had been staring at men who had no idea they were about to die by his hands, but they were blocking the roads holding guns. They weren’t the law, not the way they were dressed, along with the cars and rifles. They were dressed too well to be the law. They dressed like the masters of the world, but they were lying to everyone, most of all to themselves.

                They looked like gangsters from the girl’s father. She wasn’t lying about him being the boss of one of the Southern crime families, and Abel never had a problem killing any Made Men. He liked killing them over anyone else. He didn’t feel bad at all. He could do anything to them and not feel anything about it.

                He took a deep breath, letting the cold touch him. It reminded him of the winters during the war when he crawled over No Man’s Land to get behind the enemy’s lines. Abel and his team would drop into those lines, killing in the night and being gone before the sun came back up. He and his team would often travel farther behind the lines, taking out targets of higher value.

                Then, the enemy started to hide from Abel and his assassins. So, they started to go after their families.

                It was dirty work, but it was war. All of war is dirty. All of the war was Hell.

                He let out his breath, reached into his jacket, and pulled out his long blade. He glanced up at the sky, watching the moon be covered by some clouds, smiling. The men had no idea they were about to die.

                He hoped they made peace with God.

                Abel started down the hill, making sure to be as quiet as possible with the woods. He watched a few men light up cigarettes. It was the last smoke they would get before the end of their lives. There were four of them, which wouldn’t be a problem.

                He got closer to them as they kept their rifles close by. Those rifles were powerful, and if it was any other man, they might hand over the girl and call it a night, but Abel didn’t fear those rifles. The men were too relax like they were on a lunch break. They might have been killers, but those kills weren’t against people who knew how to kill as well.

                Abel grinned in the shadows. His mother wanted him to grow up to be a man of God. His father, on the other hand, knew what Abel was deep down, and that was a killer. His father understood Abel was born at the wrong time. He should have been born in some ancient time battling the Romans, being a mighty warlord of darker people.

                He had the soul of a warrior.

                There was no way he could change it. He had tried before, and Hope was the closest to changing him until the Great War broke out. When the States got pulled into the war, the boys in green showed up at Abel’s door, needing his help.

                Hope wasn’t thrilled, but she also understood what kind of man Abel was deep in his soul. The first man standing closest to the tree line found out what kind of man Abel was born in this world to do as the knife was pushed into his back. The man cried out, trying to fall to the ground, when Abel grabbed his rifle, jerking it up and popping off a round. The round kicked the farthest man in the chest, throwing him off the hill's edge. He was dead before his body rolled to a stop.

                The man closest to him spun, pulling his rifle up as Abel threw the body off to the side, dashing for the man. He grabbed the rifle with it going off and the knife was nailed into the man’s neck. He jerked the blade free from his neck as the man dropped the rifle, grabbing the flood of his life.

                The last man had his rifle up firing, but his shot went wild. The bullet raced by Abel’s face, but his stone stare didn’t break as he took the barrel of the rifle pulling it away from the shooter. He pulled the weapon free of the man, batting him across the face and breaking his jaw, but the man didn’t have time to feel the pain as Abel knocked him out.

                The man dropped to the ground with Abel standing over him. He should hate killing a man when he is out cold, but an enemy is an enemy. He fired a round into the man’s head before kneeling and cleaning off his knife. He tossed the rifle away, looking back at the cars.

                Abel pushed them down the hill, letting them crash into the trees before moving the bodies out of the way. He didn’t want the girl to see the bodies. She had seen enough. He could tell it had changed her, and it was never a change for the better. He looked around for a moment, seeing the blood in the dirt. He sighed, knowing there was nothing he could do about it. He hoped she didn’t see it, but he had to risk it.

                Abel looked back up at the hill and saw his car still sitting there, which was good news. He loved the rush of combat, but he had to get back to the girl. He wanted to get home. He walked back up the road to the car, dropping his head and shaking it when he saw the passenger door open. The girl was gone, running blindly into the woods, and Abel looked up at the sky.

                “Why are You making this so hard for me, huh?”