Page 19

Chapter nineteen

Dane

It takes a minute for my eyes to adjust, the city lights through the floor-to-ceiling windows offering a dim, but manageable glow for us to see by.

The power outage is the signal given by my virus that Vera tried to touch something in the network, causing everything to reboot and power to turn off until it’s back online.

My heart thunders in my chest, racing at the knowledge that Vera is here.

It doesn’t matter , I remind myself firmly.

I’m not trying to win her over or keep her here this time.

And after we take care of Royce, she might…

“Everyone to their positions, like we discussed,” Aiden orders, fixing his jacket back on.

I scrub my face to get my head together.

I can’t get distracted.

“Where do you want me?” Reid questions, standing to join us.

Aiden tugs the sleeves of his dress shirt beneath his jacket down.

“Here. No one should make it here, but if they do, then teleport somewhere else and come back. This shouldn’t take long.”

We don’t have a lot of time before the power returns and systems come back online, so the rest of us are already running from the room and down the hallway to the main hall of the Guild.

Jack, Rae, and Kellan split off in another direction, and I snap my teeth together to keep from joining them.

This is the plan.

I catch Jackson taking Rae’s hand in his and force myself to breathe through my nose.

She’ll be safe. Even if Charles or Royce do show up, she has Jack and Kellan with her.

Aiden appears next to me before we drop to the first table and flip it on its side for cover.

Agents are already loose in the main hall, but the unexpected emptiness has slowed their steps, uneasiness clear in their expressions.

Other Guild members are spread throughout the room, hidden in their designated spots until it’s time to use their gifts.

I don’t see Vera when I sneak a glance around the table, but I know she’s here somewhere.

She triggered the virus that shut the Tower down, so by now, she’s hacking the system to do what she’d originally planned.

Since I didn’t have my laptop nearby when the power went out, I won’t be able to complete my part to counter whatever cyberattack she’s working on.

We’re stuck with plan B, which requires me to stay put for most of this.

I hate plan B.

“Remember…” Aiden begins, and I pull the gun from the back of my waistband and flick the safety off.

“Yeah, yeah. I’ll stick to you like glue.” My finger settles on the trigger, rubbing along it with the itching desire to end this all quickly.

Patience isn’t my strong suit .

Aiden slides his unamused gaze to me, but the first agents are getting close to the perimeter, to us, and he’s forced to return his attention to them.

“Get ready.”

He places his hand on the floor, and I risk another peek at the portal.

There are more agents coming through, but enough of them have filled the main open area for Aiden’s plan to start.

Aiden nods behind us to the bar, where another Guild member is crouched and waiting.

The hardwood floors split and crack in unison in a sound that snaps and echoes through the room.

The agents all freeze, looking around to figure out what’s happening, but it’s already too late.

Metal spikes strike from the narrow openings in the floor, growing to needlepoints as tall as the agents and impaling anyone in their range.

They fly up together in an instant until the main area of the hall is a maze of angled metal thorns as thick as a fist and bloody, screaming bodies.

“Fuck, that’s brutal,” I breathe, watching the metal retreat, sinking to the single thick sheet Aiden had added beneath the floorboards last week.

Bodies thud to the floor one after another once the metal is no longer holding them up.

You’d think that would have gotten all of them, but Aiden only had a single area he could use that attack on without risking anyone from the Guild being injured.

Some of the agents had already made it outside of the attack zone and are hurrying further away.

More agents rush out of the portal and skirt the center of the room, smartly running around the perimeter of bodies to avoid another attack.

Aiden might be able to pick off another couple that stray too close, but he won’t be able to use it to catch so many again.

Not that I’m fucking complaining.

He took out at least two dozen at once, and the confidence the GE agents had when they first stormed in is gone.

Shifting instead to wariness and anger for the ones who see their fellow agents on the ground.

Once the next wave of goons is through, the rest of the members trigger their own traps in their assigned areas of the room.

Shouts of surprise and battle break out as everything descends into chaos.

Agents are pushed back to the center of the room where there’s more space, but Guild members are there as well, which officially ends Aiden’s trump card.

He grips his whip sword in his hand instead, checking over his shoulder that I haven’t moved.

“Still here,” I growl, aiming my gun at an agent who dodges another member’s attack and lands a couple yards from me.

He’s down with a single headshot, and then I’m seeking out the next target.

I try to find Raegan and the others in the chaos, but there’s too much happening at once in a room full of people.

A table the size of a pontoon boat smashes down on a group of agents, flattening them in a single blow.

Vines dangling from the beams across the high ceiling are snatching agents up left and right, swinging and crashing them together or waiting for flying knives to catch them before they’re dropped.

It’s amazing the difference from a few months ago when we were the ones at a disadvantage against GE.

And now?

Aiden’s sword extends, the lethal diamonds splitting into a whip that he slashes at the three agents in his reach before his wrist snaps the metal back to him.

“Dane. ”

“What?” I bark when my shot misses.

“Get ready to move.”

I look over at him.

Leaving this spot isn’t part of our plan.

He’s too terrified of Rae or me being kidnapped again, so he wanted us to stay close to someone just in case.

That’s more difficult out in the middle of the fighting.

I scan the room, searching for what could cause him to abandon his own plan so easily, then pausing when something moves in a blur, knocking Evie off her feet.

Well, fuck.

Tinsley.

“Don’t tell me she’s already on their side,” I mutter irritably.

That’s going to make rescuing her for Reid twice as hard.

I’ve already failed trying to get my sister back from them.

She’d been with them for most of her life, though.

They’ve only had Tinsley for a couple of weeks.

It just goes to show how fucking strong Raegan is for holding out against Gordon for as long as she did.

“Now!” Aiden shouts, and I jump to my feet at his command, racing after him.

He throws his arm out, his whip sword lengthening and rounding its sharp edges.

Tinsley dives under it mid-run, picking back up on her feet without missing a beat.

Aiden tries again, sending a shield of metal at the end of his sword to trap her against the wall.

She scurries up the wall, her speed keeping her feet moving until she’s standing on top of a beam high over the room.

She plants her hands on her hips and tsks at Aiden, her finger clocking back and forth.

“Can’t catch me!” Tinsley yells at him, her voice taunting and playful at the same time.

“I should get rubber bullets,” I grumble while staring up at her.

I don’t think Aiden has enough metal to reach her up there.

Not unless he pulls some from the floor.

Someone grabs my wrist that has the gun.

I turn, yanking my hand back on instinct and then freezing when I see Vera there.

“Ver…” I breathe, my chest constricting.

It doesn’t matter that I’ve decided to stop chasing after her.

Or that I’ve accepted she’s the enemy.

One of them.

“We have to go, Dane.” She smiles at me.

I follow the scar that runs from her eye to her lips, and then her words register.

I twist my wrist to break her hold, jerking myself free.

“No.”

Her face darkens, and she reaches for me again.

“You never listen,” Vera snaps.

I dodge her hand with a scowl.

“If I go back, I’m dead. Do you get that? Or maybe you don’t care. Maybe there’s nothing left of my sister, and I’m just talking to a puppet .”

Where the fuck is Aiden?

Taking a step back to put some distance between us, I look for Aiden and find a blur spinning around him, trapping him in the middle.

Fuck. Tinsley was the bait to draw us out.

“Don’t call me that !”

Sharp pain flares in my arm.

“Aargh! What the fuck?!” Vera pulls something away from my arm, and I stare at the bleeding pricks there.

“What was that?”

Before she can say anything, knives swerve in her direction, and I react before I realize what I’m doing, tackling her to the ground before they reach her.

She yells beneath me, but mine are louder when pain in my side tells me I didn’t get us out of the way in time and a knife buries into my side.

“Dane!”

Raegan’s voice pierces through the agony.

My eyes fly open as she runs toward me, and I throw a hand up, struggling to my knees and off Vera even as the pain in my side sharpens at the movement.

“Stay back!” I can’t risk Vera hurting her.

Whatever she’d jammed into my skin could hurt her.

Or she could have another one.

I shift myself between them to make sure Vera can’t get to her.

“Jack, don’t!” she cries, grabbing his arm before he can attack Vera again.

Vera scrambles out from under me, but instead of glaring at Raegan like I’d expected, she’s staring wide-eyed at me.

“Why?” Her gaze drops to the knife buried in my side, then back to my face.

“You picked her. Why would you take a knife for me? I thought...you saw me as your enemy.”

I cringe when the movement of breathing causes the pain to intensify to white-hot levels, and I huff irritably.

“You’re still…” Fuuuuuuck, this hurts.

“…my sister,” I grit through clenched teeth.

“Nothing will change that.”

Her face draws together in a mix of emotion, like she can’t figure out what she’s feeling as she watches me in pain on my knees before her.

She takes a step back.

And another. Vera casts a fearful look at Jackson and Raegan as she backs away.

She taps a finger to her ear.

“Enough. Pull back,” she says, then touches her back pocket.

Water falls over us in a downpour, saturating the hall in seconds from the sprinklers.

The remaining agents make their escape through the portal.

I can’t help but watch as Vera does the same, her unsure expression branded in my mind even after she’s gone.