Out of Plans (The Mercenaries #2) (29 page)

Lily yanked the door open and immediately dropped into a crouch. Bullets laced through the wood above her head. While the bodyguard continued to shoot at the door as if she was standing directly behind it, she scooted around the edge and shot him in both knee caps. He screamed and fell backwards, his gun flying out of his hands.

Marc had told her she only had minutes, but really, it was less. The other two guards were already turning towards the commotion, guns at the ready. Lily strode boldly forward, shooting the closer guard in his right shoulder. The remaining guard managed to get a couple shots off, but his aim was wild. Lily's aim was impeccable, as always, and she planted two bullets in the center of his chest.

Them or us.

She walked the length of the building, glancing in the stalls. Each one held a group of kids, anywhere from six to twelve of them. Most were huddled into corners, their hands over their ears. Lily tried not to make eye contact with the children. She didn't want to be seen as their savior, and more importantly, she didn't want to cry.

Not yet. Not until it was over and she could ensure their freedom.

The office was in the very back, behind the last stall. There was a large window in the door and she wormed her way across it, trying to see the room from every angle. It looked empty, but there could be anyone hiding behind a huge metal desk that took up most of the space.

She moved to stand next to the door, then grasped its knob and slowly turned. It fell open slightly and she began feeding the muzzle of her gun through the space, letting it lead the way. That way if anyone popped up, she could hit them first.

Then, someone
did
pop up. Literally. From underneath the window, out of her line of sight. He shoved his weight against the door, shutting it on the gun, which in turn caused the body of the weapon to slam against her side. She cried out, then almost fell as that same person grabbed the barrel of her rifle and yanked it forward. She went stumbling into the room.

She did her boys proud, she didn't hesitate. Lily already had her knife in hand as the strap of the rifle went tight around her neck. She sliced at the material and as the nylon went slack, she spun around with her elbow out, catching her captor in the face. He howled in pain and she flipped her knife around, driving the blade down into his shoulder. When he dropped to his knees, she quickly grabbed him by the hair and slammed his forehead into her knee, repeatedly, until he fell backwards, unconscious.

The problem with Marc's whole “
never hesitate
” philosophy, though, was that sometimes it meant she didn't have time to look around. The bodyguard had barely started to fall when someone rammed into her from the side. Before she knew it, she was rammed up against the wall, a strong forearm pressing down against her chest.

“My dear, I have been waiting a
very
long time to meet you.”

Lily had never actually met Anatoly Stankovski. She'd only seen him at a distance and through pictures. She had expected him to have an accent, like his wife. His
late
wife. But he didn't – his voice was deep, and soft, and very polished sounding. His eyes were even bluer than she'd thought, his hair even blonder, and he was a ridiculous amount taller than her, possibly even as tall as Kingsley. A very imposing man, in every sense of the word.

“Really? Odd, you run away every time I get close,” she managed to chuckle, struggling to breathe under his weight. He was silent for a moment, his eyes traveling up and down her length. Then he gave a small laugh, almost under his breath.

“You know, you don't look like her very much,” he commented.

“Who?”

“Your sister.”

Lily's blood ran cold.

“No. No, unfortunately, she was blonde.”

“Yes, I do love my blondes. But she had these same eyes,” he sighed, and with his free hand, he ran a finger down the side of her face.

Lily had her fingers curled around his arm, and with a shout, she wrenched his wrist away from her. He cried out in pain and his free hand wrapped around her throat. She gave a sharp kick to his shin, then an elbow to the side of his head, but he caught that arm, and before she even knew what was happening, she was flying through the air. He tossed her over his shoulder like she weighed nothing and she landed hard on top of the desk, the air knocked from her lungs. She watched as Stankovski dove for the bodyguard – he couldn't get to the rifle as the heavy man had fallen on top of it. But he was able to pull her knife out of the man's shoulder. Still gasping for air, she rolled off the desk top and backed into a corner, keeping the piece of furniture between them.

“I should've guessed you'd put up a good fight,” she coughed out, trying to catch her breath.

“You don't build an empire the size of mine and then just give up,” he assured her. She nodded.

“Good point. Maybe that's why your wife fought till the end.”

“Did she?”

“Yes. I was impressed, until I shot her fourteen times.”

“Fourteen? Seems overkill.”

“Har dee har har. I never thought you'd be funny, either.”

“I'm a man of many talents.”

He threw the knife at her and Lily barely managed to dodge it as she whipped her Glock out of its holster on her back. She planted four bullets in the spot where he'd had been standing just seconds before; he'd managed to slip out the door before she'd pulled the trigger.

She bolted around the desk and ran out into the walkway. Stankovski was jogging away room her, shouting something in Russian. She wished she'd spent some of her time learning the basics of the language, she was sick of not understanding things. She sighted her gun on the back of his head. She would much rather he have been looking at her, watching as she ended his life, but she would take what she could get. She stopped moving, not wanting anything to ruin her shot, and she held her breath as she began squeezing the trigger.

Suddenly, gun fire. All around her. She screamed as something sliced down the side of her bicep, then she leapt to the side, hugging the wall. Someone was above them. In the ceiling. Was there an attic!? They were shooting down, using some sort of automatic weapon. A bullet had grazed her arm, a lot closer than she would have liked, and she pressed a hand against the wound.

“
Sweetheart!
”

Marc was yelling as he charged through the stable doors. She wanted to scream no. He was always trying to be her hero. He should've waited outside – that had been the plan. If she'd needed him, she would've called for him. But of course, neither of them were very good at letting the other risk life and limb, so when he'd heard her scream, he must have come running.

Stankovski was waiting just inside the door, and he'd acquired a gun. Lily managed to get out one good shout before Marc was shot in the shoulder. Her shout turned into a shriek. She'd watched him get shot before; in Africa, Ivanov had shot him in the chest. But she'd known he was protected by his bullet proof vest, then. His shoulder didn't have the same security. Hearing the shot and seeing the blood, it sent a shock wave through her system. Marcelle De Sant was, it turned out, very mortal. Suddenly she was fear and rage and sheer terror, all rolled into one.

That was your fault. If he dies, it will be
all your fault
, and then you'll be all alone, for real. No more jobs. No more road trips. No more Marc.
Don't let that happen.

Impressively, Marc didn't go down, though he did stagger to the side. Before Stankovski could get off another shot, Lily was firing her own gun. The Russian dove back so he was hiding behind the very first stall. Marc was across from him, crouched behind some boxes of ammo.

“You okay?” Lily asked, checking her magazine. Shit, only seven bullets left. The bottom bullet was from the original magazine, the one she'd almost emptied into Roksana. She was still saving it for him.

“Good thing I'm a righty,” Marc laughed loud enough for her to hear.

“Duly noted! I'll aim for the other arm next time!” Stankovski yelled back.

The gun from up above opened up again, this time closer to Lily. She swore and dashed forward, trying to keep ahead of the bullets. But then Stankovski leaned around his corner. She had no choice but to throw herself over a stall door, narrowly avoiding a shot to the face. She landed hard on the ground. The kids in the corner screamed and cried, all fleeing to the wall opposite her.

“Shut up! Just get down!” she yelled at them.

She could hear Marc shooting at Stankovski, or maybe they were shooting at each other. The gun was still firing from the ceiling above them, but it still hadn't found her. Then it sounded like a small missile flew through the stables. She recognized the sound from Africa –  Kingsley was shooting into the building. She ground her teeth together and pressed herself flat against the dirty floor, trying to mime to the children to do the same.

What the fuck is he thinking!? I told him not to shoot at the building!

Another shot was high, she could hear it ripping through the roofing. Footsteps thundered across the ceiling and she risked peeking over the stall door. Marc and Stankovski were embroiled in a shoot out, preoccupied with each other. She turned and watched the other end of the building as a hidden trap door was opened in the ceiling. A gun barrel poked out and a heavy burst of gunfire ripped down the walkway. Once the gunman felt confident that he'd cleared the area, he began lowering himself out of the opening.

Clearly, he hadn't seen Lily's eyes peeping over her stall door. She jumped to her feet and leaned into the walkway, immediately firing two shots into his back. He yelled once and fell to the ground, then didn't move at all.

She took a deep breath and unlatched the door, kicking it wide open. Then she crouched down, waiting for gun shots. Nothing happened. Marc and Stankovski had stopped shooting. The stables were eerily quiet, even the kids had managed to quiet down.

So when the explosion happened, it was even more startling.
Something
went off, and very close, judging by the way the building shook. Lily was thrown to the floor, completely exposed in the middle of the walkway. A couple beams fell out of the ceiling, some of the paneling came off the walls, and a cold breeze ripped through the stables. She watched as Stankovski stumbled and grabbed one of the doors, trying to hold himself upright.

“
Not yet, you idiots!
” he yelled, then he pushed himself outside.

“
NO!
”

Lily was on her feet. She was vaguely aware that the back wall of the stables was now gone, and that was probably important, but all she could focus on was getting to Stankovski. If he got outside, he could get away. She couldn't let that happen. Her whole universe was focused on him, on not letting him get away.

Marc let out a shout as she ran past him, but she didn't listen. She burst through the doors, sending them flying open, and was in for a shock. Stankovski hadn't run away. In fact, he was standing just a few feet outside the entrance to the stables. Lily barely had time to skid to a stop before running into him, and even less time to notice the gun he had pointed at her. The snow on the ground worked to her advantage and her feet began to slip, so she simply fell to the side. He lowered his gun as he pulled the trigger, but wasn't fast enough to correct his aim, and his bullet ripped through the side of her thigh. Not a clean shot, thankfully, but still much more than a graze.

Holy shit, that's way more than a graze.

She screamed, she couldn't help it. There went her streak of never getting shot. She pressed her palm over the gash in her leg, warm blood oozing around her fingers. She kept trying to scramble backwards, and when she glanced up, Stankovski was reloading his gun. Her own gun had fallen out of her hand, lost in the snow somewhere.

Marc came bursting out of the stables, took one look at Lily, then barreled into Stankovski. While the two men wrestled around, Lily managed to climb to her feet. She could see a black figure running down the hill towards them. Kingsley. At first, she was shocked that he'd left his hiding spot and thought he was being stupid and rushing to her rescue. Then she saw what had caused him to flee. Men, pouring out of the woods behind him.
A lot
of men, from god knew where. Kingsley tucked and rolled, dodged and weaved, but there were so many behind him.

Get your shit together, Liliana! Think!

Explosives. The back of the stable had gotten blown up and Stankovski had yelled something. “
Not yet
”. The explosion hadn't necessarily surprised him, but its timing had; was there a plan to blow the building? It made sense – an insurance policy of sorts. If the feds ever came knocking at his door, he could just hit a button and boom, evidence gone. Maybe once Marc and Lily had stormed into the building, he'd instructed his men to blow it as soon as he got clear.

Which he is, right now.

“Get away from the building!” Lily screamed, clutching her bleeding leg as she hobbled towards the corner of the stables.

“Run for it! I'll take care of him!” Marc called back. She turned towards him, hopping backwards as best she could, and watched as Stankovski wrestled Marc closer and closer to the entrance of the stables.