Phantom Shadows (29 page)

“Stuart,” Bastien said, his expression darkening.

Richart and Lisette appeared. Richart vanished again as Bastien ushered Melanie out into the hallway.

Guards urged the other network employees toward the far end of the hallway. Already at the dead end, Todd fiddled with something in his hand, yelled, “Fire in the hole!” and detonated a charge, blowing a huge, jagged opening in the wall and revealing a cement escape tunnel.

“Lanie!”

Melanie turned and saw one of the guards steering Linda past.

“I’m fine. Keep going!”

She nodded, face pinched with fear, and was soon swallowed by the mass of men and women flowing toward Todd.

Bastien curled an arm around Melanie’s shoulders and cut a path across the stream of moving bodies, leading Melanie to the door of Stuart’s apartment. “Open it,” he ordered grimly.

Hands shaking, she fumbled for her security card.
Déjà vu.
Swiping the card, she entered the code as Lisette stepped up behind them.

Bastien threw the heavy steel door open as though it were hollowed-out plywood.

Stuart stood across the living room. Eyes wide, he backed away as Bastien and Lisette stalked toward him. “I didn’t do it! I swear! I didn’t lead them here!”

“Then how the hell did they find us?” Bastien demanded.

“I don’t know! I don’t know!”

“Wait.” Lisette halted Bastien. “He’s telling the truth. He has no memory of interacting with the mercenaries.”

“He
wouldn’t
if he let them drug him afterward.”

Lisette’s eyes narrowed. Her eyes glowed brighter.

Stuart winced and gripped his head. “Ahh! What are you doing?”

“Your memories are still there. The drug has merely hidden them from you. I intend to find them.”

Melanie bit her lip as Stuart tugged his hair, his face creased with pain.

The building continued to shake with blasts. Pieces of the ceiling fell like snow.

Was it true? Had Stuart betrayed them? Had he made a deal with the soldiers, then let them drug him?

“How could he have told them where we are?” she asked. “He has no way of communicating with them. No phone. No walkie-talkie.”

“I don’t know,” Bastien said. Face set in stone, he watched the vamp writhe as Lisette riffled through his thoughts. “But he found a way.”

“You said you searched him before you brought him here.”

“I must have missed something. Anything yet?” he asked Lisette.

“No. There’s nothing between his running from the mercenaries and his waking up in the shed.”

“There must be
something
! Because they sure as hell didn’t follow us from my lair. We teleported!”

“There’s a chip,” Richart spoke behind Melanie.

She spun around. “What?”

Clothing torn, rumpled, and stained with blood, he nodded at the vamp, who abruptly stopped moaning. “I heard the mercenaries talking. There’s a chip implanted just beneath the skin.”

“Where? I didn’t see anything when I examined him.”

“Under his hair at the base of his skull.”

Eyes wide, Stuart reached up to touch the back of his head.

Bastien palmed a dagger and strode toward him.

Stuart shook his head frantically. “Bullshit!” His voice rose an octave as he scrambled backward, bumped into a wall, and skidded sideways. “That’s bullshit! I didn’t help them!”

“It’s true,” Richart said. “He didn’t get away when they tranqed him. He passed out. They implanted the chip, then stuck him in the garden shed so he would think he
did
get away. All they had to do then was wait for us to take the bait.”

Melanie jumped when Bastien suddenly shot forward in a blur and caught Stuart. He overpowered the boy’s struggles with ease. Lisette crossed to the duo and took the dagger from Bastien.

When she ran her fingers through the vamp’s dark hair, then angled the dagger to remove the chip, Melanie looked away from the kid’s fear-filled face.

Richart dialed his cell phone and swore. “Why is Seth so fucking hard to reach?”

“Because so many need him,” his sister replied drolly as the building shook again.

Stuart howled.

Richart shoved his phone back in his pocket. “I already teleported Étienne in. He’s trying to hold down the fort on the ground until there are enough of us to start a counterassault. They’ve got fucking shoulder-fired missiles up there. Grenades. Too many mercenaries to count. Lisette, help Chris evacuate the mortals.”

“Hell no!” She handed Bastien his bloody dagger and the chip she’d removed, then zipped over to her brother’s side. “I’m going with you.”

Richart nodded and gripped her arm.

Melanie threw out her hands. “Wait!”

They hesitated.

“In my office. In my desk. Bottom right drawer. Auto-injectors with the tranquilizer antidote Bastien tested. They have green caps. I upped the dose, so you should only need one each. Take one for Étienne, too.”

Richart nodded. The two vanished.

Bastien drew his phone out and strode toward Melanie.

Face pale, she stared up at him with wide brown eyes. Her heart raced. Her hands shook. But she didn’t bolt. Her courage both impressed and terrified him. He wanted her on her way out of the damned building with her colleagues.

Taking her hand, he headed for her office, checking out the hallway as he did. No infiltration down here thus far.

“Would you please get me one of the auto-injectors?” he asked.

She nodded and hurried over to her desk.

Richart and Lisette had already come and gone, leaving the drawer cracked open.

Bastien stayed in the doorway and dialed two numbers. Seth didn’t answer. David did.

“Yes?”

“The network is under attack.”

David swore foully. “By vampires or humans? Darnell!”

“Humans. The mercenaries are here in force with heavy-duty weaponry. Shoulder-fired missiles are pounding the hell out of the building. So are grenades. We need all hands.”

David relayed the information to his Second, who began to make calls in the background.

Bastien could hear automatic weapons firing on the first and second sublevels, so those two floors must have already been infiltrated by soldiers. Mortal network employees continued to walk, limp, or drag each other past the doorway. Lisette, Richart, and Étienne began to wreak havoc among the mercenaries’ ranks, eliciting satisfying screams.

Melanie handed Bastien an auto-injector, then returned to her desk.

“Help is on the way,” the elder immortal told him.

Bastien thought furiously. “David.”

“Yes?”

“We need Ami here.”

“Are you out of your mind?”

“Look, I know—”

“Forget it!” David ended the call.

Swearing, Bastien dialed another number. The scent of blood grew stronger as casualties from the upper floors entered the hallway and trekked past.

He glanced over at Melanie and did a double take when he saw her loading up with weapons. 9mms. Extra clips. Tranquilizer darts. Daggers.
Shit!
No way in hell was he letting her fight!

She met his gaze. “Bastien, you know how badly Emrys wants to get his hands on Ami. Why do you—”

“Hi, Bastien,” Ami answered in a cheerful voice. Darnell must not have contacted her.

“Hi, Ami. I need to talk to Marcus for a moment.”

“What’s wrong?” she asked, voice sobering.

“Just let me talk to Marcus for a minute, please.”

“Okay. Marcus, honey, he wants to talk to you.”

Marcus answered, his voice as cold as his wife’s was warm.

“What?”

“I’m at the network with Richart, Lisette, and Étienne. Emrys’s soldiers are attacking.”

“How many?”

“All
of them by the sounds of it.”

“I’m on my way.”

“Marcus! I was thinking . . . We have a chance to end this here and now, but I need you to listen to me. Okay? Will you listen to me?”

“All right. Go ahead.”

“You need to bring Ami here.”

Marcus hung up.

Growling, Bastien dialed Ami’s number again.

“Fuck you!” Marcus snarled into the phone.

“We can use her gift to get these bastards!” Bastien shouted. “To get Emrys! You want him dead, don’t you? You want to find him and make him pay for what he did to Ami?
I
sure as hell do!”

Steely silence.

“Look, I’ll find Richart and have him teleport both of you to Sublevel 5. The fighting hasn’t reached here yet. All Ami has to do is stand here and absorb all of the energy signatures she can so if any of these assholes get away she can trace them back to the source and we can napalm their asses, or better yet, turn them over to Seth and David.”

Ami had done the same once before. She said every living creature possessed a unique energy signature. Once Ami was in close proximity to that individual, she could locate that signature again, tracking it like a homing beacon. If even
one
soldier got away, he could lead them back to Emrys.

Marcus’s inner struggle was palpable, his tension carrying over the line.

“You can remain by her side every second,” Bastien promised. “If it looks like the mercenaries are going to get down this far, have Richart teleport her to safety. This is our best chance, Marcus. I don’t want those fuckers to get their hands on her again. Or on Sarah or Lisette. Or any immortal, for that matter.”

Melanie stared at him, face grim.

Bastien couldn’t read what she was thinking and wished she were close enough to touch. Did she think him as crazy as the others to risk Ami’s safety? Did she think him uncaring?

“I’ll ask Ami what she wants to—”

“I’m in,” Ami said before Marcus could finish. “He was kind of yelling, so I heard enough to figure out the plan.”

“Darling, it’s too dangerous.”

“I’m doing it. Bastien, send Richart.”

The call ended.

Bastien pocketed his phone. “Go ahead and say it. I’m a bastard.”

Melanie shook her head. “It’s brilliant. I’m just afraid for her.”

Relieved, he yanked her to him and hugged her close. Her fear stole into him. “Lisette!”

What? I’m busy taking out a Hummer.

Tell Richart to go pick up Marcus.

He’s fetching Roland and Sarah. I’ll tell him when he gets back.

Across the hall, Stuart stepped into the doorway of his apartment. The collar of his shirt bore a red stain from the wound Bastien had inflicted. Brow furrowed, he watched the humans hurry past as debris and dust fell from the ceiling. He shifted his weight, met Bastien’s gaze.

“Cliff,” Bastien said.

I’m here
, Cliff answered through his door.
How bad is it, because it sounds fucking cataclysmic.

“It’s bad.”

Chris Reordon exited the stairway at the end of the corridor, the arm of an injured guard looped over one shoulder.

Dr. Lipton’s okay?
Cliff asked.

“For now.” His gaze returned to Stuart. “Cliff, you up for a fight?”

Hell, yes, man. Let me out and I’ll help you kick some serious ass.

Me, too
, Joe said.
I’m a little out of it from the drug, but I can hold my own against humans.

Bastien set Melanie away from him and urged her out into the hallway. “You have to go now.”

“No. I’m staying. I can fight.”

Above the employees’ heads, through the dust and shit falling from the ceiling, he caught Chris’s gaze as Chris half carried, half dragged the guard forward. “Don’t argue with me, Melanie. You’re human.”

“So are they!”

He didn’t have time for this. He wanted her safe and didn’t want to risk her being taken and tortured for information. “If you insist on staying, help Chris evacuate the wounded. But I need you to stay down here.”

She nodded.

“Promise me.”

“All right. I promise. Be careful.”

He gave her arms a squeeze, then zipped through the throng to Chris’s side. “Étienne and Lisette are up on the ground,” he shouted so the human could hear him over the explosions that grew louder and closer as parts of the structure gave way above them. “David will be here any minute. Richart is fetching Roland, Sarah, Marcus, and Ami.” Bastien took the injured guard from him, swept him over to Melanie, then returned in a blink.

Chris stared at him in disbelief. “Why the hell is he bringing Ami here?”

“We have a plan! I’ll fill you in later!” He motioned down the hallway. “Right now you need to let the vampires out to play!”

“Now I
know
you’re crazy!”

“They want to help! And we need all the help we can get! It’s going to take all of us immortals to handle the human firepower. We need the vamps to keep the damned building from collapsing until the rest of you can evacuate! Let them out! I’ll take full responsibility!”

“Which doesn’t mean shit! Because once Seth hears you put Ami in danger, he’s going to kill you!”

Probably. But . . . “What other choice do we have?”

“You’d better be right!” Chris headed for the vampires’ apartments. As he passed Stuart, Chris pointed at him and said, “You’re dead, motherfucker!”

Bastien shook his head. “He didn’t know they were tracking him!”

Stuart followed them to Cliff’s apartment. “You won’t kill me if I help, right? You aren’t going to let those guys capture me again, are you? I mean, I can help, right?”

“Yes,” Bastien answered while Chris swiped a card and entered the security code. “Help the humans get their wounded to the tunnel.”

Stuart did as ordered. Racing to the stairwell, he grabbed a wounded network employee two others were struggling to support, looped him carefully over one shoulder and raced over to the ragged tunnel entrance to pass him off to Todd.

Cliff’s door opened. Cliff stood there, brown eyes already glowing amber. “I can help up on the ground.”

Bastien shook his head. “I don’t want to risk your being tranqed.”

Chris moved on to unlock Joe’s door.

Joe stepped into the hallway, eyes glowing a vibrant blue.

“Help with the evacuation,” Bastien ordered and it felt almost like old times. These were
his
men. Members of
his
army. “Check the upper floors. See if anyone is trapped. Get everyone out you can.”