“We’ve established contact with more Druids in the last month than we’ve ever had. We’re building the bridges with a new understanding, and reconnecting families through it,” Dina said as she took her seat again.
“And the IMPO has been its strongest in terms of organized crime in recent months. Because they caught Axel.” He wasn’t going to let her forget that. “They have taken every hit. So, I don’t see why my team should be broken up because they got into an accident and Sawyer got emotional. Isn’t that what you want to see? That the infamous Shadow has a heart that led her from a life of crime? That she can feel? So you can know that she regrets and understands guilt?”
Dina grabbed the deck of cards they had been playing with and began to shuffle them without a word. He was strangely impressed with her ability as she dealt them hands.
“Are you going to say anything?” He took his cards, not really looking at them.
“I’m not going to break them up. As long as they don’t say anything about my nephews, I made a promise and I intend to keep it. I tried something dirty and underhanded. I look back on it all the time. She was smart to remind me that people…died for my scheme, and I…” Dina sighed. “I messed that all up, then I had to salvage it. Those soldiers would have gone there without Special Agent Judge, certainly. They would have been more severely injured, I believe. But still, I put more at risk.” She gave him a vulnerable look. “I’ve had to live to regret that, even if my colleagues find it a normal day’s work.”
He wasn’t sure if he believed the speech about regretting it, but he could see that she wouldn’t risk pissing off Sawyer or the rest of the team. No, her nephews obviously meant the world to her. While all of the other Council members left their families at home, Dina brought those boys to keep them right at her side. She obviously cared for them like she was their mother.
“Let’s play cards,” he said, dropping the conversation.
It was a few hours later, too late in the evening, when his phone went off. He held up a finger to Dina, who looked tired herself, as he checked it.
It was a text from Thompson, who had forwarded him something from Jasper.
“Well, Dina. Your gut was right.” He held up the image on his screen for her. Naseem with Councilman Suarez, who looked at ease, not in any danger. “This should all be over tonight. I bet they are arresting him right now.”
“That’s good-”
The blast blew open the door, sending it into the window, and flying out into the night.
James reached for Dina, grabbing her and pushing her head down with one hand as he pulled his sidearm with his left. He fired blindly at the door.
“STAY DOWN!” he roared as he pushed her towards the boys’ room next door. “MOVE!”
She did, staying bent over as they got to the door. He didn’t bother opening it as he fired another shot blindly at a now-building fire at the door of Dina’s room. He pushed Dina through, keeping his hand on her so they could both phase using her magic.
Once inside, she ran for the boys as he positioned himself to stop anyone from coming through the door.
“Move!” one of the boys yelled and he did, jumping to the side as that door was blasted into the far wall. These fucking boys.
“Dina, get them out of here!” he demanded.
“No, I don’t think so,” a cruel, feminine voice said politely. James turned for the door. He hadn’t felt any other Magi. He hadn’t been looking, truthfully. The fire, the explosions. Those had mattered more. He saw her as she tried to plunge a sword in his chest.
It’s very hard to phase when an object is coming towards someone at an unknown speed and force but he managed, jumping away before he lost it and the sword ended up in his chest.
“Go,” he snapped to Dina, who nodded, grabbing the hands of the children and running for the door. Kalama practically hissed in anger as James took a potshot at her for her attention. “You’ll have to kill me first.”
“Fine.”
She pulled fire in from the blaze in the other room and tossed it at him. He rolled, taking a shot as he went. He didn’t have anything except his sidearm. She dove at him with a short sword that was blazing.
He had less than a second to make a decision. None of the options were good ones.
He took the sword to his chest as he pulled the trigger, hoping for the best. She yanked it out, her eyes wide.
He looked down at the bleeding on her chest, falling to his knees as she stumbled back.
He heard a thump.
Fire consumed the room, wildly out of control.
He couldn’t feel the heat.
30
Sawyer
Naseem made the first move, and it wasn’t for her. He phased down again, a dangerous grin on his face. She followed, running after him the moment her feet touched the floor.
Her mind reeled. Was he really going to race her to Thompson? Was that the game they were going to play?
Yes. As he phased through a wall and she kept after him, she decided that it was exactly the game he wanted to play. She wasn’t sure why, though. Thompson would already have the text. It would be on his phone. If he was smart, he would send it to others, as backup to the evidence.
She knew he was working in his office late, waiting on them to report to him. Well, he’d gotten his report in a single text, a single picture.
Naseem ran through the last wall to leave the WMC building and she followed close behind. They both made short work of the small alley and phased into the IMPO building. She knew this building better and went straight for the stairwell. It was a tall building, but she could make short work of it.
She lost Naseem, not knowing how he was going to scale the massive building. She looked up the center of the stairwell for a moment and blinked upwards, finding herself five stories up and about to fall down. She sublimated and got back on the stairs before doing it again to go higher. It took a lot of concentration to blink like this, knowing there was nothing to catch her at the spot she wanted to be at.
But she still made it up the stairwell much faster than an elevator could get her.
She burst out on the top floor and ran for Thompson’s office, phasing through his door. He was just standing there, frowning at his phone, looking tired.
“Sir.” She was breathing hard as she walked closer to him.
“Sawyer? What are you doing here?” He turned his frown on her.
“Sir, Naseem is coming for you. We need to get you to safety.”
“Really?” Thompson dropped his phone on his desk. “I sent a copy of that image to James and several others, to make sure that everyone was on the same page at dawn.” He pulled open the top drawer of his desk and pulled out a small pistol. “Do we want to bunker down here?”
“Yes…” She glanced at the door as she walked closer to him. “Stay away from the windows. Find a place…” She pointed to a corner near his fireplace. “There. You’ll be able to see the entire room.”
“I know.” He seemed so relaxed. “I used to be an agent, Sawyer.”
That explained it. He was trained. Like James. They had once been agents like the guys. They knew what they were doing.
“Don’t shoot him. I want him alive,” she said.
“I’ll shoot him if I think you’re going to die. Or I am. How’s that?”
“I would prefer you just sit in the corner and pretend like you don’t exist.” She glanced at him. “Just…let me handle this.”
“Because it’s personal?”
She didn’t want to say yes but it was the truth. She was taking this assassin down personally. For a thousand reasons, it seemed like, but now, the only one that mattered was her guys. He was a threat to her guys and she couldn’t allow that.
She felt sweaty. Her palms were clammy. Her shirt stuck to her uncomfortably as her heartbeat refused to slow down.
Something had her anxious.
She had beaten Naseem to the top, which gave her the advantage. What w
as bothering her?
She closed her eyes for a moment, rubbing her temples.
A split second to catch her breath.
The sword sliced across her ribs and a laugh echoed in the room as she staggered away, shocked by the attack.
He had gotten in at some point and she hadn’t even realized it. She hadn’t been careful enough to look for the empty spot. The energy, the race, the adrenaline had distracted her.
“Axel’s whore. You’re fast, but please, you aren’t better than me.” Naseem attacked her again. She had to pull her daggers and deflect faster than she ever had before, forcing his sword off to her side. She responded, trying to get in his guard and deliver a quick hit to his gut.
She felt the push, the pressure.
A strong air manipulator could gently push people off their trajectories. A bullet, even a fraction over, would become ineffectual. A punch would land wide when it should have landed.
She had fought against them before, but air manipulators were a serious weakness for her, especially those with such minute control. Her secondary form was crippled by them, on top of her inability to land a hit.
He took the chance to slice open the other side of her ribs. Neither wound was fatal, by any means. He planned on wearing her down, making her hurt, proving he was the best there ever was in their business.
She blinked to get behind him and delivered her own hit on his back, scoring it open. He spun, going low and sending his blade upwards to strike her. She had to stagger back, her ribs aching.
“I’ve killed a Druid in open combat. What makes you think I’m going to die to you?” she demanded, watching him dance away after his slash didn’t land. “While I’m asking questions…why are you so sloppy?”
“Why am I sloppy?” he repeated softly, then chuckled. “The Triad took this job on a dare, not because Suarez offered as much money as he did. What we didn’t account for was how you really do refuse to die, or how pushy Suarez would be once the plans slipped up a little. At the end of the day, we had a professional reputation to uphold. We couldn’t back out on an unfinished hit.”
“Reputation.” She was tired of hearing about reputations. “Who would harm your reputation so much if you walk away that you would rather die?”
“There’s one or two people out there with that sort of power.”
She used to work with one, but he was out of the game, so then who could it really be?
The conspiracy was much deeper than she had anticipated. There was someone else, someone not in this part of the game. There was a bigger picture she was missing. She would need to tell Vincent that later.
She didn’t need to hear any more, blinking closer to Naseem and delivering a swift hit to his temple with a right hook. She didn’t go for anything fatal because she wanted information. She wanted a name at the end of the night.
He took the punch and stabbed upward again with his sword, slicing her hip as she moved to the side. He got a grab on her shirt, which was bad news for her. As long as he held on, he was going for a ride if she blinked.
She decided to use it, blinking closer to the giant windows and swinging him into them as his sword missed, jarred by the impact. She slammed him into it again, making him lose his grip and stagger.
She bent him over and brought her knee up into him. She didn’t know if she hit his face, chest, or gut, but it didn’t really matter. She was a brawler and she knew how to fight close. He might have stopped her ability to sublimate, but blinking worked just as well.
And she was better than him.
She pulled his face eye level to her and delivered one more hit to his temple, letting him drop to the ground.
“Handcuffs?” she called out to Thompson. They flew across the room and hit the window with an unnatural accuracy. She didn’t know any of his abilities – well, now she knew one. He must have telekinesis. She rolled Naseem over and handcuffed him, leaving him there as Thompson met her in the center of the room.
“You have…an impressive set of skills,” Thompson said, a little uncomfortable.
“I was born lucky, I guess.” She knew her abilities had made her a target for Axel to exploit. Not many people in the world, if any, had the combination she did. And if they did, they didn’t use them like she did. She knew that because she never heard of them.
They stood in an awkward silence for a long time.
“Come sit down. We’ll put him…somewhere. Other agents should be coming soon as well. I hit an alert on my phone, so everyone should be coming.”
“All right.”
She’d won, but none of it felt finished. She needed an update from Vincent or Jasper. She wanted to get in touch with Quinn, Zander, and Jasper.
She wanted to finish the mystery too. Who would dare the Triad to take this on and they were afraid to back out of it?
They moved Naseem and propped him up against a wall. Then, she took a seat opposite of the Director at his desk, as if they were going to have a normal meeting. The silence was uncomfortable and she didn’t know what to do with it.
“So…you and Elijah?” he asked softly, pouring a drink. The weirdness of this wasn’t missed by her and it must not have been missed by him either. “We can’t leave until backup arrives. Might as well talk.”
“Me and Elijah. Elijah and Quinn. Me and Quinn.” She cocked an eyebrow at him. She wasn’t in the mood for this. “Me and Jasper, and Zander, and Vincent. What are you going to do about it?”
He had been moving to take a drink and stopped. He set the glass down slowly, threading his fingers together as he leaned on his desk.
“Nothing. You and that team have-” His phone began to go off. He picked it up immediately. “Director Thompson.”
He was quiet as someone on the other spoke frantically. At that moment, she could hear sirens down on the street. She needed to investigate. Unable to resist the urge, she stood up and went to the window, looking down on the street. She could see the ambulance, the non-Magi police forces.
“Sawyer? There’s been a fire at one of the safehouses.” Thompson sounded…sad. He shouldn’t. They had won. Naseem was handcuffed on the wall. Jasper and Vincent should have Councilman Suarez in cuffs, waiting for backup as well.
But there was an ambulance on the street. In front of the WMC building, just next door to them.
There was a fire at one of the safe houses.
“What happened?” she demanded softly.
“From that report, Kalama attacked them. Dina and her nephews were the first targets she went for.”
“James is protecting them,” she said, something dark settling in her.
“He was. Firefighters pulled out his body, along with Kalama’s.” Thompson must have been working hard to sound steady. She could hear the tremor. The pain. But he put so much effort into keeping it steady.
She was shaking as she kept her eyes on the ambulance.
“I need to check on my team,” she said, her chest growing tight.
“Sawyer. James is dead,” Thompson said, clarifying.
“I heard you!” she snapped, turning to storm out of the room.
Once her feet began moving, they didn’t stop. She ran through walls to the stairwell and jumped over the rail and began to fall. She was smoke before she hit the floor. She was human again to keep running, through doors and walls, past agents who were scrambling to get up to the Director’s office. The IMPO headquarters were coming alive.
And she felt like everything was falling apart.
She kept running as she broke outside onto the steps. She found the ambulance and didn’t stop. She needed to find her team.
Who was in that ambulance?
She ran into him. Strong hands took her upper arms. “Sawyer. He’ll be okay. He’ll be okay.”
“Who?” she begged. “Who?”
“Vincent.”
She blinked and looked at the stormy eyes, whirling with emotion, staring directly at her. The blond hair, the classic good looks.
> “Jasper, what happened?” she asked softly. “What happened?”
“The IMPO agent, Deacon, stabbed him. He’ll be okay. Lost a lot of blood but he’ll be okay.” He looked around, seeing the chaos now. She was ignoring it.
Still, something felt like they hadn’t won tonight.
“Sawyer?” Jasper looked back at her eyes. “What don’t I know? What’s going on?”
“I stopped Naseem,” she whispered. “And there’s a fire at one of the safehouses.”
“Shit. Kalama? Suarez said something, but…”
She nodded. God. They hadn’t won tonight. They hadn’t won. There would be no winning. She looked at his hands on her. Covered in Vincent’s blood. He had been too busy to worry about Kalama because Vincent had been hurt.
“Okay. Tell me-”
“James is dead.”
31
Zander
Zander was waiting for them to get back when he got the text from Jasper. Vincent was coming in with an injury. Case closed, but bad news.
Bad news.
“Well if Vincent is injured, I expect there’s going to be some bad news,” he mumbled to himself. He left Quinn and Elijah in the room, knowing they would be okay. He wanted to be at the main entrance to hear this bad news. And see Vincent. He couldn’t help, not burned out from helping Elijah, but he needed to see. Another brother hurt. God, this entire thing had been a fucking mess.
Case closed meant it was at least over.
The entire day, he’d been out of the loop. It didn’t help that he slept most of the day. It also didn’t help that once Vincent, Jasper, and Sawyer left for the WMC building, no updates came. From anyone.
He saw their rental pull up and waited.
He tried not to think about how Sombra’s attitude had been so low when he walked out of the room. He tried not to think about it because the first thing he noticed about his friends was the hollow looks in their eyes.
Sawyer’s was the worst. Not cold or emotionless. Hollow.
An Echo of Darkness (The Redemption Saga Book 4) Page 30
