AllFreeNovel
Share Us
As he came to a halt, the footfalls of what was pursuing him were the heartbeat of his demise, but he felt no fear. He concentrated on the keypad and punched in the code the blond woman had given him.
“Come now, come now…”
Just as he caught a major whiff of his own blood, the dead bolt gave way, and he punched at the bar. The second steel weight opened, he slipped through, re-shut things, and listened to the lock reengage.
A staircase, good lighting, and fresh air greeted him, as if he had entered a luck lottery and come out a winner. Plenty of those units had seen him go inhere, so they knew where he was—and that meant Kurling was going to order a takedown and put all his resources into the effort. Pulling clean oxygen into his lungs, Blade’s thoughts began to fragment, likely from the blood loss, but he couldn’t let his concentration slip. He needed to give himself a flight’s worth of head start before he let them close in—
The steel door was blown off its hinges directly in front of him, the panel flying at his body, only his quick reflexes sparing his life as thewoof!of the shock wave tossed him to the side and the heat singed his eyebrows and hair.
Without missing a beat, he spun for the stairs and took them two at a time, his left leg hindering his ascent—whilst down below soldiers that had the advantage of not needing oxygen to power their muscles came after him at breakneck speed. Thinking of Lydia, he ran even faster because he needed to survive a little longer, so he could draw the fight farther away from her. As the zenith of the ascent was reached, he struggled to punch in the code to free the lock—
The release took many seconds longer than he’d wanted, and he had no idea what he was getting into when the door was finally able to open—
He burst out with gun forward and head swiveling, as he made sure the stairwell’s exit closed and locked behind himself.
It was another hall, in another structure. And the air was dry, and smelling of concrete.
A basement?he thought. Likely of the home.
He chose right for no reason at all, and looked for cover as he went along. There were a number of closed doors—
Boom!
As the robotic squad blew another door off its jambs, the banging sound as the steel panel ricocheted off something hard echoed through the hallway. Continuing on with his limp, his breath burned in his lungs, and that left leg seriously lagged. He must go faster. He was prepared to get into a shootout, but he wanted more distance if he could get it and some cover.
As he reached yet another door, something teased at the edge of his consciousness, but he didn’t have time to allow it to come to full cognitive recognition. He entered the passcode, endured an interminable wait, and hit another stairwell and exit.
And then he was back in the house proper. He could tell by the scent of fresh oranges and dishwashing soap—but he was not where he had been let in before.
A kitchen, he thought as he tracked the scent.
Rounding a corner, there was stainless steel cabinetry everywhere, as well as ovens, gas burnerranges, and refrigerators that were professional grade. Crossing the red-tiled floor as quickly as he could, he kept going, emerging out the other side into a small private eating area with a round table. From there, he entered the foyer with the statues, and paused to look back. As there were no immediate sounds of a chase coming for him, he glanced down to assess his wounds.
They were all superficial ones.
Those soldiers with the perfect aim, once they had identified him, had not tried to kill him. And that was when he realized that he had thought he was leading them. Instead, they had chased him… here.
Soft laughter percolated into the space and he pivoted sharply.
At the base of the primary stairway, sitting on the bottom steps, a male with a face that was nearly identical to his own was smiling.
“Did you have a good workout, cousin?” Kurling drawled.
THIRTY-NINE
WE CAN’T STAYhere. The air quality is getting worse.”
As Daniel spoke, Lydia glanced down at him. They had come back to the point at which they’d entered the smoky escape tunnel, and to take the pressure off his legs, she and Gus had sat him on the concrete floor. In the unreliable, on/off lighting, she tried to judge his vital signs by how pale his face was and how often he blinked. Which was nuts.
And of course he wasn’t doing well. How could he be?
Gus coughed and paced back and forth. “He’s right. Besides, there’s nothing out there anymore. No more shooting, no explosions—”
“That we can hear,” C.P. cut in.
The woman was standing off to the side of the door Blade had departed from, that gun in her hand held with a relaxed confidence, her eyes locked on the latching mechanism like she expected things to open at any moment.
The air was getting thick with smoke that had backed up into the ventilation system, and though it was nice to think the quality was better down on the ground where Daniel was, she knew his lungs were vulnerable—and she herself was getting light-headed.
