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No, no, no.
Chase knew he couldn't let Dragos go anywhere alone with either one of these important men. He could not let that happen.
Indecision raked him as he struggled to hold his talent in place, his gaze fixed on Dragos's slightest move. Every Breed cell in his body urged him to leap over the balcony and attack - kill the bastard in cold blood, before he even knew what hit him. But to do that would be to expose himself publicly as something other than human. If it were only he that he had to be concerned with, he wouldn't care. But the ramifications of showing himself as part of the Breed were irreversible, and too far-reaching.
Maybe he could create a distraction, something to cause momentary panic. Something to make the vice president's guards rush him away from the party and from whatever plot Dragos was hatching as he grinned alongside him.
Chase felt his talent slip as he grappled with what course of action to take. The shadows fell away, like mist through his fingers, leaving him standing there unconcealed.
In that very instant, Ms. Fairchild looked up and spotted him. She motioned one of the men in black over and pointed up toward Chase. The agent spoke into his comm device and several others poured in from all directions.
Ah, Christ.
Meanwhile, Dragos was almost out of sight with the senator and the vice president. Chase flashed across the distance to the Secret Service man positioned on the gallery balcony. In less than a second, he'd knocked him out cold and grabbed the pistol from his side holster. Chase fired a single shot into the air. Plaster dust rained down as the bullet sank into the vaulted ceiling. In the ballroom below, chaos erupted.
People screamed and scattered, everyone running for cover.
Everyone except Ms. Fairchild. She stood stock-still in the center of all that madness, looking right at him, her eyes locked on to him like bright green lasers. Chase quickly turned his attention on Dragos. He met the furious glower with equal hatred and fired the agent's pistol before Dragos had a chance to dodge out of the way. The shot hit him dead-on, knocking the vampire off his feet.
Gunfire returned on Chase, exploding around him from every direction. On the ballroom floor below, Dragos went down bleeding. Dead or dying, Chase hoped to hell, but he couldn't be sure.
He ran to the nearest window, then dived through it in a soaring leap. As he sailed into the darkness outside, he felt a shredding blast of pain tear into his thigh and shoulder. He shook it off, dropping down to the snow-covered lawn below.
He heard the pound of footsteps rumbling through the house and over the grounds of the estate. The jangle of weapons, all of them ready to blow the dangerous intruder to kingdom come. Chase vaulted to his feet and took off running.
* * *
Dragos fumed where he lay, bleeding from his gut on Senator Bobby Clarence's ballroom floor. Moments after the gunshot wound that had knocked him flat, screams and chaos still filled the air of the estate. Terrified human party guests scattered like little birds while Secret Service agents swooped en masse to whisk the senator and the vice president out of the room to safety. Damn the Order.
How had they found him? How could they possibly have known to look for him here, of all places?
Dragos held his hands to his stomach as the hysteria continued to swell around him. Although his wound was bad, he had no doubt that he'd survive. The bullet had passed through his body. Already the bleeding was lessening, his Breed genetics well on the way to repairing the damage to his skin and organs.
A pair of black suits and several police officers pushed through the fleeing crowd to reach him. One of the government men spoke low and urgently into the comm device hooked around his ear. The other knelt down beside Dragos, joined by a couple of anxious-looking uniformed cops.
Dragos attempted to sit up, but the Secret Service agent stuck out his splayed palm to discourage him. "Sir, just try to remain calm now, all right? Everything's under control here. We've got help coming for you in just a few minutes."
He didn't wait for compliance. Confident he'd be obeyed, he went back to join his companion, leaving the two local cops to sit on watch. A few straggling party guests shuffled past, hands pressed to their mouths as they glimpsed the spilled blood on their rush to get out of the ballroom.
Dragos grunted, resenting all of these panicked humans almost as much as he despised the bastard from the Order who'd managed to derail months of work with a single gunshot. It was pride more than pain that drew his mouth into a tight line, fury more than fear that had him gritting his teeth so hard behind his lips it was a wonder his jaw didn't shatter. His fangs throbbed, already ripping out of his gums and filling his mouth. His sight, always preternaturally sharp, was growing even more acute now, the edges of his vision filling with amber light. He had to get out of there, and fast.
Before his rage betrayed him publicly for what he truly was.
Dragos glanced over at one of the attending cops - the younger of the pair. The one who belonged to him. Crouched beside Dragos, the Minion awaited his command like an eager hound.
"Tell my driver to bring the car around back," he murmured, his voice hardly more than a whisper. The Minion leaned close, absorbing every word. "And do something to clear this goddamn room of all these prying eyes."
"Yes, Master."
The Minion rose. When he pivoted to carry out the order, he nearly ran headlong into Tavia Fairchild. She stood there, unmoving, her shrewd gaze flicking from the cop who'd almost run her down to Dragos, who looked up at her in rapt but cautious interest. Although she could only have been there for an instant, it had been long enough. She'd heard the Minion address Dragos as his master. He could tell by the slight tilt of her head, the faint narrowing of her eyes, that she was trying to process information that even her keen mind didn't have the basis to comprehend.
"Pardon me, ma'am," the Minion mumbled, stepping out of her way with an awkward bow of his head. He glanced back at Dragos and cleared his throat. "Mr. Masters, I'll be right back."
Dragos nodded, his gaze trained fully on Tavia Fairchild as he lifted himself to a sitting position on the floor. The Minion's effort to cover his slip seemed to satisfy the senator's pretty assistant. As the officer walked away, her look of confusion muted into one of concern as she turned back to Dragos.
"Paramedics have been called and an ambulance is on the way ..." Her voice trailed off. She looked ill, the color in her cheeks draining away as she drew nearer to him and gaped at all the blood soaking his white silk tuxedo shirt and the ballroom floor underneath him. Her balance seemed a little off as she wrapped her arms around her middle. She met his eyes if only to avoid looking at his injury, and gave a small shake of her head. "I'm sorry. I'm just a little woozy. I don't do well in these types of situations. I've been known to faint at the sight of a skinned knee."
Dragos permitted a small curve of his lips. "You can hardly expect to be perfect at everything, Miss Fairchild."
