by Wren Weston
Lila turned away from Camille and scanned the row of admins. She fixed on one woman in the center, wearing a violet dress and black flats. Out of every admin in the room, her expression was the most outwardly calm. “What’s your name?”
“Reagan.”
“Okay, Reagan, do you have first-aid training?”
She shook her head. “They do.” She pointed to a couple on the end.
“Reagan, I want you to look up first aid for gunshots on your palm. Remind the others what to do. Answer questions based on the information you find.” Lila turned her gaze to the pair who’d been trained. “I want one of you to stay with Nico. The other will stay with Camille. Pick a partner to help you, and do what you can to slow down the bleeding until Dr. McCrae comes. Their lives depend on it.”
Lila pointed to eight more admins. “Divide yourselves into pairs. Pick a purplecoat. Listen to Reagan’s instructions. She’s going to talk you through everything.”
The men and women scattered, seemingly eager for something useful to do.
“Who has keys to this building?” Lila shouted.
One of the remaining admins raised his hand.
“Lock every exit. If anyone else has keys, do the same. Work quickly.”
The man nodded and bustled away. A woman moved in the opposite direction, darting away with another set of keys jingling between her fingers.
“I’ll go get towels for bandages,” another said, darting off into the bowels of the building.
“You, grab a radio,” Lila said to the only remaining admin. “Call for Dr. McCrae. Keep calling until she comes.”
As ordered, the woman snatched up a purplecoat’s radio and depressed the button. Her voice shaking, she summoned the doctor and every trained medic to their location.
Lila shivered at the quiet outside the building. She heard nothing. No high-pitched wails of happy or unhappy children. No shouts from purplecoats as they joked about their last shift. No grackles begging between the houses and scavenging for food.
The only sound came from the admins. They chattered among themselves, listening to Reagan as she read and reread the first-aid instructions. They clamored even louder when one of their coworkers returned with cloth napkins from the break room.
Dixon waited in the center of the room with his tranq aimed at the front door. Lila pressed into his back, covering the opposite direction, her tranq also drawn. Her eyes flitted toward Nico, who’d been laid out on the floor, his breaths slow and shallow. Too much blood pooled around his shoulder and his side.
Nico looked at Lila square in the face, mumbled a few words, then closed his eyes.
He didn’t reopen them.
Camille didn’t look much better.
“Who is the shooter?” Lila asked.
“His name is Olivier,” Camille said, her eyelids fluttering. “I tried to tell you. I tried to warn you. I wanted you to know the truth. I wanted to tell you everything. What if there’s not time?”
“There will be time.”
“You have to find Blair. She’ll know what to do.”
“The girl’s in shock,” one of the admins said, pressing her wrinkled hand against Camille’s cheek. “She’s growing cold.”
“Where’s the damn doctor?” Lila turned around to the purplecoats, all bloody, every face pale. She and Dixon seemed to be the only ones who had survived the ambush unscathed.
Boots clomped against the path outside. The front door rocked in its hinges as someone kicked it. The admins squealed in a panic, most still holding on to their charge’s wounds while they crouched, torn between hiding and doing their duty.
The door rocked again. “It’s McCrae. Let us in before the asshole shoots us too.”
Lila and Dixon rushed forward and unlocked the door for Dr. McCrae and her six assistants. The group wore purple scrubs, and each carried a leather bag. A flood of purplecoats rushed into the room behind them, taking positions throughout the room. Overhyped on adrenaline and anxiety, many paced. Others braced the doors and windows, guns in hand.
Another group of militia entered with half a dozen stretchers. The wheels clacked upon the wood.
“The evening shift is on its way too,” Dr. McCrae said, brushing past Lila and Dixon to scan the room, stopping when she noticed Camille. “Maggie, take Nico. The rest of you, tend to the others. Everyone who isn’t shot or wearing scrubs get out of the way.”
The admins scattered, returning to their positions in the back of the room, unsure what to do now that their jobs had been taken away.
Lila dragged Dixon from the rest of the group. “If Olivier wants Camille dead, then he’ll make his way back here to finish the job. I’m taking a radio and going up on the roof. I’m going to find that asshole before he takes another shot.”
Dixon pointed at the oracle’s cabin.
“Blair’s fine, Dixon. Connell probably sent half his men to protect her and her sisters. Go there if you must, I won’t hold it against it you, but I’m going hunting. That asshole broke into my car and my room. He put his hands on me. I’m going to find him, and I’m going to shoot a dart straight up his ass.” She snatched a radio and pinned it to her shoulder, then stalked to the front door.
“Keep away from the exits,” one of the militiamen ordered, a rifle cradled in his arms. “We’re on lockdown.”
“No, you’re on lockdown.” Lila threw open the door and sprinted outside, circling to the back of the building. She ignored the shouts and curses from inside.
The door shut behind her. Dixon kept up her pace.
“If this guy had been a true sniper, Camille would be dead.” Lila circled to an edge of the building farthest away from the sniper’s last position. She dug her fingers into the wide gaps between the stones and pulled herself up to the first floor, the rock cutting into her fingers as much as the cold. When she came to the second floor, she gripped the first crisscrossed log joint, which provided easy hand- and footholds, and continued her way up. Splinters dug into her hands, and the ground retreated below.
When Lila reached the top, she swung out, catching an exposed beam in the eaves to pull herself up and onto the roof, a feat made much easier by the roof’s low slant. Dixon shimmied up behind her. The pair walked carefully to the center of the roof, their boots sinking into the soft asphalt shingles, their backs bent into a crouch. No buildings rose taller than the admin building, giving them an unbroken bird’s eye view of the compound.
It only took them a few seconds to spot the sniper rifle. It lay abandoned on the roof of a cabin nearby, well within range. A ring of purplecoats had spread themselves around the structure, heads twisting back and forth frantically as they searched the area. Two recruits paced across the cabin’s roof, ignoring the gun, both scanning the nearby alleys.
“Olivier is on the move with another gun, mark my words. He’s got one mission this morning, and he hasn’t finished it yet, not by a long shot. You understand that if he believes we’re onto him, he’ll come for us next?”
Dixon nodded. He walked carefully to the edge of the building, pointing for her to take the opposite corner, both their heads swiveling to catch a glimpse of Olivier and sound the alarm.
The security personnel seemed just as frustrated as they were. No one had a good fix. Not even Connell. He and a few of his men had rushed the guard towers. Others had spread themselves out along the compound’s stone wall, several noticing Dixon and Lila.
Connell lifted his radio to shout at them. Even from so far away, they could see his scowl deepen.
Before he could say a word, another shot rang out.
Chapter 27
Lila and Dixon both rushed toward the front of the admin building, boots thumping against the shingles, their arms spread wide to keep their balance. They planted their feet near the roof’s lip and scanned the ground in the last shot’s direction.<
br />
One of the purplecoats on the ground aimed at Lila.
Lila pulled back, breathing wildly, wheeling her arms as she caught her balance. “Hold your fire,” she yelled down below.
“Not a chance,” said the purplecoat below. “Someone just climbed the edge of the admin building. We think it might be the shooter.”
Lila and Dixon retreated to their respective corners, careful not to trip and fall and roll. They lay down, peering over the eave, leaning as far as they dared.
Another flurry of shots rang out.
A purplecoat slipped from a second-floor window and prowled across the side, like a spider. He’d stowed his gun away while he descended, and a burst of frigid wind caught his coat. Even from two floors away, Lila could see that his gun didn’t quite match a purplecoat’s standard issue. The grip was far too wide.
Lila whistled, catching Dixon’s attention. As soon as he turned toward her, she gripped one of the beams along the eave and flipped herself down, hanging by the strength in her fingers.
Walking her hands toward the edge of the building, she planted her boots on the outcropping of timbers then let go to catch the first crisscrossed joint. More splinters dug into her skin and scars, pinpricks of pain she refused to give voice too. Skittering down the edge of the building, she quickly descended until she reached the last log.
The purplecoat figure landed in the dirt just below her and sprinted away.
Lila didn’t bother climbing down the stone. She planted her feet, walked her hands down as far as she dared, then hung. A split second later, she let herself go, falling several meters to the ground, crouching as she landed.
Dixon hit the dirt beside her.
She didn’t have to tell him what he already knew. Olivier had fulfilled his mission. He’d stolen a purplecoat’s uniform and slipped inside the admin building, murdering Camille, perhaps shooting others in the process. If Olivier wasn’t captured alive, then Mòr would never learn the extent of what the Italians knew about the oracles. Mercs might come again and steal their children, perhaps successfully this time.
All it would take was one hotheaded militia member to shoot, and they’d get nothing.
“Stay close,” she said before sprinting after Olivier. Dixon labored beside her, both struggling to close the distance.
The faux-purplecoat darted between a row of cabins, the same place they’d lost him days before.
When they turned two seconds later, they found Olivier bent between two hedges, lifting a grate. He might have been Max with darker hair. A forgettable face with forgettable brows and brown eyes the color of tree bark. He’d been gifted a slender body, as well, one he might use to wriggle into the tightest of places.
Seeing them, he dropped the metal door with a loud whack and turned, bringing up his pistol to fire wildly.
The log behind Lila’s head exploded, raining down splinters.
Olivier’s mouth widened. He spun and ran, the gun still wound in his fingers.
Lila didn’t stop or pause in her pursuit. The asshole hadn’t even aimed. Wild shots were bad shots, desperate shots. Hers would be just as bad if she tried to draw during their chase. A tranq couldn’t penetrate a thick purplecoat, and hitting the back of his head was a roll of the die. She’d need to target his face or neck to bring him down.
Olivier had no such limitations. His wild shots might injure a bystander if he panicked and fired again. He might not have cared, but he obviously understood that the purplecoats did. Keeping between the log cabins would keep him safe.
He ran on, purplecoats throughout the area confused by their chase. Some ignored it, thinking it might be a distraction. Others followed, guessing the intruder might have stolen a coat, their pace too slow to keep up. Luckily, none of them fired. Connell must have ordered them to take him alive.
Olivier shot over his shoulder.
Lila ignored him and ran on, a wooden porch railing catching the blast.
Olivier cut right and ran between two cabins, but he didn’t dash around them this time. Instead, he finally made a break toward the compound wall, rushing toward a section that had no guards along the top. Two hundred meters away, several purplecoats leapt off the wall and jumped outside the compound. They screamed into their radios, shouting plans to trap him.
Olivier’s hand disappeared into his purplecoat. An ocean of static burst from Lila’s shoulder, the radio struggling against the audio muck and grit.
Then it fell silent. No more static. No more snarling.
Nothing but dead air.
The purplecoat’s plan, their coordination, would all go unheeded.
Olivier holstered his gun and rushed up the wall, using his momentum to grab the top. He swung his leg and heaved a foot over it, gaining purchase on his third attempt. After a brief struggle for balance, he levered himself over the wall.
Lila followed. She’d trained the move so often that she succeeded on her first try. She dropped down to the other side, crouching in the dirt, drawing her tranq as she searched for the mole’s stolen purplecoat and his dark brown hair. But the few purplecoats rushing toward her position were all blondes or redheads.
“The trees! The trees!” they yelled from a hundred meters away, pointing.
Lila started off as Dixon landed beside her. His ankle rolled, and he breathed out with a hiss and a groan. Hobbling forward, he cried out, struggling to follow.
“Stay here,” Lila said over her shoulder, rushing off again to follow Olivier, leaving her friend behind. She sprinted into the tree line, hopping over brambles and brush.
Another shot rang out.
Lila ran toward the gunfire, ignoring the little twist in her stomach that told her to turn back. Leaves crunched under her boots. Branches slapped at her face. Still she dashed on, not even trying to walk quietly. If he’d been watching, he already knew where she was.
Purple flashed ten meters ahead, a blur of color tossed into the wind, replaced by a black hoodie. He ran toward the dusty road, toward a gray Cruz sedan, a car very much like her own except in color. The only saving grace was that this car had been parked half on the road, half off. The driver’s seat was empty, and the engine was dead.
He’d need to start it before rushing off. That would buy her some time.
Olivier turned again in the center of a clearing and lifted his gun, facing in a different direction. Several purplecoats had noticed his car. Their faces tight, guns locked in white-knuckled grips, they sprinted toward it. The undergrowth tore at the trains of their coats.
Olivier shot in their direction, and they scattered, diving into a ditch.
Lila hadn’t stopped running. In that moment, she didn’t think. Just as on the mat with Dixon, she charged. She didn’t charge with the composure of a highborn, though. She didn’t charge with thoughts of completing a waltz or preying as a panther. No, Elizabeth Victoria Lemaire-Randolph charged like a bear, filled with every ounce of anger and scorn withheld over the last six weeks. Not as a noble mother bear, either, lunging to protect its cub, but as a bear stung in the ass by a thousand bees, angry and frustrated to find her honey stolen.
Stolen by the man before her.
This was the man who had pointed the mercs at Oskar and Maria Kruger and the oracles. This was the man who had marked three young girls for capture. This was the man who had caused her to enter that warehouse, forcing her to kill to save her friends. This was man who’d caused her to paint the cement with blood.
He was the reason Shaw would stand on a stage in the auction house.
He was the reason she hadn’t had the time to save her father’s career.
Olivier saw her just before she leapt, managing to get off another wild shot before she blundered into him. As they fell, the gun skittered a meter away on the leaf-strewn earth.
Lila grabbed his belt and tugged herself onto his chest,
gripping his collar. She punched his face, pummeling his cheek and his nose and his eyes. Her hand smashed against sharp bone rather than upon a rounded, heavy bag of sand. The crunching only drove her onward, goading her to land blow upon blow.
Gods, she enjoyed the pain. Not the pain she inflicted upon Olivier, but the pain in her knuckles, the pain in her hands, the way it reverberated into her shoulder, the way she felt it in her neck and chest and knees, rolling, like a wave throughout her body.
Lila didn’t stop, not until Olivier punched the side of her belly. She cried out, letting loose a torrent of air that stopped and congealed in her throat. Her eyes reddened, watered, and her bloody fingers opened, letting loose the hold she’d taken of his collar.
Olivier shimmied out from under her and raised his fist.
Lila didn’t wait for the blow. She didn’t rack her brain for the perfect counter. Instead, she just got the fuck out of the way, rolling awkwardly as her heart pumped in her chest.
Olivier abandoned his attack, crawling toward his gun, clawing at the earth and leaves and underbrush to retrieve it.
All at once, he lurched to the side, drunkenly, hands grasping his gun and a fistful of leaves. He turned, swinging his weapon toward Lila, but his arm didn’t rise high enough. He shot twice into the ground and toppled into the dirt, his fingers still wound in the trigger.
Leaves rustled at the edge of the clearing. Dixon huffed and puffed, tranq gun in his hand, mouthing something Lila couldn’t understand as he hobbled to her side.
“I’ve never been happier that someone didn’t listen to me.” She laughed, her side aching.
Dixon did not join her.
Dropping his weapon, he knelt at her side, his hands flying to her belly. He pushed into her side so hard that she thought he might wring her in two.
It wasn’t until then that she spied the blood spreading down her torso, seeping into her coat.
“When did that happen?” she murmured stupidly.