Sam did, fish-tailing as the tires fought for traction. They got a little lead on the darkling vehicle, but it kept accelerating. Sam swerved into the oncoming lanes, the SUV’s engine rumbling in protest, barely avoiding another hit. The darkling car spun out trying to follow too sharply, hitting a street light broad-side before spinning its wheels and regaining traction.
“There. That warehouse,” Sydney yelled, pointing. “Turn there!”
Sam did, throwing the wheel over as hard as he could. The SUV barely kept upright as it made the sharp ninety-degree turn on two wheels. The darkling car shot past them, either caught by surprise or unable to make such an abrupt change in direction. Sam hit the brakes, tires squealing, and made another sharp turn into an open garage bay door. The SUV fishtailed to a halt in the middle of a wide, open room filled with stacks of empty shelves along the far walls.
Sydney popped her seatbelt and bolted out of the car. “Help me get the door closed.”
Both men obeyed instantly, jumping from the vehicle and helping her lower the enormous, reticulated metal door until it clanged into place on the concrete floor. Sam threw the lever that kept the door firmly locked and stepped back, shoulders heaving as he panted.
“Think we lost them?” Dex said, panting just as hard as Sam.
“Not a chance.” Sydney marched to the Rav-4 and yanked the trunk door upward. “They’ll be coming for us. Arm up.” All their gear had been shoved in the trunk compartment. She unzipped her duffle bag, pulled out her suppressed Ruger SR22, and began busily shoving extra magazines in her coat pockets.
Sam cursed as he joined her. He tossed Dex his go-bag before reaching for his own. “How do you know? They couldn’t have seen us come in here. Maybe we—”
“Not a chance,” Sydney repeated flatly. “That’s a hunting pack Marlon sent after us—Broken darklings who’ve been programmed to hunt a specific target. They won’t stop until we’re dead, or they are.”
“Fucking great,” Dex snarled as he loaded a magazine in his Glock and hung several more on his belt. “How many?”
“Depends on the pack,” Sydney said grimly. “It could be—”
Boom!
All three of them jumped as the reticulated metal door shuddered with an abrupt impact. Sam whirled, a gun in each hand. As he watched, something hit the door a second time, hard enough to punch out a dent. “Jesus. What the fuck is that?”
“Take cover,” Sydney commanded. “Get on the other side of the SUV. Hurry!”
Sam and Dex moved to obey as the garage door kept shaking, more and more dents appearing in the metal. Whatever kept hitting the huge door was strong, stronger than any human had the right to be. And yet, their efforts seemed futile, since the door was designed to withstand a car trying to bust through it. Why waste their strength fighting something that would never give?
Movement flashed in the corner of his eye. He looked over and watched Sydney climbed atop the SUV, settling in a squat on the car’s roof with her gun pointed toward the garage door. Sam scowled up at her from his position beside the windshield. “Are you nuts? You’re fair game up there!”
“No time!” Sydney replied. “It won’t be long before they notice there’s a—”
The sound of glass shattering echoed through the enormous room, and all three of them turned, weapons pointed toward the sound. A small entry door made up of metal and glass panels sat beside the larger garage door. A head poked through what used to be the top glass panel, the face torn and bloodied from broken shards. The man—if you could call it that—snarled at them with hate-filled black eyes, gnashing his teeth as he tried to wiggle through the small opening.
Sydney shot the darkling through the forehead. It sagged like a bag of flour, dead in an instant.
“Save your bullets,” Sydney said, voice ice cold. “Aim for the head. Body shots will only piss these guys off.”
Sam didn’t have time to ask her how she knew that because the shit hit the fan real quick after that. The darklings discovered the glass-walled front entryway, a kind of service waiting room on the eastern side of the building, and started throwing themselves against the sheet glass. Sharp cracks and crashes filled the air as one panel, then a second, shattered under the onslaught. Sam took cover behind the SUV, aiming over the car’s hood, while Dex covered the rear wheel. Sam shot two darklings just as they threw themselves through the shattered window pane, dropping them instantly. Dex took out another as it scrambled over the first two, his Glock leaving a large, gore-filled hole in the side of the darkling’s skull.
Four down, Sam thought. But how many had been shoved in that one car?
He got his answer when glass shattered somewhere overhead. Sam whirled, aiming toward the ceiling as two darklings burst through a skylight and landed on a scaffolding platform. They moved more like animals than men, crawling and clawing their way across the metal structure as they hissed and glared at them. Sam popped off several rounds, but the creatures moved too fast, hiding behind thick metal I-beams and other structural supports.
Then Sam cursed as one of the darklings took a giant leap off the edge of a metal platform, aiming for Sydney’s position atop the SUV. Sam, Dex, and Sydney filled the creature’s body with so many bullets, he died mid-air and burst like a ripe melon as it hit the ground.
Sam pivoted, taking aim toward the ceiling once again. The last darkling hissed from the shadows near the ceiling, using a nest of pipes and metal grating for cover. Sam let out a string of the most colorful expletives he knew, trying to get a bead on the bastard, but it kept jerking its head around like a crazed mongoose. Sam took a few steps away from the SUV, staring upward as he looked for a clear shot.
An errant sound—the crunch of heavy boots on broken glass—made him whirl in place.
A seventh darkling was using the distraction to sneak up on Dex.
“Dex!” Sam screamed, aiming his weapon. “Down!”
Dex dropped seconds before the darkling leaped. Sam put a bullet through the creature’s skull just as it hit the apex of its flight, while Sydney got off two more shots on its way back down to the ground. It dropped like a stone, hitting the mangled rear bumper of the SUV before sprawling sideways, its limbs jerking like a rag doll.
Dex scrambled to his feet, gun pointed at something above and behind Sam. Remembering the darkling who’d been hiding near the ceiling, Sam whirled around.
The darkling had made it to the warehouse floor, and now it was almost on him, its eyes wide and bloodshot. Someone had filed the man’s teeth down to sinister points, and his nails had been shaped into humanoid claws. The darkling snarled, reaching for his throat—
Then jerked sideways as a fountain of blood spewed from the side of his head. The darkling collapsed inches away from Sam’s shoes, its clawed fingers still twitching.
Sam looked up to find Sydney watching him from the roof of the car. “Thanks,” he said, with dazed sincerity.
Her lips quirked. “Thus the reason I chose the high ground.”
“I’ll try and remember that next time,” Sam replied, wiping sweat from his temple.
“Is that all of them?” Dex said, looking toward the destroyed glass waiting area.
Sam scanned the same vicinity, then checked the garage door and the smaller door beside it, where the dead darkling still hung from the shattered window panel. “I don’t see any more.”
“Keep looking,” Syd said grimly, “There should be—”
The SUV rocked in place as something crashed down onto the small hood.
The next few moments happened in a slogging, slow-motion blur that still went by so fast, Sam didn’t even get a chance to blink.
He saw the SUV sway. Saw Sydney’s arms windmill as she fought for balance. Then he saw the black-clothed man who’d jumped atop the SUV’s hood make a flying leap toward Sydney. She’d been facing Sam, her gun pointed downward. Worse, the gun was in her left hand, and the darkling was attacking from the right. There was no way, no way in hel
l, she could regain her balance, pivot, and lift her gun in time to shoot the bastard. Sam felt his lungs expand with a breath, felt his eyes widen with terror. He started to swing his own gun around, but it felt like trying to drag a boulder through twenty feet of water. The darkling was too fast, Sam’s reaction too slow. He watched, helpless, a scream of warning building in his throat even as he knew it would never come in time.
He watched Sydney raise her right hand in a futile effort to ward off her attacker. Saw the grimace of terror and outrage that crossed her beautiful face. The darkling’s boot hit the SUV’s roof, his arms reaching out to grab hold of her.
Sydney’s palm hit the darkling’s chest.
And then a bright, blinding flash of white light shattered every shadow in the room.
Sam cried out, shielding his eyes, but the light faded almost before it began. Blinking after-images out of his vision, he looked up.
The darkling had vanished. Sydney stood alone on the car’s roof, her hand still outstretched. And where the darkling had once been, a pile of fine, white powder lay heaped across the roof of the SUV. As Sam stared, disbelieving, half the pile slid down the windshield, while the rest of it started slowly bleeding off the sides of the car in a sullen, dusty rain.
“A pack leader,” Sydney said. Her voice echoed in the deafening silence. “There’s always a pack leader.”
Sam said nothing. He’d almost forgotten how to breathe.
Sydney stood frozen for a long, long moment. Then, she quietly lowered her hand.
“What…the fuck…just happened?” Dex said from somewhere to Sam’s left. Sam looked over to see the same look of amazement and fear he probably wore on his own face. Dex stared up at Sydney, eyes wide enough to show the whites all around. “Syd? What the fuck just happened?”
She didn’t answer. Instead, she lowered herself into a sitting position, dangling her legs over the side of the SUV, then slid to the ground. She stumbled on landing, but Dex was right there to catch her, providing a helpful hand under her elbow.
“Shit. Syd, are you all right?”
“I’m fine,” she said, not looking at either of them. “Forgot about the stilettos for a second. Thanks.” She tried to pull out of Dex’s grip, but he kept hold of her elbow.
When she finally looked up with a tiny frown, Dex looked at the mess of white powder on top of the SUV. “Remember when we said ‘no more secrets’?” He looked back down at her with a scowl. “I think you left some shit out.”
Sydney sighed, pulling her arm away from him and straightening her jacket. “Remember when you came to my room and made your confession? I told you then that I had secrets that would change the way you felt about me.”
And I was right.
She didn’t say those words out loud, but they hung in the air anyway.
Dex cast him a helpless look. Sam, for his part, was still trying to process what he’d just seen. He licked dry lips, glancing around at the carnage. “We’re…” He paused, cleared his throat. “We’re going to have to call this in. Can’t let local LEOs get ahold of them.”
“No need,” Sydney said, voice still dull. She opened the SUV’s trunk, pulled out her duffle bag, and carefully put away her weapon. Then, as both men watched, she walked over to the closest darkling. Without looking at either of them, she dropped to a prim, lady-like squat beside the body and placed a hand on the darkling’s chest.
Another flash of white-hot light filled the room, and less than a heartbeat later, the darkling’s body disintegrated into another pile of thick white dust.
No. Not dust. Not powder. Ash.
Neither man moved. Neither man spoke. Sydney repeated the process, going to each darkling in turn. By the time she finished, it looked as if someone had opened several hundred bags of flour and dumped their contents into varying-sized piles all over the floor. The white light even consumed the blood-spatter, leaving no trace of remains anywhere to be found.
No evidence. No bodies. No sign of a fight except for the broken windows and the damage to the SUV. Just piles of white powder that could have been anything from cocaine to baking flour.
The local LEOs would be scratching their heads over this one for decades.
Sydney straightened, clapping her hands together. Clouds of white dust danced in the air around her. She moved across the room, not looking at them, and headed for the SUV. At the passenger side door, she stopped. “We should leave. I can handle darklings. But I don’t do windows.”
Then she climbed into the car and shut the door behind her.
Sam looked at Dex. Dex looked at Sam. Neither man could think of a single thing to say.
It was a very long, very tense, very silent ride back to the motel.
Chapter 19
Sam held the door for Sydney as they trudged back into the motel room.
“I’m going to change,” Sydney said the moment Sam closed the door behind them. Her voice held no inflection whatsoever. She still refused to look at either one of them.
“We’ll be here,” Dex’s expression held a wistful sort of worry as he watched her disappear into the bathroom with her duffle bag. He gave Sam a helpless look after the door closed.
Sam heaved a sigh and plonked himself into the nearest chair. “I need to report in.” He held up a hand when Dex immediately started to protest. “Boss sent a communique two hours ago. If I don’t report in soon, he’ll send in the cavalry, and then the shit really will hit the fan. We can’t afford that.” He glanced at the bathroom door. “And neither can she.”
Dex’s jaw muscles ticked as he clenched his teeth, but he nodded assent. He stalked off and sat on the edge of one of the beds, leaning forward with his elbows braced on his knees. Sam took out the Com-Sat and set it on the table. A message-alert lit the screen the moment the gizmo turned on.
10:08PM EST: Sit-Rep Required ASAP
Sam grimaced. He thought hard for a moment, then typed his reply using the encrypted on-screen keyboard.
11:12PM CST: Target located. Possible nest activity. Recon tomorrow night to confirm. Expect full report then.
He pressed send and started to put the Com-Sat away, but right at that moment, the screen lit up, and a message flashed across the screen.
[ {...Live Connection Pending…} ]
Sam blinked in surprise. Boss almost never used the live communication feature on the Com-Sat. He was a busy man, coordinating hundreds of darkling hunting units across the U.S. and many U.S. allies. He’d had to have been waiting for Sam’s message to initiate the live-link so quickly. Was he really that worried about them?
The screen tripped through a series of encryption codes, blinking rapidly, then settled into an AOL-style private messenger screen. Anyone looking on would assume it was just some classic social media platform instead of a highly classified government communication channel. After a few more seconds, a familiar screen handle sent a message.
[ ConMan1986: Status report? ]
Sam hesitated before typing out his reply.
[ SSFoxCoAlpha: Situation neutral. Target located, but more suspected nearby. Recon planned for tomorrow night to confirm. ]
[ ConMan1986: Major players? ]
[ SSFoxCoAlpha: Local heavies. We have a lead we’re pursuing. Possible path for network infiltration. We’ll know more tomorrow. ]
[ ConMan1986: Recon Location? ]
Shit. He couldn’t tell Boss the truth about Marlon’s party. Sam tapped the tabletop with his fingertips, thinking fast.
[ SSFoxCoAlpha: Location pending. ] He thought for a moment, then wrote, [ Intel unreliable. Locals recruited to assist in recon efforts. ]
Boss didn’t reply immediately. Sam started to sweat a little, wondering if Boss knew more about their mission than he let on.
[ ConMan1986: Identify female informant. ]
Sam startled.
[ SSFoxCoAlpha: Clarification? ]
Sam could almost see the angry scowl accompanying Boss’s next words.
[ ConMa
n1986: The hooker. What’s the name of the hooker? ]
Sam sat back in his chair. Fuck. Boss had eyes on them—he had to, to know about Sydney’s involvement. How much did he know about Sydney? Did he just assume she was a hooker because that was the part she’d been playing? Was he asking for her name because he didn’t know it?
Or was he asking to find out if Sam would lie about it?
Sam sucked in a deep, silent breath, and typed,
[ SSFoxCoAlpha: She goes by Damsel. Local insider. Recruited as a covert operative. Assisting with local contacts. ]
The next part pained him, but he had to add,
[ We’re just using her to back our cover. ]
Boss didn’t respond. Sweat beaded at Sam’s temples as he waited, wondering if he’d just fucked up royally. The Agency rarely condoned the use of inside informants. The risk was too great; word might get out that the DEA didn’t just focus on cartels and pill-pushers. On the rare occasions when the Agency did use informants, it was always a carefully planned and coordinated affair—and the informant usually “disappeared” immediately thereafter.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity, Boss answered.
[ ConMan1986: Proceed. ]
The Com-Sat went dead before Sam could reply. He stared at the blank screen, then put the device back inside the pocket of his go-bag and looked around the room.
Sydney had come out of the bathroom sometime during his conversation with Boss. She now lay in the exact center of one of the beds, her legs outstretched and crossed at the ankles, her back against the headboard. Her arms were clasped tightly over her chest, her eyes closed. She’d changed out of her stunning dress and now wore a tight black camisole with a skimpy pair of black shorts that did nothing to hide her tantalizingly smooth legs. Any other time, she would have looked sexy as fuck.
Right now, she looked as if she was preparing for a funeral.
Or, perhaps, an execution.
Sam settled beside Dex on the second bed, close enough to let their knees touch. Dex shot him a brief, grateful smile—glad for the show of solidarity, most likely—then re-focused his attention on Sydney. “We’re here, Syd. Please, talk to us.”
The Darkling Hunters_Fox Company Alpha Page 23