“You sound like my avi, Commander.”
“Your grandfather’s a smart man then, and I have good reasons for not trusting luck.” She stepped away from the front wall, ready to finish their walk, but suddenly remembered she hadn’t called Brian the previous night. Because she’d fallen asleep for fuck’s sake. “Listen,” she said to Danilo. “I hate to ask, but I need to make one phone call before I forget it . . . again. Can you wait five more minutes?”
“Sure. If I wait long enough, my husband will have the kids fed and the kitchen cleaned by the time I get there.”
Layla started to laugh as she pulled out her phone, but before her hand left her pocket, she was running for the gate as well-trained reflexes reacted to the sound of gunfire before her brain managed to process the sound. She grabbed Danilo’s arm when she would have run alongside her. “No,” she said and pointed in the other direction. “They might be hitting more than one quarter.”
Danila nodded and ran back the way they’d come, while Layla stretched out her legs and ran full tilt until the gate was in sight. She slowed then, just enough to assess the situation and take precautions. The wall wasn’t high enough to conceal her full height, so she stopped at the first battlement she came to and grabbed the MP5 submachine gun the day guard had waiting for her. Waiting only long enough to check the magazine and sling the extra ammo belt over her shoulder, she bent into a crouch and kept running until she reached a battlement much closer to the gate where another guard was firing short, controlled bursts through one of the openings in the stone enclosure. He glanced back when Layla ducked into the narrow space, putting his back against the firing shelter’s stone wall, while Layla did the same on the opposite side. The two of them took up most of the limited space, their feet nearly touching between them.
“Same strategy they used before,” the man said, breathing heavily. “But twice as many shooters. Radio reports two serious injuries on our side already. They’re double-teaming us when we step up to fire, so we have less time to aim properly and are scoring fewer hits.”
Layla nodded her understanding, then clicked the comm to Danilo. “New strategy. We’re going to work in teams. When they pop up to fire at our first shooter, our Number Two steps out of the enclosure and fires at them. First shooter gets better coverage, better results. Our second should be able to take out at least one before they can switch targets. The teams take turns randomly, and space their actions in seconds, so the enemy can’t identify a pattern.”
“Roger that. I’ll comm the other teams.”
“Roger out.” She met the guard’s gaze across the small space, wanting to be sure he’d been listening. “What’s your name?”
“Tony Tosell, ma’am. Who goes first?”
Tony was older than she’d first thought, which she was glad to see. Some of the day guards were too young to have had real world experience. Xavier’s territory had been too peaceful for too long. “You stay inside. I’ll step out to your left and start firing two seconds after you.”
He nodded, checked his weapon, and gave her a single, sharp nod.
She did the same, then crouching as low as she could, she slipped around the battlement and crept up to the wall. Hearing Tony’s weapon scrape on the stone in the instant before he began firing, she stood, aimed, and got off two controlled bursts before slamming her back against the battlement wall. As Tony’s weapon went live a second time, she shouted, “Moving,” and spun around the battlement to the opposite side. Popping up immediately to fire a second time, she dropped straight down to her knees to avoid return fire that came at her a lot faster—not because the enemy had ascertained the defenders’ new strategy, but because she was now on the gate side of the battlement.
Duckwalking back into the enclosure, she met Tony’s concerned gaze across the tight space.
“You’re bleeding, ma’am.”
Layla blinked and touched her cheek, suddenly aware of a sharp stinging sensation. “Damn stone wall. A shard must have been chipped off. And it’s Layla, not ma’am. Not when we’ve become so close.” She grinned when she said that, which had Tony grinning in return. “Ready?” she asked as she counted the seconds in her head. “Switch positions.” She indicated the right-hand gun slot on the enclosure, establishing the routine on this first round.
“I’m up,” he said and disappeared as she stepped up to the narrow window, aimed as she moved, and was firing while the barrel of her MP5 was still sliding forward. Two sharp bursts, duck. Two more bursts while Tony was still firing, and she dropped to a crouch, her back against the wall beneath the gun slot. Tony was in the narrow doorway an instant later, checked her position, and slipped inside the battlement.
Layla counted three seconds in her head, and they started all over again. Shoot, wait, move. They continued that way for what seemed like hours, though she had more than enough combat experience to know it had been nowhere near that long. The Fortalesa teams kept up a steady, but random pattern of fire, moving and shooting all up and down the wall, taking turns inside the shelter and out. By the time the enemy’s fire began to slow, she and Tony were both soaked with sweat. Layla’s collar was wet with blood that colored the sweat dripping from her jaw, while Tony had a rough bandage around one arm that was more red than white where he’d been shot.
As always, Layla’s jaw ached like a son of bitch, because she’d never managed to break the habit of clenching her teeth when shit got heavy. She worked the jaw as she slammed in her fifth thirty-round magazine. She had one more mag after that, and had called for additional ammo from the runners stationed along the base of the wall for that purpose. But with the enemy’s rate of fire slowing, she hoped she wouldn’t need it.
“Is it me, or are those assholes covering their retreat?” she asked Tony, meaning the enemy fire had shifted from active targeting to undirected sprays which seemed intended to force the wall’s defenders to stay down.
Tony nodded his agreement, and she inched toward the doorway. “I’m taking a look. From the left,” she added wryly. The left was the side which provided better cover from enemy fire. She fired three more bursts, to test the enemy’s mood, but by the time her final round got off, the enemy’s fire had ceased completely.
“Damn it,” she swore and ran for the stairs. This might be her best chance to follow those assholes, to see where they went and discover how they managed to disappear so completely that not even vampires could track them.
Tony followed without being asked, and they both caught fresh mags as they ran, all but falling down the stairs. Somehow landing on her feet, she raced for the sally port, the small, heavily secured door twenty- five yards left of the gate. No one else was moving in the yard, except the Fortalesa’s small team of medics who were gradually being joined and assisted by exhausted fighters. A quick survey as she ran told her the enemy’s new, much larger attack force had done serious damage.