Furious, she swung the MP5 over her shoulder to rest on her back, pressed her thumb against the biometric scanner, sighed a relieved breath when it worked, then used both hands to lift the heavy metal riot bar. Swinging her weapon back to the ready position, she glanced once at Tony, then cracked open the thick door. When a quick glance told her there was no one waiting to pounce, she opened the door farther and rushed out, heading straight for the tree cover. She paused only long enough to scan the immediate area, then continued. There was a trail of sorts this time. More shooters meant more feet stomping the detritus- covered ground, and more bodies crashing into branches and through undergrowth. They were quiet, she’d give them that. There were no cries or moans, no curses. She stopped suddenly, taking cover behind a trio of entwined tree trunks.
Tony appeared confused, but stopped next to her, crouching low.
Layla held one finger to her lips and just listened. The silence was so absolute that even the normal sounds of the forest were absent. No birds, no rustling rodents, not a breath of wind moving through the trees.
What the actual fuck?
She stepped out and continued following the trail which was still as plain as a blinking red sign. Until it just . . . stopped. She stared at the ground, saw the leaves and dirt flattened as if several pairs of feet had passed, and then the trail just disappeared, as if the fleeing people had been lifted into the air, or vanished into an invisible fairy mound.
“Impossible,” she muttered, and paced to the left and right of the truncated trail, looking for something to indicate where the retreating enemy had gone. People didn’t simply disappear mid-step. They had to have gone somewhere.
But though she and Tony both searched for more than an hour, not only along the line of the break, but traveling deeper into the trees, searching for renewed sign of a trail that had to be there, they found nothing. The two of them exchanged a look, as if each was doubting the sanity of the other.
Layla broke the gaze first, with a shake of her head. “We’re not imagining this. It happened.”
He frowned and said, “Magic, Layla.”
She smiled. “Magic? Really?”
It was his turn to smile, to give her a look that said she was being naïve. “We sleep surrounded by vampires, but you doubt the existence of magic?”
“Vampires are natural, just like you and me. Not exactly like us, because they’re . . . higher on the evolutionary chart, but they bleed, they die. That’s not magic.”
His smile widened. “Perhaps you should speak to Lord Xavier about this. You meet with him, yes? Just as the commander did?”
“Yes.”
“Ask him. If I’m wrong, no matter. But if I’m right, he needs to know.”
Layla thought about that as they walked back to the Fortalesa. She’d assumed—Xavier had let her assume—that he’d been waiting for new information, for his vampires to find the evil genius behind these attacks, and then he’d take action. But waiting wasn’t Xavier’s usual modus operandi, was it?
No, Xavier was a fucking vampire lord and far more powerful than anyone else she knew. And that asshole knew more than he was telling her. God damn him.
She walked faster, her boots thumping the ground, while Tony— not having been privy to her thought process—shot worried glances her way. When they broke out from under the trees, with the Fortalesa in sight, the sun immediately tried to burn a hole in the top of her head, and she remembered it was still morning. Which meant she’d have to wait hours to confront that lying bloodsucking asshole.
“Well, fuck.”
“Layla?” Tony asked cautiously.
Geez, did she look that deranged? “Come on,” she said on a sigh. “We can’t do any more with this, and there are wounded to tend to.”
AFTER LAYLA HAD made sure the last of her injured fighters had been taken care of, and had her own minor wound treated, she walked every inch of the Fortalesa’s wall, both on top and at ground level, including the far back wall, where the forest was so dense as to be impassable. She was tired. More tired than she should have been. She’d fought harder and longer battles with her team. And sure, they collapsed at the end of it, but while they were in the grinder, they ran on pure adrenaline, pushing each other to keep going.
And that was the difference. She missed her team. She knew what each of them was capable of, knew whom she could count on for what, with no questions, no doubts. Tony had been great, but she didn’t know him.
“Well, fuck,” she muttered and climbed the stairs to her parents’ apartment to do what she should have done the previous night. She called Brian.
“Ma’am?” he answered.
“Don’t start that,” she said wearily.
“You sound tired, Layla.”
She sighed. “It’s been a hell of a day.”
“More fighting?” He sounded surprised. She supposed he had good reason to be, since the last time they’d spoken, everything had quieted down.
“More and worse. They doubled their number. We fought them off, with no fatalities, although we sustained a few nasty wounds. But they’re disappearing into thin air once they retreat. I tracked them myself this time, and their trail simply vanished.”
“People don’t disappear.”
“No, they don’t. And I have a strong suspicion that Xavier either knows or has a damn good idea of what’s going on.”
“What’s he told you?”
“Nothing. But that’s going to change. It’s time for some answers.”
“Uh. Vampire lord. Maybe you shouldn’t piss him off.”
“Fuck that. I grew up with vamps, remember? The worst he can do is fire me.”
“Say the word, Layla, and we’re there.”
“I’m saying it, Brian. My dad’s got a good group, but I need more experience and my team’s specific talents. I don’t want to short-staff the Wilkerson estate, though.”
“No problem. I’ll call in a team of boy scouts yearning for their combat badge.”
She laughed. “Okay, then. You, River and Kerry.”
“Excellent, we’ll be there tomorrow . . . early morning, possibly before dawn. That okay with your vampire?”
“He’s not my vampire.”
“Okaaay. See you then.” And he hung up.