“We are going, Cat.” He says it precisely, firmly, like how he used to talk to me in dangerous situations. He reaches down, pulling me up and wrapping a protective arm around my shoulders.
“Wait- I can download more-”
“My team is barely holding the perimeter,” he interrupts. “I’ve got to get ye out of here.”
“Understood,” I shove the flash drive in my pocket. “Let’s go.”
The elaborate stained-glass windows lining the hall are cracked or shattered with bullet holes. As we race down a stairway I’ve not seen before, narrow, and dark, I can see a huge chunk of the wall in the kitchen has crumbled into dust. Most of the guards are outside and the noise of the gunfire is making my eardrums bulge ominously.
“Kyle, the asset’s acquired,” Lucas is speaking into his mic, “get out of the castle. Any sign of Dubois?”
“No,” a voice crackles back, loud enough for me to hear it, “and I’ve been looking for the bastard. Shite- I’ve got action.”
The gunfire outside is too loud to hear anything else but Lucas’s face tightens. “Dinnae engage unless ye must, get out.”
We’re on the first floor and he’s pulling me toward a door on the east side of the castle, an area I’ve not been in before. It hits me how little of the castle I was allowed to see. This is ridiculously opulent, pillars slathered in gold and silver gilt and several enormous paintings, some I recognize as reported stolen from the Louvre a few years ago. There’s fewer bullet holes and less destruction here and most of the fight sounds like it’s on the other side of the castle.
“Kyle, sound off.” Lucas is grim, sweeping thehallway as we race through, listening to the static in his headpiece. There’s one answer that crackles back and he sucks in a deep breath. “Good, get to the meeting point. Team, I have the asset. Continue suppressing fire for three minutes and retreat.”
We round the corner and nearly run into two guards who look just as shocked to see us as we are to see them. They bring their guns up, but Lucas is faster, spraying them both with bullets. They drop like wet sacks of meat onto the gold-laced marble floor and my silly high-heeled leopard print boots slip on their blood.
“Wait!” I gasp. “The smaller one, I need his boots. I canna run in these.”
Lucas growls, looking at his watch and hands me his knife. “We’ve got thirty seconds.”
I’m proud to say that even with my hands shaking something fierce, I’ve got the laces cut at the knot and loose enough to yank the boots off the dead man’s feet, hauling them onto mine in my allotted time. Lucas pulls off my stupid ornamental footwear, helping me get the heavier ones on. They’re too big, but they’ll do.
A new round of gunfire echoes down the hall and we’re off again, racing for the enormous, elaborate doors leading to freedom. Lucas hits the handles and locks with another spray of bullets, sending the doors flying open and we’reinto a little courtyard, the golden stone bright under the moon.
“Asset is out of the house, meet us-”
There’s an enormous explosion that rattles the windows, a ball of fire rolling up from a spot on the mountainside above us. “Abort, abort!” Lucas snaps. “Extraction point is gone, make your way out on one of the secondary routes-go!”
There’s a painful burst of static and he winces, pulling the headpiece out of his ear. “Cat, we’re changing course, I need ye to run as fast as ye can, keep-”
“Keep my head down, aye, I know.” Like I dinnae know this shite? Not the time to remind him. I duck my head and dig my heels in, racing for the low wall ahead of us. He hauls me up by the waist, sending me over the barrier before easily leaping over it himself.
“Two trip lines ahead,” he says, shooting a camera mounted on a tree, sending it flying in a shower of sparks. He slides his night vision goggles on, scanning the area. “Let’s go.”
We dodge and run, bushes scraping my legs in the ridiculous fecking skirt Dubois forced me to wear. At one point, Lucas pulls me into a grouping of trees and drapes an aluminum blanket over us.
“Drones,” he whispers in my ear. “I’m sure theyhave thermal imagining.” Two huge ones soar over us in a grid pattern, red lights blinking.
We’re pressed together, my breasts against his chest and his breath soft in my ear. He’s got his arm around my waist, hand splayed against my lower back protectively.
My eyes close, pushing against the swell of emotion. Lucas still smells like the forest back home and old leather. He’s warm,sowarm and it’s always been comforting when you’ve been raised in chilly Scotland.
“Let’s go.”
His mouth is right next to my ear, I can feel his lips moving against my skin… Straightening my spine, I step back. “Aye, I’m ready.”
We keep running into the dark forest, sporadic bursts of gunfire and an occasional explosion lighting the night sky.
Two hours later…
“We need to take a break,” Lucas says.
Lying bastard, he’s not even breathing hard. But my stolen boots are rubbing blisters into my heels and I’m grateful for a break.
