Not even two seconds later, Darion, Eli, and Jax burst back into the suite, their expressions grim with alarm.
“Holy hell,” Micah said when his gaze fell to the notification on his device from Gideon at headquarters. “Five Darkhavens in the city are under attack by Rogues.”
“It’s already chaos downstairs,” Eli said, his words punctuated by the sounds of panic and screaming from Slake’s other patrons and employees at street level. “Everyone’s rushing for the doors.”
Nathan read out the Darkhaven addresses Gideon provided in his alert.
“They’re all close,” Darion said. “Just a few blocks from here.”
“I’ll get the Rover,” Jax said, already starting to pivot away.
“No time,” Nathan said.
Micah nodded in agreement. “We’ll get there faster on foot.”
Jordana and Phaedra both rushed over, less frightened than grave with understanding. Attacks on civilian Breed residences was uncommon, but it happened from time to time. Particularly in recent months, now that the terror group Opus Nostrum had begun weaponizing a narcotic called Red Dragon. The drug accelerated a Breed vampire’s blood hunger, sending the Bloodlust-affected victim into a fevered, murderous rage. Too often, the only cure was a brain full of bullets or the business end of a Rogue-killing titanium blade.
“What can we do?” Jordana asked.
“Stay put,” Nathan ordered. “You’ll be safest up here until we come back, especially with the stampede taking place downstairs.”
“Lock the door behind us,” Micah added, his gaze locked with Phaedra’s. “There’s a panic room in the library. If you need it, use it.”
Neither Atlantean female looked like they were ready to run and cower, not in the suite and certainly not in a concrete-and-steel-reinforced chamber in a tucked-away corner. If anything, both Phaedra and Jordana looked ready to fight.
“Nathan,” Jordana said, but he cut her off with a quick, silencing kiss.
He pressed his comm unit into her hand. “I’ll be back for you.”
Micah could hardly tear his gaze away from Phaedra’s in the moment before he and his brethren took off from the suite, the door banging closed and locked in their wake. Her wide-eyed golden stare was burned into his mind as he, Nathan, Darion, Elijah, and Jax flashed down the stairs then tried to slice through the logjam of a hundred or more Breed civilians and human blood Hosts trying to push their way out the main doors.
The crowd was going nowhere fast, too many bodies attempting to shove through at the same time.
“Side alley,” Eli shouted, already racing for the delivery entrance that dumped out to the service street.
“We’ll split up once we’re outside,” Nathan said. “One man to each location.”
Micah nodded, mentally triangulating the addresses they’d been given. The Order would no doubt be en route to the attack sites at the same time, but the sooner they had a warrior at each Darkhaven to deal with the Rogues, the fewer civilian casualties they’d be risking.
As they headed for the exit, he tasked everyone with a location. “Eli, you’ve got Book Hill. Jax, Wisconsin Avenue. Darion, M Street. Nathan, you take Thirtieth. I’ve got O Street.”
The team burst through the service door into the access alley—and immediately found themselves on the end of incoming gunfire.
Snipers on the rooftops.
What the fuck? Based on the hail of bullets flying at them, there had to be close to ten or more assailants. All of them firing down on the warriors like shooting fish in a barrel.
But it was damn hard to hit one of the Breed when they could flash from one spot to another faster than almost any eyes could track. And these idiots had piss-poor aim on top of that.
Micah and the rest of his comrades returned fire as they dodged the bullets raining down on them. He took out a gunman on the building opposite Slake, hitting the son of a bitch in the head. The body tumbled down to the alley in a bloody, broken heap. The scent ofHomo sapiensred cells hit Micah’s nostrils and he snarled a curse.
“They’re humans,” he shouted to the others, astonished by the boldness—to say nothing of their apparent death wish. Because these bastards were going down.
Nathan took out two more, one man slumping over the edge of another building, the other body falling to the street.
Evading still more unskilled shots, Micah dropped another assailant while Jax threw a hira-shuriken with one hand and opened fire on a second man with the 9mm in his other. The razor-sharp star sliced a wide gash in the human’s throat. As the shooter reached up to stanch the blood flow, he stumbled and plunged from his perch.
Eli shot two more assailants as he danced out of the way of the bullets coming at him from multiple directions.
