If they wanted him dead, they could have easily shot through the condo walls at him with their weapons. Kyle had no doubt they were tracking him through infrared, because it’s whathewould do if he were in charge of bringing someone back alive in a situation like this. One of the lessons he’d learned during his years with Strike Force was that there were many different definitions ofalive. If they didn’t want him dead, they wanted him for something else.
But Kyle, like any good soldier, wouldn’t abandon his post without a fight.
Two fighters darted into the room, sighting down their weapons. Rather than wait for them to come to him, Kyle threw himself at the pair, diving under their weapons to slam his combat knife in the back of one man’s knee at an angle. The serrated blade slipped through between the knee-guard straps to sink into flesh, grating over bone. The man screamed and half-collapsed, raising his rifle and bringing it down like a club into empty air because Kyle was gone, already moving onto his next target.
Kyle got behind the man’s partner, getting an arm around his throat and gripping his tactical vest by a strap to swing him around. The man elbowed Kyle hard in his side, pain blossoming for a few seconds before rapidly fading. Bullets flew through the air, hitting the bed, the dresser, and the man’s kneeling partner in the face and throat. Blood sprayed into the air like a dark mist as the kneeling man’s face was torn apart. Kyle let go of the man’s vest, took hold of his head in both hands, and yanked it to the side with enough force to break his neck.
A black cylinder was tossed into the room. Kyle closed his eyes and held his breath, suffering through the flash-bang because he had no other choice. Ears ringing, hearing shot, Kyle blinked fading spots out of his eyes as he kept his back to the wall, letting several more enemy soldiers into the room.
The next few seconds were a blur of blows that Kyle accepted and pushed through, his rapid healing ability making the pain disappear before he could really process it. The fight was short and vicious, because Kyle’s first goal wasn’t to kill, it was to distract.
Four men had walked into the guest room, intent on disarming Kyle. None of them survived when Kyle dropped his last grenade at their feet and dove for the doorway, rolling into the hall and staying low as the explosion ripped through the room. He felt the heat of the explosion along his back as he scrambled to his feet—
—and the punch to the gut of a high-velocity bullet that threw him backward to the floor.
His vision went black at the edges, the roar in his ears so loud it was almost quiet as his entire body shuddered through the hit, organs tearing deep inside. Kyle blinked rapidly as he coughed up blood, white-hot pain radiating out from his middle overriding everything else. He pressed his left hand to his torso, fingers sliding into a ragged hole that shouldn’t be there.
Kyle coughed again, blood almost choking him. He rolled to his side, ignoring the agony spreading through the center of his body with long practice. His brain was already trying to compensate for the pain but it would take time.
Time he no longer had.
His AKR-75 lay near the wall, a mere arm’s length away from him. Kyle reached for it, mouth twisted in a snarl as it felt like his body ripped somewhere deep inside from the motion. He kept reaching, shaking fingers skittering against the cold metal, his own blood staining his skin and dripping over his engagement ring, dulling the diamond there.
Kyle hadn’t taken it off yet. He’d meant to, before the fighting started, but he hated being without it while home.
He hated disobeying Jamie.
That thought floated through his mind as he tried to curl his fingers around his rifle. The boot heel that stomped down on his hand stopped him from gaining a weapon. Kyle choked on a yell as the sheer weight of the person standing on his hand broke bone. He could feel a knuckle crack beneath the hard sole, the joint flattening painfully.
The sound of a bullet being chambered forced Kyle’s attention away from his out-of-reach weapon. His eyes tracked up the man’s body, drifting past the tactical pistol aimed at his head to the blurry face. Kyle blinked tears out of his eyes, watching as the man pulled off his tactical goggles and unclipped his face mask.
“Got someone who wants to talk to you,” Declan sneered. “He tells me you can heal from this.”
The gun moved, a black blur that Kyle couldn’t track, not in his weakened state. A shadow fell over him, and Kyle meant to fight, he did, but rapid blood loss was difficult to quickly overcome, and his power was working overtime to keep him alive.
Something cold pricked his neck, piercing his skin. A wave of coldness followed the touch, an icy numbness that Kyle couldn’t fight against. His eyes slid shut, body refusing to obey as unconsciousness dragged him under into a darkness he couldn’t escape as his thoughts faded away.
Jamie…
* * *
“Take cover!”
Alexei barked out the order and was glad to see every single cop immediately obey as the RPG streaked through the air toward them in the street. Alexei flung himself behind a low brick wall in front of a home even as he called up his pyrokinesis. He didn’t have Madison’s energy blasts at his fingertips to knock the grenade off course, but when it hit the street somewhere behind him, he could do something about the aftermath.
Fire and smoke followed after the concussive force that rolled through the air from the hit. Alexei got control of the fire and formed it into a massive fireball that hovered in the air. Sitting up, Alexei made a slashing motion with his arm, hurling the fireball down the street to the barricade the Sons of Adam had set up just past the intersection of East Capitol Street NE and Fifth Street. The house on the southwest corner was on fire, but that wasn’t Alexei’s doing. He’d put it out in a moment, as soon as he dealt with the fuckers shooting at them.
He made a fist when the fire hit the barricade, forcing the flames to scatter and attach themselves to anything that would burn—trees, plants, cars, clothes, bodies—he wasn’t picky. Alexei kept half his awareness on his power, the rest of his attention getting caught by movement out of the corner of his eye up on the roof.
“You late,” Alexei called out as he shifted to his knees, bringing up his weapon.
“You seemed to have them well in hand. Didn’t want to get in the way,” Matthew said as he dropped down beside Alexei. The shock absorption nanotech in his boots and tactical body armor meant the two-story fall didn’t faze him at all.
“Fuck you.”
“Hard pass. You’re still not my type. Heard you’re engaged, though. Congratulations. If we survive this, I’ll owe you a drink.”
Boys, I want that street cleared,Katie ordered.
