The ferals paused, confused for a heartbeat.
Then the corridor erupted.
“What the fuck is happening?” Ashcroft shouted, his voice laced with sudden panic.
Snarls turned into motion. Bodies slammed into opening gates. Wolves poured out, claws scraping tile, eyes wild, moving toward where voices and heat and human scent concentrated.
“Move,” Elias said.
Shouts rose. A scream cut off abruptly. Doors slammed. Boots pounded against the floor.
We slipped into another maintenance corridor, avoiding the main flow. We moved to the next junction where Eamon was meant to rejoin us. He appeared out of the shadows a minute later, breathing hard, eyes bright.
“It’s done,” he said immediately. “I found the feral drugs stocks. They’re completely destroyed. There’s no chance they’ll be able to salvage any of it.”
Relief hit me like a wave.
“And the exits?” I asked.
Bishop’s voice drifted through the corridor as he emerged from the stairwell. “They’re all sealed. Every gate except the one we came through.”
Griff exhaled slowly. “So they’re trapped.”
“Yes,” Bishop said. “They’re trapped.”
We didn’t stand there to watch. We didn’t need to.
We’d done what we came here to do.
We moved back the way we’d come, fast and quiet, slipping through the maintenance hatch as screams echoed behind us like a rising tide.
No one followed.
No one could.
When we finally emerged and the sound of London’s normal nightly hum returned, it felt almost unreal, like the city had swallowed up what we’d done and moved on without a fuss.
Griff checked my face briefly, his eyes searching mine. “You all right, Tam?”
I nodded. “Yeah.”
We moved back into the city streets, leaving the lab and the horrors it contained behind.
As we walked, I let myself believe one thing: Ashcroft wouldn’t be walking out of there. In fact, none of them would.
And I was perfectly fine with that.
CHAPTER 27
Tamsin
We made it back to the safehouse a few hours later in the dead of night. No one spoke much. There wasn’t anything to say that wouldn’t make it worse. We washed what we could, stripped out of our damp clothes, and fell onto our cots exhausted.
I didn’t remember closing my eyes.
I remembered opening them.
The light in the room had changed when I woke. The sun had risen with that particular gray-yellow cast London was known for. When I padded into the common room, I found that the others were already awake.
