The other teams arrive, pooling into the space before the Watch.
The intruder checks his watch.
Kade’s stomach drops.
The backup power.
No, there’s no way.
There is no fuckingway—
The lights come on.
The area is flooded with light.
And then the wall of steel the intruder was leaning up againstopensand he drags Kade backwards through the newly opened doors, the staggered entrance mirroring Kade’s hasty exit six minutes ago.
The return surge dropped the magnetic locks a fraction too long.
Kade is getting dizzy from lack of air but he’s well aware of everything going down including the closure of all three doors behind them as the locks reinitialise.
They’re in the Watch.
He’s failed Riley.Failed Iron Star, his family.
Kade’s hearing is coming back, muffled and distorted.
‘…your fuckingknees…ask twice!’the intruder barks at Cole and Finn.American accent, rough and controlled.Kade is counting the seconds until he passes out, knows it’s now or never.He waits until the guy starts talking.‘Now open … doors to … hiding like a fucking coward—’
Kade drags himselfdownand forces a spin kick that drops the intruder hard.He steals one of his handguns from the thigh holster but is rewarded with a hard punch, the gun kicked away.Kade bounces back and throws all his power into a hammerfist that lands beautifully, sending a spray of blood and spit into the air like a grim rainbow, but the intruder recovers too fast.
The way he moves, Kade knows they’d have onehellof a fight hand to hand, but he’s not taking the risk of him getting anywhere near the boss, so he grabs a gun and swings it at the intruder who spins around and then…
The man freezes.
Got you,Kade thinks.
Only it doesn’t seem like the reason the guy froze is because of the gun.
He barely seems to notice it in fact.
No, he’s staring at Kade.
Eyes wide, face pale.
He is the epitome of astonishment.
Panting harshly, the intruder pays no mind to Kade’s team streaming inside.He only frowns and gasps the word ‘Jules?’right before Kade empties the entire clip into his face.
CHAPTER TWO
Kade’s in trouble.
Medical teams are patching everyone up on the fourth floor.Bodies of their fallen were taken to the basement morgue, often called theCold Room.Iron Star runs a full crew, all of whom were well protected during the failed one-man invasion, and they get back to work before the dust has even begun to settle.Sweep teams are performing a full and thorough search of the whole Tower.Whoever sent thisfuckeris going to pay dearly, but for now that’s not Kade’s interest.The medical team gave him a quick once over, packed and wrapped the shallow wound from earlier, put cotton wool in his ears, but he tends to heal fast anyway and they all know it.
The Tower is locked down.
And Kade is absolutely in trouble because he went directly against protocol.Tunnel attacks are one thing.This was something else entirely.
