Total pages in book: 155
Estimated words: 141532 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 708(@200wpm)___ 566(@250wpm)___ 472(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 141532 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 708(@200wpm)___ 566(@250wpm)___ 472(@300wpm)
“Can that safe room stand up to explosives?” Mitya asked his cousin.
“Damn straight,” Fyodor said. “Made certain of it.” He was tossing weapons and masks to his cousins and the others in the room. “This has to be dear Uncle Lazar. He likes to make a big entrance.”
“Classic attack,” Mitya agreed. He’d seen his father do it a million times. He liked a big explosion to shock everyone, to kill as many as possible and then calmly follow up by entering the home and shooting everyone in sight.
The shock of the explosion would paralyze those Lazar attacked, making his appearance dramatic as well as terrifying. That wasn’t going to be the case. He thought he’d caught the cousins together and that they would be with their women. He had no way of knowing they weren’t alone, and each ally had brought their bodyguards with them.
There had been no one in the great room, so there wasn’t a single death. Timur was already directing his troops. He had the shifters all stay back, circling around. He wanted them to quietly take out any of Lazar’s soldiers they came across. Then they looked to Mitya. He knew his father and his methods better than anyone else.
“He will go after any woman or child. They’ll make certain you hear their screams. If possible, they’ll draw you out by dragging her in front of you and hurting her. Even raping her,” Mitya explained. “There will be another explosion soon. They’ll lob in gas, and he’ll come behind that one with his men. Do we have eyes on them? We need to stay away from the walls. If there are masks anywhere else in the house, tell our men the locations so they can get them. They’ll need them soon.”
He spoke to them as he slid weapons and ammunition into the loops on his coat, adding to his arsenal, but his gaze was on Sevastyan. He’d sent Vikenti and Zinoviy to check on Ania. Sevastyan gave a small shake of his head.
Mitya’s heart dropped. “Where the fuck is she?” he roared.
“She wasn’t with the other women when the explosion went off. She’d gone to the kitchen to get whatever had been prepared for refreshments. Vikenti and Zinoviy headed that way after her.”
The words were barely out of his mouth when another explosion ripped through the house, the shock wave even stronger this time. Mitya grabbed the heavy table for stability as the walls undulated and shook all around him. The blast was so loud, for a moment he could hear only ringing in his ears.
He felt desperate. He knew what Lazar was capable of. Worse, he knew Lazar would make Ania’s death slow and ugly, most likely uglier than anything Joshua’s killer shifters had visited on those little girls. Mitya had seen so many vile, depraved acts, so many types of torture in his lifetime, that the idea of his woman falling into his father’s sick hands made him crazy. For a moment he couldn’t think, and it had nothing whatsoever to do with the blast and ensuing chaos.
Sevastyan bumped him hard, and automatically, Mitya turned to follow him as his cousin led him out of the meeting room into the hall. The moment they stepped out into the hall, Kiriil and Josue fell in behind Mitya. Timur led Fyodor out, with Gorya right behind him.
“I put a tracker on her, Mitya,” Sevastyan said. “Take a breath, we’ll find her.”
“If that fucker touches her—” Mitya snapped.
“He won’t get to her,” Sevastyan assured over his shoulder. “She’s too smart for him, and she takes this shit seriously.”
The smoke bombs began hitting the floor, lobbed through the holes in the walls and broken windows. The men inside spread out, their gas masks protecting them as they slid into the shadows of Fyodor’s house. The room turned gray with fog and gas. The men were still. Waiting. Knowing Lazar’s men would come in shooting, expecting to find everyone inside disoriented, dead or dying. They thought they would have easy targets.
Mitya didn’t give a damn about them. He didn’t want to be stationary; he wanted to be running to protect Ania. He hissed at Sevastyan, who seemed to be staring down at his watch. He pointed up. Mitya slid the tiny but very powerful bud into his ear. It could pick up his whisper and deliver it to Sevastyan and any others who thought to use their radios.
“Where the fuck is she?” he demanded.
“I think on the roof. She’s definitely above us. Vikenti said the wall cabinet was opened and she must have armed herself and taken a mask. At least, there were several weapons missing, ammunition and a mask gone. He closed it back up just in case.”
Mitya took a breath, breathing in clean air while the room filled with tear gas. Fyodor was going to have a time cleaning the room. The blinds and furniture he could replace, but scrubbing all that wood and redoing the floors wasn’t going to be so easy. He tried to make himself think about that rather than the fact that his woman was out there somewhere and if she was spotted, Lazar would send every leopard he had to retrieve her.