Blood and Bone: (Royal Blood #6) (17 page)

T
he facility wasn’t
difficult to infiltrate.

I moved through the empty halls with Banshee, our boots silent on the polished concrete floors as we searched for Moltke.

I wondered how Mercy was faring. Knowing her, probably better than we were. They had a stationary target while ours was unpredictable and teetering on the edge of complete insanity. The notion was a startling picture, giving me a glimpse at where I could’ve ended up post-brainwash.
Absolutely delightful
.

Moving through the loading bay, we passed several storage rooms that were dark and devoid of life. Further inside the facility, things started to heat up. Voices and lights filtered from a room up ahead, and I gestured to Banshee. She nodded, and we approached slowly, our guns drawn.

She took point, easing the door at the end of the hall open. Light flooded through the gap, and I waited for the verdict. Would be need to go in guns blazing, or would it be the stealth approach?

Banshee held up her hand and gestured. She’d made three bodies in the room…one of which was Moltke. Of course, he was here. If his planning was in the finishing stages, then he would be here to oversee the final preparations. Since Gruber accidentally detonated his last bomb, he would want to make sure nothing else fucked up his grand scheme.

Banshee gestured for me to go left, and she would go right…
quietly
. Understanding her reasoning, I nodded. We’d have two clear vantage points and could pincer him in the middle. It was the most logical approach.

Slipping into the room behind her, I ghosted around to the left, using the crates as cover. Finding a vantage point that had a good line of sight, I watched as Moltke paced back and forth like a hungry lion in a cage and waited. Taking the time to survey the layout of the room, I made all the exits. One at either end of the space.

Inside the room, large pressurized tanks lined one wall, all of them labeled with hazardous and flammable warnings. I made the first one out to be oxygen, the next nitrogen, and the third helium. I couldn’t make out the fourth and fifth from my position, but they were all as bad as each other in a firefight. If a gun went off in here and a bullet clipped one of the tanks… Well, it’d make one great big fireball of destruction, that’s what it’d do.

Moltke continued to pace, the two guards leaning against the wall watching him intently. If I wasn’t mistaken, they were on edge. The way their gazes followed the insane bastard in front of them told me he was becoming more and more unpredictable as this mess wore on. I’d put money on it that Bateman employed these buffoons.

There was another thread that was loose and in the wind. Where the hell was Bateman?

A phone rang shrilly, the sound bouncing off the walls. Moltke fumbled in his pocket and pressed the thing to his ear.

“What?” He started pacing, looking angry. “Are you fucking serious? Can’t these people just fucking die?” He slapped his palm against his forehead. “If they want the Veltium-34 so badly, then they can witness firsthand what it does to their friends.”

My gaze met Banshee’s across the room, and she narrowed her eyes. They had Mercy and Jackson. There was no way in hell I was letting anything happen to them. I made Mercy a promise that I’d never be apart from her again. This was not how this story was going to end.

Moltke slammed the phone down onto the ledge that ran around the tank of nitrogen and waved a hand to the two guards. “Go to the containment room, and leave me the fuck alone,” he barked. “I can’t think with your fucking stupidity suffocating me.”

The men moved off without a word and disappeared through the doors at the end of the room.

If we were going to take out Moltke, now would be a perfect opportunity. We couldn’t use guns, but with two of us, we could overpower him.

I curled my lip, and Banshee stiffened as she realized what I was about to do. Not waiting for her, I shoved my gun into the waistband of my jeans at my back and stepped out of the darkness.

As Moltke turned, his gaze hit mine, and his shoulders visibly tensed.

“I made myself a promise,” I said, my voice sounding loud in the concrete room. “The next time I came face-to-face with you, I’d rip you apart with my bare hands.”

His lip curled in anger, his eyes practically shooting daggers of pain at me. What was that saying?
If looks could kill…

“Can’t you people just fucking die?” he snarled.

Lunging for me, he collided against my chest, causing pain to tear through my wounded shoulder. Shoving the sensation to the back of my mind, I leaned to the right, causing his weight to spin us around. Using the momentum to my advantage, I swung my left fist and slammed it into the base of his skull.

The impact jarred right up my arm, and I cursed as Moltke only grunted and twisted away from my grasp. My right-hand side was severely impaired, and my left was weaker. I’d never be able to muster enough force to knock him on his ass this way.

Banshee darted out into the open, her gaze meeting mine as I fisted my hands into Moltke’s shirt and hauled him back toward her. Sensing a second body, he turned on his heel, and his fist almost slammed into Banshee, but at the last second, he faltered and slipped. He landed on his ass, staring up at her with unmasked shock.

“
Vesper?
”

“You must stop this madness, Moltke,” she said, her accent slipping into a rather good British one.

He scrambled to his knees, practically bowing at her feet, and I was all but forgotten. “How… How is this possible?”

“You were played,” she said.

“Played?” He shook his head. “No. I saw the evidence. It was irrefutable.”

“It was planted. You know the job,” Banshee replied. “You know nothing is what it seems.”

He stared up at her, his eyes misting with tears. “Where have you been? Why didn’t you come back to me? I looked for you… I searched…”

“You searched in places you were not welcome,” she hissed. “All of this is because you can’t let go. You need to let me and this madness go, Moltke.”

“We can get our revenge,” he said, ignoring her plea. “You and I. We can punish those who took you from me. Britain and Russia. We can
kill them all
.”

“Stop it,” she said. “Please, stop it.”

“I love you, Vesper. All of this is for you.”

“I never asked for it,” she snapped. “I never asked you to kill for me.”

“I’d gladly tear your enemies apart with my bare hands if it meant you would be avenged.”

I stiffened as Moltke’s words slammed into me. They sounded extremely familiar… I’d said them before. I’d felt the rage flow through my body, and I’d used it to take my revenge on the men who took my life away. If Moltke could kneel in front of his lover and declare those things to her in the same way I’d declared them to Mercy…what made us different?

I clutched my hand against my stomach, suddenly realizing the wound in my shoulder had torn and blood was dripping down my arm. I knew the answer to my question without having to ask it. We were the same. Moltke and I were the same.

Was this the life I would have to lead if I couldn’t fight off the insanity? Was this the life that would constantly hang over my head if I allowed the monster to surface? I could let the beast take over and never come back…

“Come with me,” he pleaded. “Come with me, Vesper, and we can finally be together.”

Banshee shook her head as she drew her gun and clicked off the safety. “
No
.”

He stared at the gun, utterly confused. “No?”

“You killed them all for nothing,” Banshee said, her voice eerily calm. “
For nothing
, Moltke.”

“
No!
”

“You were played. Can’t you see that?” she said, kicking him away. “This is what they want you to do. They want you to murder all those people for their own end, not yours. You think you’re acting alone?
You’re not
.”

“It’s a lie,” he said, falling back onto his heels. “They got to you, Vesper.
They got to you
.”

She closed her eyes, her expression slipping. For a moment, anguish painted her features…then it was gone.

“I can’t allow you to murder anyone else,” she said, turning her gaze back to him. She raised her gun, and Moltke’s eyes widened.

“No,” he said, clutching at her legs. “You wouldn’t.
Vesper
…”

The cold kiss of steel pressed into the back of my head, and I stiffened. Raising my hands, I snarled.
Busted
.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.” Bateman’s voice echoed through the room. Banshee stared up at him and uttered some foul Russian swear word. “Drop the gun, Banshee.”

“What?” I asked as he moved around me, the gun following his movements. “You know her?”

“Seems like she loves a double-cross,” he drawled as Mercy and Jackson came into view, led in by the two guards who had flanked Moltke moments before. I tensed, and Bateman clicked his tongue. “Don’t try anything, or your head goes pop.”

Banshee hissed and dropped her gun to the ground. “Fuck you, Bateman. My parting gift to you should have been a bullet in the head.”

Moltke snatched up her gun and rose to his feet. “You fucked her?” he roared at Bateman. He strode across the room and shoved the gun against the Englishman’s head. “If you touched her with your filthy cock, then
prepare to die
.”

“Like I’d let him put that thing anywhere near me,” Banshee drawled. “Put the gun down, Moltke.”

“X,” Mercy hissed, and I glanced her way. The guards had forced her and Jackson to their knees, guns pointed at the backs of their heads.

That’s when I saw the present Bateman had wheeled in with them.
The bomb
.

This whole situation was fucking impossible. I ran over different scenarios in my head, and all of them came up ending in blood. Lots of blood. If I moved, the guards would shoot, and Moltke would put a bullet in me. He might die at the end of it by Banshee’s hand, but we’d still be dead.

I wanted all of us to come out of this alive, and Moltke, Bateman, and his crew the ones choking on their own blood. Right now, I couldn’t see a way for that to happen. Not yet…

Banshee’s gaze darted to the bomb, then to me. I tried to read her intentions, but she was a closed book. Nothing shone behind her eyes, and I began to shake my head as I put two and two together.
No! She couldn’t…

“Perhaps you’re right,” she said to Moltke. “Perhaps I should have done things your way a long time ago.”

“
Bitch!
” Mercy exclaimed, attempting to rise to her feet, but she was pushed back to her knees.

Banshee glanced at her briefly, and then turned her attention back to Moltke and Bateman. “When I found out what they did…”

“You’ll come with me?” Moltke asked hopefully.

“Don’t believe a thing that bitch says,” Bateman snarled, and before he could take a step, Moltke raised his hand and fired the gun.

I flinched, but I didn’t need to worry about the five massive tanks of pressurized and highly flammable gas. The bullet slammed into Bateman’s heart, and he dropped like a stone. His eyes stared up at the ceiling, glazing over as blood began to pool beneath his corpse.
Fuck…

The two men who held Mercy and Jackson raised their guns and pointed them at Moltke and Banshee. The rest happened faster than I thought possible. Banshee stepped forward, pressed a soft kiss against Moltke’s lips, took the gun from his hand, and shot the two guards in quick succession.
Bam
.
Bam
.

“Get Jackson out of here,” I hissed at Mercy.

“But—”

“
Go!
” I shouted at her as I pulled my gun and turned to face Banshee and Moltke. Looked like the mercenary’s heart wasn’t so cold after all.

“Let me do this one, love,” Moltke said, curling his hand around hers and prying the gun from her grasp. “I do like to finish what I’ve started.”

Banshee slid her hand over his shoulder as he turned to point the gun at me. Smiling, she ran her fingers lovingly through his hair. “Shall I go after the other two?”

“No,” he murmured. “They won’t be hard to track down. Revenge is a never-ending merry-go-round after all.
She’ll be back
.” He smiled at me and laughed softly. “Then when I kill the other one’s family…he’ll be back.”

“If you say so, love,” Banshee said, letting him go. She wandered over to the bomb and began inspecting it.

“Time to die, Blood,” Moltke snarled. “I’d like to draw this out, but it seems like you have a skill for resurrection. I’ve got to make sure the deed is done this time. I’m sure you can respect that, being an assassin and all.”

“We’ll see,” I said, tightening my grip around my gun. “It’ll be a matter of who’s got the faster trigger finger.”

“Vesper, love?” he called out to Banshee.

She sighed, her gaze taking in Moltke. “I didn’t want things to end this way,” she murmured.

Moltke narrowed his eyes. “What…”

Her hand slammed down onto the bomb, activating it, and the timer flashed at two minutes and began counting down.

1:59…

1:58…

“
What have you done?
” Moltke roared at her. “The fail-safe…”

I stared at Banshee, my head spinning. Once the bomb was activated, it couldn’t be shut off.

“Go!” she yelled at me. “Please!”

The gravity of what Banshee had just set into motion slammed into me in that split second, and I understood.
I understood completely.

Turning, she launched herself on Moltke, and they fought, rolling across the floor, punching and wrestling for control of the gun. I didn’t wait to see how it ended up. I stumbled toward the opening Mercy and Jackson had disappeared through, my shoulder slamming against the door. Pain erupted through the gunshot wound, and I ran.

Blood had been running down my arm unchecked for far too long, and I blinked hard to force my vision to clear. A dull orange glow appeared in front of me, the outline of a body in the doorway right ahead of me.

“
X!
” Mercy shouted, gesturing me forward.

“Run!” I yelled. “The bomb…”