Rising to his feet, he peered over the edge to look down at her. Dirt and blood streaked her pretty features. Her pants had become shorts that hung in tattered and burnt ruins, exposing the flesh that had been ripped apart by her bones when they’d torn through her skin. One of her boots no longer had a sole and he could see the tips of her toes through the other one.
If she had been anyone else, she would be dead right now. Instead, she’d used the life of the man trying to kill her to save her own. He could see the results of those deaths on her, and not in the vitality of her skin or her rapidly healing wounds. No, it was in the shadows lining her haunted, honey eyes. Their deaths had been necessary, he knew she realized this, but she would forever bear the stain of them on her soul.
He would make those within this building pay dearly for that.
“I’ll be right back,” he assured her before turning to examine the flat, concrete roof. Because of its location in the center of the clearing, no leaves or pine needles littered the solar panels lining the roof. The sleek panels shone in the moonlight as he made his way around them, exploring every inch of the roof.
He had no doubt The Commission had fortified this thing to be stronger than Fort Knox, but they had no idea the shitstorm they’d stepped into on the day they’d captured him.
As he walked, he became aware that he could still feel the ebb and flow of Quinn’s ability within his body. He wondered if Quinn knew she was still attached to him in such a way, or if she didn’t realize her ability could still hold onto someone when she was apart from them.
Draining those two men had probably caused her power to strengthen with the influx of life and her continued use of her ability. If her power had grown to the point where she didn’t have to be in contact with someone to drain them, she could be nearly indestructible. He smiled at the possibility as he reached the other side of the building.
Standing at the edge of the roof, he peered down the back of it. Completely void of anything, even windows, it was nothing but a concrete wall. He stared down at the wall before lifting his head to take in the mountains surrounding them. Their craggy peaks stretched high into the night sky in a natural wall encompassing the land and fence surrounding the building.
His gaze searched over the clearing around him as he picked up pinpoints of light and details about the night no human ever would. Turning, he studied the fence to his left and the mountains looming above it. He saw nothing out of the ordinary there; he detected no movement within the forests. Even the animals knew this was a place of evil and stayed far away from it.
Moving back to where he’d left the others, he slid down the front of the building and dropped onto the ground beside Quinn.
“Anything?” she asked.
He took hold of her hand, pulling her closer to him. He’d discuss this new development in her ability with her later, when they were alone.
“This is the only door I can see,” Julian replied.
“We have to find the other ways in and out,” Luther said.
“We will,” Julian said.
***
It was almost two hours before Dani, Luther, Hadie, Prue, and Carla returned. Julian had sent them with a dozen more vampires to search for another exit. When they returned, everyone met in the middle of the minefield. While the group had been gone, the rest of them had worked to locate and set off more of the mines. They’d cleared a pathway across the earth and removed the injured vampires from the field.
The Commission could already be looking to flee from one of their other exits, but Julian had stayed here in the hopes his presence would keep the bastards focused on him. However, he suspected that after what they’d seen Quinn do, they would be far more interested in her than him. They wouldn’t evacuate here until they were certain they were going to lose, and right now they had no reason to think they would.
Dani wiped away the sweat on her forehead when she stopped before him. “We found one.”
“It’s about two miles from here,” Luther said. “And the door appears to be as fortified as this one. We couldn’t get it open. It’s not in the middle of a mine field, or at least none of us blew up trying to get to it.”
Julian tipped his head back to peer at the night sky. Dawn was still a few hours away; they had enough time to launch an attack. “It’s their panic route. They won’t risk accidentally blowing themselves up if they’re fleeing in a hurry,” he said.
Luther lifted his glasses and rubbed at the bridge of his nose before settling them back into place. “They probably have more than two exits.”
“Most likely,” Julian agreed.
“So what do we do now?” Dani asked.
“We’ll send a group to start trying to get at them from the exit you found. It will cause them to divide their forces inside and weaken them.”