“Hopefully the others have been able to get more than we have from here,” he said, sounding disappointed. “So far, all we know is that she’s got a buttload of shifters helping out, which isn’t necessarily the worst thing in the world, but it’s sure as hell going to complicate matters.”
“True,” I agreed. It wasn’t like we had really expected her to try something like this magic-stealing crap without any backup... but it would have been nice. I guess her hubris only extended as far as confessing her plan in advance. “How many have you counted so far?”
“About fifteen or sixteen,” he replied, shifting his weight to find a more comfortable spot. “You?”
“Same,” I confirmed. They’d been carrying boxes and potted plants out of the basement for the past hour, loading them into a waiting truck. That suggested they were clearing out space for something.
“We can handle that many normal shifters easily. I just hope she doesn’t have more stashed inside or something.” He had a good point. Fifteen shifters would be a walk in the park for two dragons alone, and that wasn’t even taking Caleb, Austin, and Wes into account. Or River with his arsenal of weapons. As for me? Well, my job was pretty clear. Bridget.
Distract, delay, detain—whatever it took to keep her occupied while the guys saved my bacon. I’d really never fully appreciated how much I relied on my powers until I no longer had them. I felt powerless and vulnerable. Was this what Lucy had felt like when I was on Fox jobs? If so, it fucking sucked and I owed her an apology.
A tremor of anxiety rumbled through me at the thought of my bestie. She still hadn’t returned any of my calls, but after Wesley had looked into it, he’d said there was evidence they might have just gone away for a vacation.
Every fiber of my being hoped that was true.
“Hey,” Wesley whispered as he materialiszd from crow form to human beside us. “Any luck here?”
“No sign of Bridget, but we’ve counted about fifteen shifters,” I reported. “How about you?”
“The roof of that building is that sort of retractable glass designed so you can open it up and have a courtyard, you know?” He fiddled with his ring as he lay beside me on the roof. “So I’m wondering if this entrance brings them out into that part. It would make sense if Bridget actually needs the moonlight to complete the spell.”
“You couldn’t see anything?” Caleb asked, and Wes shook his head.
“Nope, the glass is tinted and it was too dark inside to make out anything.” He sighed, and I placed my hand over his.
“That’s good info, Wes,” I assured him. “It makes sense with all the plants they’ve been moving out.”
He huffed, pursing his lips as he looked down on the spot we were monitoring. “Have they brought anything in at all?”
“Not much,” Caleb answered. “Except for whatever that is.”
While we watched, several muscle-bound shifters carried an intricately carved silver chest off the truck and down the stairs into the darkness. It was big, maybe five feet long, and looked heavy. Whatever it was, they were handling it with extreme care.
“Well, that’s interesting,” I murmured. “What do you suppose that could be?”
Caleb shrugged. “I’ve never seen anything like it. Maybe an altar or something? It looks like an old, magical artifact, at any rate.”
“Definitely old,” Wes agreed, staring at the darkened hole where the chest had disappeared with its guards. “We will need to keep an eye out for that when this all kicks off.”
“Hopefully it’s just a pretty box that she thought would look great holding her cauldron and spell book,” I mumbled under my breath, and Caleb arched an eyebrow at me. “Yeah, yeah, not the time for jokes. Got it. Any new orders from River?” I asked Wes.
“Yep, he said if nothing more has happened to fall back to the meeting point. It won’t be dark for another couple of hours yet, so we should be conserving energy.” He gave me a little nudge with his shoulder. “Or maybe fuelling up on coffee?”
I snickered, despite the tense situation we were in. “I love it when you talk sexy to me, Wes.”
“You two are addicts,” Caleb muttered, scooting away from the roof edge and dusting off his clothes. “Why don’t you just throw in some cheesy bread for Kitty Kat, and she’ll really be in heaven.”
I licked my lips with enthusiasm, even as my stomach rumbled its agreement. People shouldn’t joke about coffee and cheese with me; that was a quick way to getting stabbed with a fork or something.
“Silly thing to joke about, bro,” Wes chuckled, following us back over to the fire escape on the far side of the building. “Now you’ll need to follow through on that offer.”
Caleb groaned, and I laughed as we made our way down the rickety iron ladder to the dirty alleyway below and then around to the diner we had named as a rendezvous point. It was a totally inappropriate time for joking and coffee, but... if not now, then when? We really needed to seize these moments when they arose because who knew when the next one might be.
If ever.
26
Our carefully planned mission of infiltration fell to pieces mere moments after crossing the threshold into the greenery-lined atrium. Wesley had been correct in his guess that the passage Caleb and I had been watching would lead us to the greenhouse. From what we could tell, the exteriors of the building were totally separate from this center area and the only way in or out of this inner part was via underground passageways.
That was all well and good, except for the booby traps Bridget had left for us along the way. Turned out she wasn’t as stupid as I had thought she might be.
Cole and Vali had found another way in, accessed via a manhole in the street on the other side of the building, so they had taken that way in, along with River. I could only hope they were faring better than we were.
After disabling the wolf shifters guarding the entrance, we had made it barely fifty feet inside before Caleb stepped on a trap spell that immediately encased him in ice. Thankfully, both he and Austin had their familiars out, and Sam was able to relay Caleb’s message to me that he was fine and to go on ahead. He was confident he could get out, but unsure how long it’d take. Seconds after delivering that message, the ice extended to Sam, even though the snake was nowhere near the trap.
“Because he’s part of Caleb,” Austin explained without me asking.
No sooner had we left him than we ran into our next roadblock.
“Shit,” Austin cursed as he threw a white hot ball of magic at the first half-shifted wolf who lunged at us from the darkness. His ball hit, sending the deformed beast flying back several yards, only to be replaced by another. “How many? Can you see, Wes?”
“No,” Wesley replied, sounding frustrated. “They’re moving too fast for me. There’re a lot though.” Even as he said that, he spun to narrowly avoid the slashing claws of another wolf and then seized its furry head between his palms. Whatever he did in those few seconds that he clasped the shifters face resulted in the creature slipping lifeless to the ground, twitching as foam bubbled from his mouth. It was scary as fuck, and also crazy awesome.
“There’s a hell of a lot more than fifteen shifters in here, Princess,” Austin snapped as he took on two more rabid creatures who both tried to pounce on him at once. “Something tells me your mom expected you to show up.”
“No shit,” I replied, using my handgun to shoot a third shifter who was attempting to catch Austin unawares. “Notice none of them are going for me?”
Something heavy dropped from the ceiling of the tunnel, and Wesley dodged it just before being flattened. When it moved, I fired off three shots into its mass to prevent it disemboweling my dorky lover.
“Thanks,” Wesley called out to me before slamming his hand into the forehead of another attacker. Whatever it was he could do to them, it looked fucking painful.