“What the hell? Why did the elevator stop?”
Peyton sighed. “Looks like they figured it out. I’m keeping the door closed for now, but I can’t do much if they force it open.”
“Any guys near me?”
“Nope, not yet. They’re having to take another elevator.”
Shay grinned. “Looks like it’s time for Plan B. Go ahead and open it.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah. Five flights of stairs I can handle.”
Peyton chuckled. “I guess this is why I don’t go into the field. Too much running. It’s tiring just listening to you.”
The elevator doors dinged and slid open. Shay ran around the corner and threw open the door to the stairwell.
She stopped for a moment to listen for footsteps or shouting but heard nothing. With a smile, she started taking the stairs two at a time. Shay arrived at the thirtieth floor and peeked through the narrow window. Without active camera coverage, she had no idea where anyone might be, but she’d memorized the layout of the floor and three likely storage rooms where they might be keeping artifacts prior to sale.
Shay removed her 9mm from her holster, then reached into another pouch on her tactical harness and retrieved her magical silencer. After screwing it onto the weapon, she slowly pulled the door open.
She entered the thirtieth floor. No one so far. She hurried down the hallway and took a corner. Two men with skull tattoos stood on either side of a conference room door. Demon Generals.
One of them blinked. “Who the fuck are you?”
Shay whipped up her gun and put a round in his head, then another in his friend’s. They slumped to the ground, their blood splattered against the wall. The magical silencer had made the shots mere hisses.
Poor discipline.
She walked over to the door they had been guarding and waited a few seconds. She gave herself a three-count and kicked open the door.
A long polished wood conference table sat in the center of the room, a perimeter formed by leather chairs. A familiar piece of metal had been placed under a glass dome: Lily’s artifact. Two others, a small brush and a ring, she didn’t recognize but assumed they were from one of the other teens.
“So much for the storage rooms,” Shay mumbled. “I found Lily’s artifact.”
“Lily should be there soon,” Peyton reported. “I spotted her running up the stairwell before I lost cameras. She’s coming in from the opposite side, it looks like.”
“Good. This is being damned easy. Glad we caught these assholes by surprise. I’ll catch up with her.” Shay yanked off the glass domes, then grabbed the three artifacts and stuffed them into pouches in her tactical harness.
Shay stepped out of the conference room, taking a moment to glance down at the dead gang members before jogging toward down the hallway. Voices in Russian drifted from around the corner.
She flattened herself against the wall and crept down the rest of the hallway before a quick peek around the corner. Two men in dark suits sat there chatting and gesticulating wildly, clearly agitated. Large bulges in their jackets outlined their not so-concealed weapons.
Shay spun into the hallway and put both men down before they’d even realized what was happening. She continued toward the second stairwell. The door opened, and Lily stepped through, panting.
Lily looked at Shay, fear in her gray eyes. “We’re screwed.”
The tomb raider shook her head. “No, we’re doing great, kid. I grabbed the artifacts. We just have to complete the exit plan, and we’re good.”
“You don’t understand.” The teen swallowed. “I just had a vision. Tons of guys are coming. Demon Generals and Mafia from the looks of it.”
“Peyton? Lily said she just had a vision of reinforcements. What the hell? I thought you said they couldn’t communicate.”
Peyton groaned. “Yeah, one of the drones just spotted a bunch of SUVs and cars on the way, coming damned fast.”
“How many vehicles?”
“Enough that I think you’ll run out of ammo if you tried to take on all those guys.” Peyton sighed. “There’s no way they got a message through. I was even monitoring our frequency for other encrypted traffic.”
Shay frowned and shook her head. “Then they somehow knew we were gonna raid tonight. Maybe one of the tunnel kids ratted us out.”
Lily glared at her. “None of them would sell us out.”
Shay shrugged. “Just considering the options. If not… Shit.” She scrubbed a hand down her face. “That damned elf must have placed a phone call. He was playing both sides. Doesn’t matter now. We stick to the plan and get the hell out of here from above.”
She rushed past Lily into the stairwell, and the teen spun on her heel to follow. They all but flew up the last few flights.
The tomb raider reached for the roof door, but Lily jumped and pulled Shay down.
“What the hell are—” the tomb raider began.
Bullets ripped through the roof access double doors. A dozen holes decorated both doors a moment later.
“Oh.” Shay blinked. “Good vision timing there.”
Lily grinned. “I try.”
“Stay low. Can you tell me what we’ve got?”
The teen took a deep breath. “Four guys, three on the left and one on the right.”
Time to do this. They don’t have their reinforcements yet.
“Okay, stay low.” Shay crept over to the door and reloaded. “One…two…three.” She threw open the door.
The crack of pistols and rifles echoed in the night. Bullets whizzed over her head. Two Demon Generals stood on the left, both with handguns, and one tall Russian mobster holding a rifle. A smiling man in an expensive suit stood on the right with a rifle in hand.
Shay didn’t give herself time to register any other details before she jerked her pistol up and snapped off two shots at the first man on the left. Three quick moves of her hand and shots later, all four lay on the ground.
She stood and rushed toward the groaning men. Without any hesitation, she put bullets in their heads.
Lily blinked a few times at the dead men. “Wow.”
“This is what it means sometimes,
