“These guys won’t stay down forever,” Elena said. “Retreat it is.” She looked both ways, then pointed in our direction. “Go that way and—”

Two shots from inside the meeting room. The door crashed open, falling off its hinges. A guard inside started firing. We dove for cover. A yelp from inside the room. Then a grunt. I couldn’t see through the doorway, but Lucas hit someone with a spell. Clay barreled in. I followed and saw Sean getting up off a guard caught in Lucas’s binding spell. Clay knocked the guard out.

“We have to go,” Sean said, running toward us. “Now.”

I looked around. Josef had left, presumably through the rear door. There were medics tending to the blinded guards, and one was bent over Thomas’s body. Sean gave one last look at his grandfather, then pulled his gaze away and straightened.

“We have to go,” he repeated. “Josef will call in every guard in the city to make sure we don’t leave this building.”

“We need to split up,” Elena said. “Clay and I will take Savannah.”

“Good,” Sean said. “Smaller groups will attract less attention.” He took out his key card and handed it to me. “Use this. All-access pass.”

“But you need—”

“I can get us out. You’re the one they really want to stop.”

He quickly told us the safest route. Then we took off through the rear exit.

ELENA

Elena tried to brush a loose lock of hair from her face, only to find that it was plastered there by blood. Damn it. She touched her forehead and found the spot. Just a cut. There likely would be a few more war wounds joining it by morning—bumps and bruises and aches—but nothing serious. She glanced back at Clay. He was rubbing his right arm. The old zombie scratch acting up, as it always did after a fight. Otherwise, he seemed fine. Good. Now, to get them all to safety.

Yet another mission gone to hell. That seemed to be par for the course these days. Damn the Cabals. Damn Benicio, too. Especially Benicio. Oh, sure, just walk into Nast headquarters. Tell them she wanted to watch the proceedings. So what if they’re a rival Cabal? So what if she is a werewolf? So what if they’d taken Savannah captive on a trumped-up charge of treason. There were rules about these things and the Nasts would follow the rules and let her in.

Bullshit.

Why is it when things go to hell, people still expect others to follow the rules? Any werewolf knows better. When it comes down to raw survival, rules are the first thing to go. It’s teeth and claws and every wolf for himself and his Pack. The Nasts would protect their own, and they’d made it very clear that Savannah was not one of their own.

Damn Benicio. Damn herself, too, for listening to him. Hadn’t she learned her lesson after that colossal fuck-up at the warehouse? When Savannah and Eve wanted to infiltrate the group, Elena hadn’t liked it. But after consulting with Jeremy, she agreed that the risks were acceptable, as long as they got in and out as fast as possible.

Then Savannah texted to say they were joining a mission to Atlanta. When Clay heard that, his reaction eloquently summed up Elena’s own. Hell, no. It wasn’t just a gut reaction this time. It was experience. As Alpha-elect, she knew a few things about leadership, and if this Giles was letting new recruits join a critical mission, he was panicking. A dangerous situation. Lucas had to pull them out now. Adam agreed wholeheartedly.

Elena knew she could have persuaded Lucas … if she’d been able to get in touch with him. But she was only able to reach Benicio, and he’d brushed off her concerns and then it was too late to intervene.

And now they were here, running for their lives, as the Nast Cabal imploded around them.

Elena bustled Savannah through the board room to the rear door. She put her ear to it. Booted feet thudded down the main hall. Someone yelled, “The stairs! They’re taking the stairs!”

“Are you sure?” someone else called. “Those ones are locked.”

“I’m sure. There’s a burned hole where the handle used to be.”

Savannah whispered, “Decoy damage.”

In other words, Adam had burned it intentionally, to make everyone think they’d gone that way. Good.

When the guard’s footfalls faded, Elena nudged Savannah through the door, then glanced back at Clay. They’d been together so long that’s all it took—a glance. He mouthed “Go on.” She nodded and led Savannah as he hung back to guard the rear.

They rounded the corner. Ahead was a stairwell, the sign warning Authorized Use Only.

“That’s it,” Savannah murmured.

“Good, we’ll—” Elena caught the sound of boots climbing the steps. “Shit!”

She glanced at Clay, thirty feet back, and waved for him to duck into a room as she jogged to the nearest closed door. She put her ear to the door, then slowly twisted the knob. Behind her, Savannah bounced impatiently, those footfalls on the stairs now close enough for her to hear.

“If it’s locked, I can probably cast—”

The door opened. Savannah nudged her, whispering to hurry, the guards were coming. Elena turned to tell her to cool it—she had to check the room first—but someone in the stairwell said, “Through here, sir?” and Savannah gave her a shove, knocking her through the doorway.

“Sorry,” she whispered, as Elena recovered.

Savannah turned to close the door behind them, and as she did, Elena caught a scent that made her brain short-circuit for just a second, telling her the impossible—that Jeremy was here, when she knew he was two thousand miles away in Miami.

“Don’t close that door completely,” a voice said. “It locks from the inside.”

Elena spun. They were in what looked like a staff lounge. The lights were dim and at first all she saw was a figure rising from a chair. That scent wafted around the room. Not Jeremy—she could tell that now—but smelling like him, that rich sandal-wood scent she knew so well. There was another familiar aspect to the scent, too. The distinct musky smell of a werewolf.

The man stepped forward into the dim light as her eyes adjusted. He was a little taller than Elena, with a muscular build. Black, silver-threaded hair. Blue eyes. In the eyes, she saw nothing she recognized. But when her gaze moved back to take in the whole of the man, her heart stopped. Just stopped and she stood there, frozen, as every hair on her body rose.