Another shot rang out.
Someone screamed as though they’d been hit and not silenced. A woman back-pedaled into the wall, grabbing her shoulder. Blood pumped out, and she cried out once more, red lips opened in fear.
A blackcoat, the likely target, had been standing nearby.
He turned and slipped deeper into the crowd.
“Not that way,” Lila said. “If Bullstow is here, they’ll have called in the family militias for support. The entire compound will be surrounded, and they’ll be rounding up everyone who climbs over the walls.”
Tristan hefted Dixon higher on his shoulder. “Where, then?”
“The tunnels under the estate. I know an entrance.” Lila led the group away from the chaos of the main battle, back through the lanes between the buildings, with Frank beside her and Dice bringing up the rear.
Half the mob still fought in between the factories. Fires raged around them. Rocks and wood sailed through the air. Alarms and sirens cut through the night sky.
Frank pulled her back from an angry man’s fist as they skirted too near a fight, and he kicked the man back into the crowd.
Seconds later, Frank stumbled, struck by a dart.
Dice scooped him up almost before he hit the ground, grunting under his weight.
The group pressed on, dodging the purview of the cameras. They advanced though the smoke, finally reaching fresh air and quiet a block away from the fires.
The men clumped closer together, wary of the empty buildings.
Lila led them to the center of the compound, to a rectangular brick building designed with little imagination and even a smaller amount of money. A golden sign had been posted above the door, marking it as the Wilson-Kruger mail facility.
“Frank’s going to be so pissed when he wakes up,” Dice said as the group stopped at the door. “He said if he ever got hit by another dart, he’d track down the asshole who did it and beat the shit out of them.”
“Good luck with that.” Lila kicked the touchpad, then cracked it open, pulling down her sleeves to cover her bloody fingers. She only hoped she wouldn’t leave any DNA behind. Sore fingers typed in a code.
There was a click as the door unlocked.
Fry yanked open the door, and they followed Lila inside the darkened building. She led them past a long counter with a half-dozen computer stations, screensavers twisting the Wilson family coat of arms around the screen. They dodged several islands, laden with packing boxes, weigh tables, and labels.
Lila brushed past it all, kicking over a stanchion and velvet rope that blocked access to a hallway. Mailboxes lined each side, boxes only large enough to hold a pair of slippers.
The group hurried to the end of the hall. Lila led them down a set of stairs and into the basement filled with boxes and signs and clutter.
“How do you know where to go?”
Lila ignored Tristan’s question and turned the last corner. They’d reached an iron door, which led into the tunnel system underneath the Wilson compound.
She wrapped her hands in her sleeves again and began working on the keypad.
Tristan heaved Dixon farther up his shoulder. Reaper’s gun peeked out from his front pocket within easy reach. “How long will it take you to—”
The door popped open.
“I thought you said Toxic was faster than you.”
“She would be if I had to brute-force it. Luckily, I know the back doors to most systems. Come on.”
Lila led them into tunnels, tunnels that Alex’s grandmother had dug eighty years before. It was shoddy work all around. The cement spanned only a meter in width, and the lights had been placed too far apart to be of much use. Cracks had been patched over many times. The whole system always made her nervous. It was like something out of a disaster flick. It wouldn’t take much for the tunnels to collapse.
“Rest a second,” she said once they were all inside. “I need to get my bearings.”
“Your bearings?” Tristan let Dixon slide to the damp stone floor of the tunnels. At some point during their exodus, he had passed out. A thin string of vomit ran down Tristan’s pants.