Chapter 7 - Blood and MoonlightVance’s voice echoed across the devastated library through a megaphone.
"Give it up, Hargrove! You're outgunned and outmatched! Drop your weapons and walk out into the courtyard, and maybe—just maybe—we'll let the girl live!"
Weston didn't answer with words. He signaled to Holly with a sharp hand gesture—standard military breaching signals that only elite combat veterans recognized.
Holly nodded once.
She vaulted over the desk, firing three rapid shots that took out the overhead chandeliers, plunging the library into sudden, chaotic darkness. Shouts of panic erupted from the Blackwood operatives as night-vision equipment flared green against the sudden gloom.
In the dark, Weston moved like a phantom. He closed the distance to the nearest mercenary, disarmed him with a brutal elbow strike to the throat, and used the man’s body as a shield against a burst of submachine gun fire.
Across the room, Holly was a blur of motion. She neutralized two more operatives in silent, ruthless succession, her tactical training from Project Chimera shining through every calculated strike.
Vance cursed loudly in the dark, firing blindly toward the center of the room. "Flush them out! Burn the damn house down if you have to!"
Flames sparked as a stray incendiary round caught the heavy drapery near the shattered window, licking hungrily up the velvet curtains toward the wooden rafters.
Weston lunged behind the marble pillar where Vance was reloading his weapon. With a crushing tackle, Weston slammed Vance against the stone, sending the enforcer's gun skittering across the floor.
"It ends here, Vance," Weston growled, pressing his forearm against Vance’s windpipe with bone-crushing pressure.
Vance coughed, a bloody, desperate laugh escaping his lips. "You think... you think I'm the head of the snake, Weston? Look at your security monitors... look at who authorized our entry code!"
On the broken wall console that still flickered with emergency power, the master security log flashed a green confirmation override.
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The code hadn't come from Tristan.
It had come from the master console inside the east wing nursery.
