Courts and Cabals by G.S. D'Moore (best e reader for academics txt) 📕

the sizeable pool of jizz on the ground, and strode down the hill and out of Aveena’s room.

She’d likely just made the situation worse, but she couldn’t help herself. Aveena was a fucking bitch sometimes, and any time she could bring her down to size, she’d take it.

Chapter 22

Vernon growled as repetitive booms cut through the midafternoon air. “Cover fire!” he yelled.

“That machine gun is killing us,” he peaked up over the car he was using as a shield, and caught some asphalt debris to the face. He swiped at it with a massive paw as he withdrew behind cover.

The FBI tactical team he was assigned to leaned out from where they were scattered across a city block and returned fire. They were all equipped with M4 semi-automatic rifles capable of firing one-or-three round bursts. They were the same weapons the US Army infantry was equipped with, and normally could handle anything a wannabe gangster, or pissed off vampire, could throw at them.

Not today. Today, the rogue coven of vampires was ready. Vernon was confident there’d been a leak. Internal Affairs was going to need to figure out who fucked up, because there was no way a bunch of vamps should have gotten their hands on a pair of M240 Bravos and set them up directly on the joint task force’s avenue of approach. In the process, they’d turned a block of downtown Seattle into a fucking war zone.

Despite the gunfight going on ten minutes, civilians were still screaming as Seattle PD tried to move the unlucky ones outside the hasty perimeter.

“Those guns gotta go,” an armored mage stated as more, heavy 7.62 caliber rounds smashed into their improvised cover.

“No shit, sherlock,” Vernon bit back his retort.

He’d already been hit with several of the heavy rounds during their initial approach. Back when they thought they had the element of surprise on their side. His armor’s wards held, but there were several burned out patches of fabric across his body. If he got hit there again, he had to hope good old Kevlar could do the job.

He was fully shifted now, just like every other shifter in the assault force, which was doing more harm than good. His hulking form was hard to hide behind the compacts Seattle’s eco-conscious citizens preferred to drive. Hell, he could probably throw the damn car at the machine gun nest.

“Here’s the plan,” Vernon wasn’t in tactical command but they needed to move. Movement was life. It didn’t matter if they went left, right, up, or down; they needed to be anywhere but here. “Everyone is going to pop smoke,” he unhooked the color-coded grenade from his tactical vest. “Johnson,” he pointed to the Caeli mage, “you move this shit right up in their faces and hold it there. I don’t want them to be able to see the vamp sitting next to them, much less us.”

The mage nodded, and Vernon felt a tingle in his mind as the air started to act unnaturally. Johnson was a mid-strength mage, and he needed time to bend the air currents to his will.

“We’ll bound up by team, and get our asses through the front door,” Vernon pointed to the big man-bear shifter cradling an automatic shotgun. “Blow the hinges and kick that fucker in.”

The bear gave a toothy grin. If he was anything like Vernon, he was tired of this sitting-around chicken shit.

“On three,” Vernon counted them down, pulled the pin, and tossed his grenade.

They didn’t go boom like fragmentary or flash-bangs; it was more of a pop hiss, but a dozen of them started spewing thick gray fog into the air. The air caught it, contained it, and started to push it toward the two machine guns nests. The vamps had placed their heavy weapons perfectly, so they had interconnected fields of fire and could support each other. That also meant they were close enough that the Caeli mage could hit them both at once.

The firing became more erratic for a second as the vamps tried to blast the incoming smoke, but when they realized it wasn’t harmful, the rate of fire dropped to nothing.

“Alpha team, move!” Vernon ordered, as he leapt over the car and dashed forward. He had his Colts in both hands, and probably looked a little ridiculous compared to the armored men with M4s.

Half a dozen men and women burst from cover and headed for the door. They were about a block away, but only made it halfway before the machine guns opened up again.

“Please don’t tell me they have thermals,” Vernon prayed as he dove into an alley. Vamps getting military-grade heavy weapons was one thing, but thermal sights should have been just as, or more, tightly controlled.

The fire lasted for a few seconds, and his prayers were answered. They were probing shots. The vamps couldn’t actually see them. “Alpha set, Bravo, go!” he ordered, and poked his pistols around the solid brick corner. The other half-dozen members of the tactical unit rushed forward, passed alpha team, and made it all the way to the door.

“Breech, we’ll cover you,” Vernon ordered. The faster they were in the building, the quicker they could end this.

The heavy booms of the bear-shifter’s shotgun rang out, and seconds later, the machine guns opened up. They didn’t have an angle directly at the door, but they knew what the federal team was up to. Their fire raked back and forth across the street, and Vernon barely ducked behind the wall before bullets smacked into the brick corner.

“Things are getting interesting,” he grinned.

“Breeching!” the bravo team leader informed.

A second later, a giant rip-boom cut through the hectic battlespace. Then people started screaming. “Silver claymore!” a pained and dying voice gurgled through the communications net . . . and then nothing.

“Fuck!” Vernon peaked out from behind cover.

Most of bravo team