Chapter 10~
Infiltrating the party was easy. Disappearing is a piece of cake in a sea of teens wearing masks. Ed was right. The regent queen is making her way around the ballroom asking people if they've seen the royal twins. Everyone so far has said no, thank goodness. As soon as the queen tracks the princess back to the bathroom, she'll find Megrin's gown and know something's wrong.
"Megrin?" The queen calls and the princess' head swerves in her direction.
Ed spins Megrin around with one hand to cover the blunder and the princess plays along, hiding in plain sight on the edge of the dance floor. Carter and Petros are heading for the rear exit as casually as possible, a good plan if it wasn't for the regent queen headed their way.
"Carter, regent alert," I hiss into the comms unit as I rifle through the rich food on the refreshment table, trying to blend in.
I cast a casual glance over my shoulder in time to see Petros push Carter up against a pillar and plant a big one on her. Smooth. But effective. The queen walks right past them.
As soon as the queen ducks into the bathroom, Carter, Petros, Ed, Megrin and I sprint for the exit. The door shuts behind us and we start running as fast as humanly possible down the sloping hallway. Megrin pauses to take off her high heels and I stop too, but Ed pushes me.
"Go!" he shouts, so I keep running.
Suddenly our path is blocked by a group of four well-armed guards with good-sized guns. We screech to a halt. Carter glances at me, the message clear: Fight or flight? I'm not sure yet.
"Is this the way outside?" I ask in a floaty voice that suggests I may have had one too many glasses of wine. "Me and my friends just need some fresh air." I stumble for effect and Ed is there to support me, like I knew he would.
"I'm going to have to ask you to remove your masks," one of the guards says.
Carter, Ed and I remove our masks right away. With a dubious glance in our direction. Megrin and Petros start to do the same. I trigger the tranquilizer dart launchers in my sleeve and send two of the guards into an instant nap, while a well-aimed kick from Carter disarms one of the guards. Her steel-toed pump flies off of her foot and knocks the gun out of the hands of the last guard, then I stun them both before they have time to recover.
"Run!" I shout and the five of us take off down the hallway at breakneck speed.
Ed hears the gunfire before I do and shoves me to the ground. I hit the tile in time to see Petros push Carter and Megrin down as well. As we crawl towards the exit, I shoot as many darts backwards as possible.
There's a break in the fire. Hopefully my darts took out enough guards for now. We scramble to our feet again, never once slowing down. My feet hurt and my head is pounding, but there's no time to really process any of it.
We reach the exit door and Carter scrambles for the key.
"There's no time!" Ed yells as the footsteps pound behind us.
Carter rips off what looks like a small round tablet, yells "Take cover!," sticks it to the door and ducks as the door is blown open. We run through the smoking debris towards the waiting helicopter.
The helicopter blades slice the air and make enough noise to block out the sounds of the guns until an army of bullets whiz through my skirt past my bullet-proof undergarments and another one hits Petros in the arm. Petros stumbles and still the shots keep coming. Carter pulls out a pistol armed with tiny stun darts and shoots at the guards while Ed and I help the prince and princess into the helicopter.
Petros cradles his arm and grits his teeth as he slides all the way to the end of the tiny bench inside the helicopter, his face a mask of pain.
"It's gonna be okay," I promise. "We'll get you out of here in no time."
Ed gives Carter a boost, then jumps inside himself and reaches back to give me a hand up, just as the nearest guard grabs my ankle. I kick him off with a stiletto heel to the face. Ed and Carter drag me inside the helicopter and slam the door after me, slamming the door on my dress in the process. I wince as I hear the fabric tear, but it doesn't matter. We're all here and we're all safe.
The hardest part is over, I remind myself as we take off into the night. So why don't I feel like exhaling?