Wild Hunt - Kali Argent Page 0,34

a long time. When someone finally spoke, it was the last person he would have expected.

“The problem here is that you need two teams. One to fight the Hunters, and another to extract the prisoners.” Abby rose from her chair, though she was so petite, it hardly made a difference. “Clearly, we need another team.”

Cade didn’t even know why she was in the meeting. Even if they figured out a way to pull this off, it wasn’t as if she would be going into the camp with them.

“There is no other team.” Unwinding one arm from around Mackenna’s waist, he swept it out to the side. “This is it. We’re it.”

“The only team of Revenant,” she corrected without looking at him. “Look.” Sliding the map in front of her, she pointed to the big, red X where they’d marked the main building of the compound. “There’s a little service road about six miles to the west. Probably used by forest rangers. It won’t be easy, but you can access it from the north woods.”

Luca followed her finger across the map. “So, you’re saying we wait until the full moon, until the Wild Hunt.”

She nodded. “Getting into the building isn’t an option, so we wait. We have them bring the prisoners to us.”

Cade frowned as he listened to her speak. Since when had she become an expert in battle strategy? “That’s still only one piece of the puzzle. Where do you suppose we find another team to distract the Hunters while we’re leading injured and starving captives out of the wood?”

And why the fuck was he asking her?

She eyed him as she slid her finger south on the map. “Aspen. We’ll need to confirm, but I can almost guarantee the ski resorts have been turned into Coalition settlements.”

Since he had no idea what that had to do with anything, he just stared at her.

“If there’s anyone who hates Hunters more than the Revenant, it’s the Coalition,” she explained, her tone exasperated.

Then, every damn person in the room started nodding as if that made perfect sense. Hell, even Mackenna was bobbing her head.

“The enemy of my enemy is my friend,” Luca recited. “It could work.”

“And we what?” Cade demanded. “We just stroll into town and ask for their help?”

Flipping her golden hair over her shoulder, Abby smirked. “We persuade them.”

She still wasn’t making any damn sense. “How do you suppose we do that?”

“By sending in a distressed Gemini who just escaped a group of Hunters.” She flicked her wrist dismissively. “We’ll work out a script before then. The point is, we get the Coalition to take out the bad guys while we save the good guys.”

“All the prisoners are Gemini,” Roux said, drawing the attention of everyone in the room. “Why don’t we just tip off the Coalition and let them take it from there?”

She made a damn good point. The ARC guards wouldn’t hurt their own. Since none of the captives were human, they wouldn’t have anything to fear. Maybe the Revenant didn’t need to be involved at all.

But Abby was already shaking her head. “We run into the same problem we’d face if we tried to do it on our own. The Coalition can fight the Hunters or save the captives. They can’t do both.”

“It’s likely the prisoners would be executed as soon as the fighting started,” Luca elaborated. “Hunters wouldn’t risk them being freed and turning against them.”

“He’s right.” Mackenna sank deeper into Cade’s embrace when everyone turned to look at her. “There are vents in the basement they used to pump in sedatives. I heard one of the guards explaining to a new recruit that they could also be used to fill the room with poisonous gas in case the compound was ever attacked or infiltrated.”

“We’ll need to check out these service roads.” Luca carded his fingers through his hair as he surveyed the map once more. “Make sure they’re accessible by vehicle and that there aren’t any security patrols that far out.”

Deidra nodded. “I’ll take my team tonight.”

“I’ll take a team to check out the situation in Aspen.” Luca pushed to his feet and leaned forward to rest his palms on the table. “We have nine days until the full moon. Let’s figure out how to make this work.”

There was a lot of mumbled conversation as everyone filed out of the room, but none of it seemed to be in protest of the plan. Cade didn’t like the idea of involving the Coalition, but even he had