Free The Merzetti Effect (A Vampire Romance) by Norah Wilson

in the way their voices bounced off the walls. How was a helicopter going to get them out of this cave?
    A man detached himself from the shadows, a pair of helmets in hand. “Fuelled up and ready to go, boss.”
    Eli! A pang of guilt pierced her. She’d forgotten all about him in the headlong rush to escape the bombardment above.
    “Oh, thank goodness, Eli! You made it out.”
    “Yes, ma’am. Now put this helmet on. We’ve gotta strap in, pronto.”
    She accepted the helmet, but before she could put it on, the floor beneath her feet started to vibrate. Her gaze flew to Delano, who pointed upward. She glanced up to see the ceiling above them sliding open, exposing cold pinpoints of starlight in the pre-dawn sky. A retractable roof!
    She should have been relieved that an escape route had opened up, but all she felt was scared and confused. Who was Delano Bowen to command these resources? More importantly, who was he to attract a military-style attack on his house? “I don’t understand this. I don’t understand any of it.”
    “I’ll explain later. But trust me, we have to get out of here, and we have to do it quickly.”
    Her answer was to jam the helmet on.
    Minutes later, she finished strapping herself into the seat Delano indicated. He and Eli sat up front. Even before their seatbelts were fastened, they’d run through an ultra-rapid pre-flight check. Then Eli powered up the engines. Faster than she would have imagined possible, the beast lifted smoothly off the ground.
    Ainsley squeezed her eyes shut. She would have characterized herself as a comfortable flyer, but one glance at the cavern walls closing in on them as the craft ascended convinced her that this was one takeoff she was better off not watching.
    “It’s okay.”
    At the soothing sound of Delano’s voice inside her helmet, she opened her eyes.
    “Eli can fly this thing in his sleep, and it’s very maneuverable. Oh, and his helmet is equipped with night vision sensors. He can see like it’s high noon.”
    Good. That was all good. “What about the heat-seeking technology you mentioned?”
    “It won’t be a problem now that we’re inside the craft. It’s equipped with the latest in low-observable technology.”
    Dear Jesus, stealth technology? Wasn’t that restricted to military use? “This is a stealth helicopter? We’re invisible?”
    “Nothing is invisible, especially to the naked eye. But the craft is designed to minimize its radar signature and hide its heat signature. Once we’re away, we’ll be very hard to track.”
    “Yeah? Well, it’s the getting away part that has me concerned right now. They’ll be able to see us, won’t they? And hear us?”
    “Not to worry. I left them a little something to keep them preoccupied.”
    “Clear,” came Eli’s voice in her ear.
    She glanced out the window to see the lights of the city on the horizon, a scant three miles away. They were indeed clear of the cavern.
    “Time to give our visitors their present.”
    On cue, a spectacular explosion erupted perhaps a thousand yards away, tearing the west-facing, ivy-covered stone wall right out of Delano’s house. Flames leapt high into the air. In the orange illumination provided by the fire, debris drifted gracefully to the ground.
    Ainsley gasped, recognizing the corner of the house that had just been destroyed. “Your lab! Del, they blew up your lab!”
    “No, they didn’t. I did.”
    Just then, Eli nailed the accelerator, or whatever the equivalent of an accelerator was in a big-assed stealth helicopter, and they screamed off. In what seemed like a matter of seconds, they were racing along at what felt like an altitude of mere inches above the surface of the glittering river that bisected St. Cloud.
    He’d blown up his own lab? “Delano Bowen, you’ve got some explaining to do.”
    “More than you know. But I’m afraid it’s going to have to wait.”
    “No!” Her voice rose on a note of hysteria, which she clamped down on