Free Blood and Bone: (Royal Blood #6) by Amity Cross Page B

wrestled.
    “ Revenge ,” he spat, punching me in the stomach.
    The air was knocked from me, and I buckled, landing on one knee. Pain jarred through my leg and exploded through my face as his elbow collided with my nose.
    I was dazed for a split second, and when I pushed to my feet, it was right into the path of Moltke’s gun. He pressed the muzzle against my head, and I stared right into his eyes. If he was going to kill me, then he’d have to watch .
    “You’ll pay for what you did to Vesper,” he snarled.
    “You’re barking up the wrong tree,” I snapped. “I never laid eyes on your wife.”
    His gaze faltered. “Every arm of British Intelligence is to blame for her death.”
    It was that moment I realized Moltke’s end game. He was going to single-handedly dismantle every Military Intelligence agency throughout Britain and the world. He would pick us all off one by one if he had to. And for what? To avenge the supposed death of his wife? He’d never succeed…but he’d cause a lot of carnage and death.
    “Vesper was never found,” I said. “You were the one who almost got her killed by Tatau’s assassin. You’re fighting a pointless war .”
    “Oh, that’s where you’re wrong,” he replied, his lip curling. “Vesper suffered more than you’ll ever know. She’s dead, and you murdered her .”
    He was insane. Absolutely bloody insane.
    “You might kill me,” I said, knowing my end was inevitable, “but you’ll never get away with it, Moltke.”
    He laughed softly. “It’s much too late for that.”
    “You’ll pay for what you did to those people,” I snarled. “And for what you did to Mei.”
    “If it’s any consolation, she wasn’t meant to be there. That’s the consequence of being early, I suppose.”
    “Am I meant to feel sympathy for you?” I scoffed. “You’re a monster .”
    “Don’t worry, Folsom,” he murmured. “You’ll be seeing her real soon.”
    There was a boom that cut off as abruptly as it began…
    Then…
    Nothing.

Chapter 11

X
    O ur safe house was still secure when I arrived back from my midday rendezvous with the mystery woman.
    Mercy rose to her feet as I entered, and I supposed Jackson was there, but I only had eyes for her. Running my fingers over the red mark on her temple, she pulled away.
    “It’s nothing,” she murmured.
    “Nothing compared to Gruber,” Jackson said, raising his eyebrows.
    Mercy paled, and I glared at him. “Tact, Jackson.”
    “It was the way he died that gave me the creeps,” she said.
    “How?” I asked, ushering her back to the couch.
    “He tried to disengage the chemical from the firing mechanism,” she replied. “He spilled some on himself…” She glanced at Jackson.
    “We got some pretty useful data from their server,” he said.
    “The bomb?” I prodded.
    “That stuff was nasty,” he replied, scrolling through the data Mercy had retrieved. “I’ve never even heard of it before.”
    “What exactly was it?”
    “Their chemists called it Veltium-34,” Jackson explained. “It attacks the nervous system, then breaks down the base cells that make us, well… solid .”
    “It melted Gruber like he was an ice cube,” Mercy said, shivering.
    No wonder she was unsettled. I’d inflicted some extreme wounds on men before, but melting? That was a new kind of horror. My hand found Mercy’s and squeezed, the softer side of my combined personalities surfacing.
    “It looks like they’d developed it into a vapor,” Jackson went on. “It’s a particularly effective delivery system. It could be absorbed through the skin, breathed in, ingested, you name it.”
    “So they could’ve put it in the water supply?” I asked, and Jackson nodded.
    Mass genocide was what they had been capable of. Entire communities and countries could have been wiped out with that stuff. What the fuck was Moltke doing with a bomb like that?
    “Could they reproduce it?” Mercy asked. “Perhaps we should give the intel to