The lock on my door beeped, and my pulse stuttered. As the door swung open, I sprang off the bed, claws springing from my fingertips instinctively with a rush of adrenaline.
The guardian in the dim hall outside stared at me with a befuddled expression. Just behind him, I made out Griffin’s face, taut with strain.
It must have taken more energy than I could imagine for him to push so much emotion on the guardian that the man had felt compelled to unlock not just Griffin’s room but mine as well.
Now, I took over.
Before Griffin’s emotional control could slip, I sprang at the guardian.
One swipe of my hand knocked the helmet from the man’s head. My other fist whipped at his temple at just the right angle and power to knock him out.
Our jailers had trained us well. The guardian slumped to the floor with a thud of his ass and a faint groan.
One down, who knew how many more to go.
I heaved the man into the room and tore up my sheet with swift jerks of my inhumanly strong arms. One strip, I wrapped around the man’s mouth to gag him. With the others, I bound his wrists and ankles to the bedposts.
He wouldn’t stay unconscious for long, and when he woke up, I didn’t want him raising the alarm.
Griffin darted in after me and patted the man down. He grabbed the blue keycard and grimaced.
“He doesn’t have any of the other cards,” he said under his breath. Our friends needed green or red for the rooms on their respective floors.
I sucked in my breath with a hiss of frustration, but we’d known we might have that problem. Which was why we hadn’t set the plan into motion until we’d been sure of where the main control room was.
“Come on,” I said, and dashed out of my room.
No warning siren had gone off, which meant whoever was on security duty this late at night hadn’t noticed the altercation yet. We’d never made any trouble for our jailers, not in years and years.
Now the complacency we’d encouraged was working in our favor.
I hustled down the hall, only holding myself back so Griffin could keep up. We ran up the stairs to the floor just below ground level.
The moment I peeked out into the next hall and saw it was empty, I hurtled straight to the door to the control room.
I threw myself at the door with my full unnatural speed, smacking it with the entire side of my body. It flew off its hinges into the room as if hit by an explosion.
I ricocheted off the door and lunged at the solitary woman who had just whirled around in front of the array of displays and buttons.
She didn’t manage to get out more than a gasp. I punched her with the same force I’d used on the guardian downstairs, and she sagged across her chair like her bones had turned into beanbags.
Griffin caught up with me. We stared at the touchscreens together, my heart thumping fast with the sense of the seconds slipping away from us.
With a hitch of breath, he pointed. “There!”
One of the glass panes had an image on it that looked like a blueprint. I tapped at it and managed to flip through different floors.
Level 3. Dominic and Andreas had checked the numbers beside their doors and passed them on: 3-7 and 3-8.
I poked at the first, and a window popped up with various options. I jabbed again:Unlock door.
The screen requested fingerprint authorization. Swearing quietly, I hauled up the woman I’d toppled. Griffin leapt in to press her index finger against the circle on the screen.
The room flashed in the layout.Lock disengaged.
A jolt of exhilaration raced through my veins. We were really doing it.
I sped through the commands and the press of the woman’s finger: one, two, three times more. All the rooms open.