Head Down (The Valens Legacy Book 4) Read online

  Head Down

  Published by Jan Stryvant

  Copyright 2017 Jan Stryvant

  Copyright Jan Stryvant 2017

  Cover Credits: eBook Launch (http://ebooklaunch.com/)

  No part of this eBook may be reproduced in any form without expressed, written consent from the author. The material in this story may feature graphic depictions of a sexual or adult nature and is intended for a mature audience only. All characters in this story are fictional and of the legal age of consent for any activities they engage in. Any resemblance between characters, places, or things in this story and people living or dead, actual places, or events, is purely coincidental. It's fiction, I made it up.

  License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be copied and given away, or copied and sold, to other people. Got that? No copying, please! If you would like to share this book with another person, it would be really nice if you purchased an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use, then please consider purchasing your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  #70220

  Jan Stryvant Books:

  The Valens Legacy

  Black Friday Book 1

  Perfect Strangers Book 2

  Over Our Heads Book 3

  Head Down Book 4

  Shadow

  Table of Contents

  Probing

  Pleasant Conversations

  Real Life Realities

  Much to Do...

  The Devil You Know

  Sorceress Guild

  Hyena Days

  Guild Workshop

  Alliances

  Take Me Down

  Fellowship Meeting

  Crossing Paths

  There's a New Sheriff in Town

  See a Man About a Dog

  Back Home

  Wednesday

  Preparations

  Cat and Mouse

  Before the Storm

  Friend of the Devil

  Inside the Storm

  Fellowship Meeting, Friday

  Dream a Little Dream

  Saturday Morning

  Afterword and Recommendations

  Probing

  The team approached the building from the northeast corner. There wasn't much in the way of surveillance that seemed apparent, and their earlier reconnaissance had led them to believe that it was unguarded.

  Walking along, they appeared to be nothing more than just a few young men out for a night of drinking. The two couples coming from the opposite direction also didn't seem to be anything out of the ordinary. There were still some cars going up and down the streets, while the shops along the road had been closed for a couple of hours now, there were still enough people on the street for them to blend in, and being early April, it was still cool enough for the jackets that they were wearing.

  Just as the first group was passing the entrance to the alleyway leading to the back of the building, the sounds of a car spinning its tires, followed by a loud air horn, and then the sounds of two cars hitting each other disrupted the usual calm of the night.

  All three of the young men immediately ducked into the alleyway, flattening against the wall as they pulled their jackets off, exposing the holsters and weapons underneath, worn over urban camouflage pattern hoodies. Dropping the jackets they pulled up the attached hoods to cover their heads. Now looking more like the irregular brown pattern of the concrete blocks the building was made of, they continued down the alleyway, staying pressed back against the wall as they moved, until they came to the flat metal door with the 'Do Not Block' and 'Not an Entrance' signs on it.

  One of the young men slapped two pieces of what looked like silly-putty onto the door where the hinges most likely were, while a second put a third piece over where the lock would be.

  The third young man ran wires with small caps on the ends to all three places then they all flattened back against the wall as the sounds of a loud argument could be heard coming from the scene of the 'accident'. Then the slamming of a door and then the starting of a loud, now unmuffled engine.

  At the first sound of the engine the third man triggered the charges, all three wincing at the noise as one of them pulled out a flatbar and pried the door open.

  All three were immediately met with a hail of gunfire as they charged inside the doorway, each falling to the ground as they took multiple hits, which were then followed up by both taser shots, and entangling nets as they thrashed on the floor, their bodies trying to heal the gunshot wounds, as the electrical charges caused their muscles to spasm out of control.

  Meanwhile, the two couples on the street had been watching the argument between the two drivers with amusement, when one got into his car and drove off rather noisily due to a ruined exhaust pipe they had started walking again.

  Ignoring the sounds of the small explosion in the alley, they had continued on past the front doors of one of the shops with a 'for rent' sign on it.

  As the muted sounds of gunfire suddenly filled the air however, they moved as one up to the door, one of the women quickly picking the lock, as the other woman and the two men drew weapons. Moving inside as soon as the door was opened, they closed and locked it behind them. Taking off their coats exposed AR-15's strapped to each of their backs, folded in half at the forward receiver pin to make them easier to hide.

  Each of them took a rifle off the back of the other, unfolded the rifle, and set the rear pin. Putting a thirty-round magazine into the rifle, they each charged their weapons and took the safeties off.

  The women then pulled night vision goggles out of their pocketbooks, along with several grenades that they distributed to the two men. Looking at a map on his smartphone, one of the men took the lead and started them through the empty business space, to a back door that led deeper into the building.

  Stopping a moment the leader listened to the door. Hearing nothing he motioned the woman who had picked the first lock forward. Ten seconds later the door was unlocked, and she returned to the end of the line.

  Moving through the darkened building carefully in a line, each with a hand on the back of the one in front of them, they started for the staircase that lead upstairs, still undetected. The lead man checked the staircase for any signs of alarms or traps, then signaling the 'all clear' he slowly started up it, leading with his weapon.

  Just as he reached the top of the stairs, all hell broke loose. Two werewolves with suppressed submachine-guns opened fire from the far end of the hall, dropping the first man, and causing the three behind him to fall flat to the floor. The second man quickly pulled out one of the grenades and pulling the pin, he flung it down the hallway, where it went off with a loud pop.

  Peeking up over the top of the stairway landing, he saw both of the werewolves were down. Checking his buddy, who was dead, he grabbed his two grenades and pulling the pin on one of them, he flung that down the hallway, just as a second pair of werewolves came out of a side door, catching them both with the grenade as well.

  Gun forward he charged up the stairs now, any pretense at stealth having been long discarded, shooting at anything that moved as he charged for the next staircase, both women hot on his heels.

  He died before he got to it, cut down by a werewolf with a knife that popped out of a side door.

  The werewolf found himself suddenly facing two female werewolves, both armed with magical weapons, having dropped their AR-15's to hang from the straps. As he fell to the floor, contorting into a ball, the two female werewolves charged the stairs. The one in the back stumbled and fell as she was hit in
the back with a dart of some kind, which caused her back muscles to seize and her legs to become unresponsive.

  The last werewolf made it to the top of the stairs, only to run into the biggest damn werelion she'd ever seen in her life. Before she could even raise her weapon he just pointed at her and said, "Freeze."

  She froze, rooted in place.

  The lion pulled out a radio and spoke into it.

  "Are the borders secure?"

  "We're working on it," came the reply.

  "How many have we caught?"

  "Oak says you got them all."

  "Exercise terminated. Bring the lights up, and check on everyone."

  Sean waved a hand at the female werewolf, who suddenly unfroze.

  "That wasn't very fair," Silver complained.

  Sean laughed, "Like stacking two female werewolves behind the two 'human' attackers was?"

  "We're supposed to cheat!" Silver grumped and turning went down the staircase to check on Cinnamon, the female werewolf who had been bringing up behind her.

  "Yeah well, we aren't going to be playing fair on defense either. Still, that was a good job making it to the third floor. I'm impressed. I'm also a little pissed."

  "At who?" Silver asked, worried as she bent over to pull the dart out of Cinnamon's back. Her metabolism would probably eat up the toxin in fairly short order.

  "Hunter and Sten. They swore up and down that no one would make it to the third floor."

  "Blame Demon, that boy has a seriously warped and devious mind," Silver laughed.

  Sean nodded and went down to the second floor, where the 'dead' werewolves were looking at their paint-covered fur, more than a little unhappy with that development. He took a moment to 'unlock' Hoffen, the werewolf who'd gotten hit with the 'cramps' spell and checked on Woz, the werewolf playing a human, who'd gotten knifed.

  "How are the three on the ground floor?" Demon asked from the stairway, where he'd been 'killed.'

  "They're good. Oak says they'll be in the debrief with the rest of us."

  "Okay. See you there in five I guess."

  "So, how'd the debrief go?" Jolene asked Sean, who was now back in his human form, as he entered their third floor room along with Roxy and Daelyn.

  Daelyn laughed, "I think they were just a tiny little bit upset with Demon for breaking the rules."

  "Really?"

  Sean snorted, "Until I told them that breaking the rules was the first damn rule."

  "Yeah," Roxy agreed nodding. "You'd have thought they would have realized that our enemies aren't going to be following any rules. Hunter now wants to lead the next exercise, with Demon running defense."

  "Isn't Demon his second?" Jolene asked looking surprised.

  "Not anymore," Sean chuckled. "I put him under Oak, he's now in charge of building defense. For all that he and Hunter seem to be really close, there seems to be a lot of one-upmanship going on between the two of them."

  "Is that healthy?"

  Sean shrugged, "Oak told me not to worry about it, said that their natural competitiveness will work to our benefit in getting everyone used to the new situation."

  "Well if you say so," Jolene said with a shrug. "Which leads me to ask, what are our plans?"

  "Hmm?" Sean asked dropping into a chair, leaning back and relaxing.

  "Are we going to live here? Or somewhere else? This place is pretty open, and I don't think it's going to take that long for the local councils to figure out that a new pack of wolves has suddenly moved into a building downtown."

  "Claudia from the eastern packs has let it be known that the Western Packs had a bit of a shuffle, and that a group has split off to go it on their own here in Reno, now that Michael has stepped down and they're looking for a new leader."

  "Think they'll buy that?"

  Sean shrugged, "Claudia said that like any human organization, things happen, and for lycans it's really not all that different."

  "Why'd he step down, anyways?"

  "Sean growled at him," Roxy laughed.

  "Really?" Jolene asked, looking at Sean.

  Sean sighed, "Let's just say that my lion and he had a few words."

  'And I'm still waiting for you to tell me what those words were,' Sean said internally to his lion.

  'I just told him I didn't like his attitude,' his lion said back, coyly.

  'Right, sure,' Sean said back. 'For someone who is supposed to be a part of me, you sure don't act like it.'

  'Really? How can you even say such a thing?'

  'Because I'm a way better liar than you are. I'm not pushing, now, but....'

  Sean noticed his lion didn't respond to that. He'd have to sit down with Roxy at some point, in private, and ask about this behavior. He thought his lion was supposed to be him, yet here he was acting like somebody else.

  "So you don't think they'll suspect we're here?" Jolene continued, not noticing Sean's momentary distraction.

  "Eventually they will, and by then I hope we're past the worst of it and too well dug in for them to do anything about it," Sean said. "We are in a relatively populated area in the heart of the downtown now, so any kind of major attack is going to bring the kind of attention that the mages really don't want. For now, we'll do everything we can to not be seen around here, and yeah, we'll probably spend some time away from here, just to help throw off any suspicions."

  "Does that mean going back to the bomb shelter?"

  "I don't think so," Sean shook his head, "as far as anyone knows; only Wilston and his two dead cronies knew where it was. They had the tracking device and followed it to where we were, but even with that, I'd rather not chance it."

  "True, but we should do something to make sure that Wilston doesn't set up shop there, now that he's gotten away," Daelyn pointed out.

  Sean nodded; it was a good point, "Well, I'm for bed, who's with me?"

  "Tired already?" Roxy teased.

  "Who said anything about sleep?" Sean replied with a wink.

  The next morning after breakfast, Daelyn corralled Roxy and Jolene as Sean went upstairs to his desk to work.

  "What's up, Dae?" Roxy asked.

  "I think we should grab a bunch of our guys and go secure that bunker we were living in. Oak told me he cleaned out the bodies, and by now the smell of all the stuff that burnt up shouldn't be too bad."

  "Worried that someone else might move into it?" Jolene asked.

  "That and I think it's still a pretty safe place. Only one person knows where it is, and the extra space wouldn't hurt. That place could hold fifty, easily."

  Roxy nodded in agreement, "We could talk to Oak about getting one or two of the beta teams set up there for now, and I could call up Sean's friend John and have him setup a bunch of security on the place like he did here.

  "We're still the only ones that know about the emergency exit and where it comes out, so even if that Wilston guy comes back, an assault team or two could deal with him easily."

  "You two seem to know what needs doing," Jolene said. "What do you need me for?"

  "Magic," Daelyn said. "You can check to make sure no one else has messed with it."

  "Besides," Roxy added with a smirk, "if we leave you here all alone, you'll probably go upstairs and spend the rest of the morning distracting Sean!"

  "We have been doing a lot of that lately, haven't we?" Jolene giggled.

  "Yes, we have," Daelyn agreed. "Now, let's go find Oak."

  They found Oak down in his small office on the first floor going over security with Demon.

  "What can I help you with?" Oak asked as they stepped inside.

  "We want to go clean out the bunker and re-occupy it," Daelyn told him.

  "So we need a work crew," Roxy added. "I've called up Sean's friend, John. He's going to meet us out there to set up security cameras and alarms for it."

  Daelyn nodded, "We think you should put a team or two in there, to keep it secure and under our control. Wilston is the only one still alive who knows about it, right?"r />
  Oak had to agree with that, "I doubt he told anyone when he got back, but even if he had, Roger and Charles are dead now, and they would have been the only ones who knew. Let me roust Granite's and Roy's teams. They haven't had much to do lately, they can go do the grunt work and help John set up.

  "When it's done, I'll have them alternate watching the place, so there's always a team there."

  "Sounds good! Have them meet us by the van over at Steve's place. We can all borrow a couple of cars and all drive down together."

  "What about the shop's truck?" Oak asked.

  Daelyn sighed, "I need to work on that still, and a truck isn't going to carry a team around. We're going to need to get another van."

  "We can look at vans on the way back," Roxy said. "Oak, just have them meet us at Steve's, we'll worry about the rest later."

  "Okay!"

  "Ugh, this place still stinks," Roxy said as they came down into the bunker. Bringing up behind them were the twelve members of both Granite's and Roy's teams, along with a half dozen females from the shop as well. Roxy suspected that a few of those gals had their sights set on some of the men in the group.

  Now that the rules about only alpha team members being able to have mates were no more, a lot of the women and men were starting to hook up. She'd have to talk to Sean at some point about increasing the number of women in the building. Right now it was a two to one ratio of men to women, and that would probably cause problems eventually.

  "I think that's the mattress in our bedroom," Jolene said sniffing the air. "I wonder if it burned up, or just melted?"

  "Burned I hope, if it's melted, we'll have to chisel it out," Daelyn groaned.

  "What do you mean 'we,' Kemosabe?" Roxy laughed, and pointed to the wolves coming down the stairs and into the room, "That's their job. We're just here to supervise!"

  Daelyn made an 'oh' with her mouth. "You're right, I forgot. Well, let's check the place out and see what shape it's all in, and what needs to be cleaned up."

  "I'll start with the kitchen," Jolene said, "I've ruined enough of 'em, I know how to clean them up."