Blood and Bone: (Royal Blood #6) Read Online Free PDF Page A

were, I got out my phone and tapped in a message, my hands shaking. Lorelei needs to get out of here before the emergency services arrive . Turning the screen to him, he nodded again and took the phone from me.
    His message was simple. The cottage .
    I nodded and deleted the text. X pointed to me, then to Jackson, then to himself and Lorelei. He’d take care of her, and I’d take care of him.
    He turned to Lorelei and scooped her emancipated body into his arms before pushing to his feet and disappearing into the haze.
    “Jackson,” I said, my voice still muffled. My hearing was starting to come back, but that god-awful ringing was still there.
    His hand came down on my shoulder as he climbed to his feet. Wobbling, he leaned against the wall and wiped the dust from his face. His forehead was bright with blood, the color looking odd against the ashen color of his skin.
    He stumbled forward, making his way toward the place where Section Seven used to be.
    “ Jackson, wait! ” I called out as I scurried to my feet, but he didn’t stop. Following his path, I climbed over a pile of rubble and came to a halt, my gaze colliding with what was left of the Section Seven headquarters.
    I felt sick.
    Jackson’s mouth fell open, and he began to shake as he stared at the destruction. “ What …”
    Most of the building had come down, the insides of the east wall still intact with filing cabinets and desks perched precariously over the smoking crater. It was a full-scale war zone.
    The work day had been well under way, the offices full of agents and clerks going about their jobs, sacrificing their happiness for the greater good… There had to have been two hundred people in there.
    I was too late. I couldn’t save them.
    Color and beauty, color and beauty, color and beauty …
    Sirens wailed in the background as the cavalry swarmed toward us. I reached out for something to hold onto before I fell and found Jackson’s hand.
    “A kebab saved my life,” he declared. “ A fucking kebab. ”

Chapter 4

X
    L ater , Mercy told me about the hole that once housed Section Seven.
    Thinking about Mei, I began to regret the way I’d taken advantage of her since I’d come back into her life. She was gone, but so were a lot of other people. No one from my old life, apart from Jackson, still drew breath. The deeper I went into my existence as an agent, the more of my old self I lost. Oliver Cassel was dead in name, but his soul still clung onto that of Xavier Blood, trying to co-exist with the monster. I’d always tried to be one or the other, but in recent months, I’d attempted to be a mixture of both.
    Seemed like I was destined to be X after all. What a fucking way to find out.
    Mei … She didn’t deserve her end. Moltke would pay one way or another.
    I sent Lorelei to the cottage in Exeter on the proviso she made herself scarce once she was well enough to travel. Then I executed the back door protocol that would take me into MI6 headquarters where I found Mercy waiting for me.
    She wrapped her arms around me and sank against my chest, oblivious to the commotion around us. The office was in full throttle in the wake of the bombing. Screens were alive with news reports and images of the rubble that used to be an office block in the financial district of East London known as the City.
    “Okay?” Mercy asked, wanting to know if Lorelei was away safely. The last thing we needed was her embroiled in this and unable to get to Vaughn.
    “Okay.”
    I glanced up as a suit tapped me on the shoulder and gestured for us to follow him through the office. He was a tall guy, probably in his mid-thirties with short, cropped black hair and a no bullshit look about him. He had to be a high-ranking agent of some kind…and our contact in the event of Section Seven’s demise.
    MI6 had a protocol for every possible scenario, even their black ops divisions, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they had one for leaving your desk to take a shit.
    As we