For the longest second, I stare at the four men and silently weigh my options. Their formation blocks the opening where the glass doors leading to the plunge pool are folded shut.
“Can I pack a few things first?” I take a cautious step sideways to the disguised gun cabinet.
“Don’t move!” The closest man to me advances. He snares my wrist and yanks hard. I stumble, hitting against his bulletproof vest. “Say goodbye to this life. Nothing will be the same for you after today.”
A whirlwind temper unravels within me. Nausea squeezes my stomach until I feel like vomiting, but without a gun, I’m at their mercy. A hexed, half-dressed prisoner in the middle of the ocean. These are the stereotypical thugs whom I despise the most. Selfish goons who only act upon orders rather than think for themselves.
I summon all the venom from my past misfortunes and violently shirk my arm to wrangle free, but his viselike grip chokes my fragile bones, ready to snap them into irreparable pieces.
“Get the fuck off me,” I say, my tone freezing with indignation.
In a bid to catch him off guard, I bob low and when I rise a second later, my opposite hand sails through the air and smacks his steely jaw. Without a thought, he slaps me back in retaliation. His mocking timbre hides in the darkness of my whirling mind and when he forces me to break André's number one rule, I’m triggered.
Panic lifts my lungs with every quick inhalation, the shortness of my breath making me light-headed and desperate. The vicious demon in my soul spurs on every frantic thrash and riotous strike. My nails scrape and claw at his eyes, the frenzied attack on him dragging his mask lower to cut flesh.
The spine-chilling sound of a lethal snarl hacks through my physical assault on him. He victoriously manhandles me to the carpet. While I’m flat on my belly and writhing like a shark caught in a net, he stomps his boot on the small of my back.
“Stay the fuck down,” he bites out, hauling my arms behind my back and cuffing them.
“Motherfucker!” I hiss and pant, craning my neck to find my attacker. The metallic taste of my own blood blends into my saliva. “My husband will come for you. He’ll blow your entire fucking family to pieces and make you watch.”
The stone-cold eyes visible to me appear to sparkle as if he’s amused. “He won’t do shit when he’s the one who’ll go up in smoke, princess.”
I freeze. “You won’t get anywhere near him.”
“Yet here we are. Face-to-face with his widow.”
I give him a thin smile. “I will find out who you are and mark my words—I will personally kill you. He didn’t marry a trophy wife; he married a woman who’s a little bit fucking psycho—who won’t hesitate to cut your throat at any opportunity.”
Bang.
39
SINÉAD
One minute I’m spitting vengeance, and the next my face is splattered in warm blood and chunky gore.
I’m heaving and confused, anchoring the soles of my feet to the carpet after I push to a stand amid a gratifying massacre. The four soldiers were all precisely shot in the skull, every single one of them sprawled out before me, their fresh blood seeping into the carpet fibers.
At the far end of the deck, a man wearing an unbranded baseball cap and matching face mask stops for a second in the distance to reload his gun. The stranger is head to toe in jet-black pants, a chest-hugging top with long sleeves, and wears a discreet backpack over his robust shoulders. He doesn't wear a protective vest, nor does he lower his weapon.
Our gazes meet, my green-blue to his supernatural jade. I’m trembling in the uncertain standoff, except there’s something familiar about his confident, determined gait.
“There were four, right?” he asks in a refined Spanish accent, his raspy voice igniting odd sparks all over me. I nod and swallow, tasting alien coppery goop at the edge of my lips. “Good. That’s all of them. Are you okay, Sinéad?”
He steps over a corpse and drags the material to his chin, revealing his mouth—a mouth identical in shape to my husband’s, except this guy doesn’t use it to offer a reassuring smile. In contrast to André, he appears a little smoother around the edges and slighter in build. Similar, but not a carbon copy.
“Giovanni?” I whisper. “How did you know I was in danger? Where’s Dré?”
My husband's twin brother continues to walk the perimeter of the master suite, looking out of the portholes and then at the analogue timepiece peeking out from under his sleeve. “I’ve been watching the yacht since Dré rang me.”
“So who the hell are those guys?”
His ghostly eyes narrow on my gory appearance as he thinks quietly. “I don’t know who tried to kidnap you. But it's not safe out here anymore. I hitched a ride on a speedboat which took off the second I climbed on board. Dré has a jet ski stowed in a drive-in garage on the lower deck.”
Of course, there’s a garage.
“What’s going on? Do you know where André is? They said I was his widow—please tell me he’s safe?”
