He draws one, flips it to grasp the blade, and proffers the handle to me. I stab it into the corpse's diaphragm and drag it downward in a single, violent yank.
"Um, he's already dead, boss-lady," Kane says.
"I am aware, Kane, thank you." I wipe the blade on the corpse and return it to Silas, and then step back, glancing at Chance. "Toss him in."
Frowning in confusion, Chance does as I ask, dragging the body to the railing and heaving it over the side with a splash. The life preserver prevents the body from sinking while the effluvia leaks out, staining the water.
It doesn't take very long for them to arrive.
Fins, slicing the water. Circling. Tugging. Yanking. The orange ring bobs and dips like an oversized fishing bobber.
"Oh," Kane says. "Ohfuck."
The water thrashes wildly, red and pink bubbles frothing the surface.
I turn away to face Rafael. "Stand him up." I glance at Solomon. “Record this, please.”
Solomon pulls out a cell phone and begins recording a video, focusing on Raphael.
Chance grabs a handful of Rafael's hair and hauls him to his feet. Rafael can't stay on his feet, however, hunching and curling in on himself. He may have broken ribs. Who knows? Who cares? Not me.
I step into his space. Put my face to his, grab his jaw and force him to look at me. "My father tried to break me. You tried to break me. You both failed." I squeeze his broken jaw until he howls in agony. "Your son will never know you. You die, now, Rafael, and your name dies with you." I shove him away. "Yours is the last life I will ever take."
Chance frog-marches him to the railing and lets him go; Rafael hunches over the railing, a string of bloody saliva stretching down to the boiling, bloody, fin-filled water. "No," he groans, the word more of a garbled sound than speech. "No, no! Please, please! I'm sorry!"
At least, I think that's what he said.
I put my lips to his ear. "Think of all the times people begged you for mercy, Rafael. Think of them while those creatures down there tear you apart."
"Sophia—please—"
"Fuck—you," I snarl in English, because the phrase just doesn't have a direct counterpart in Spanish or Portuguese. "Fuck you all the way to hell."
I shove him over the railing.
We all stand at the railing together, watching as the sharks tear him, screaming, limb from limb; Solomon records the entire process.
The screams stop after a minute, and I watch until the sea goes still and the waves take the red away.
I find Solomon's eyes. "Get us out of here. Burn the ships.” I give him a phone number. “Send the video to that number.”
"Yes, ma'am," he says. He turns and immediately starts issuing orders, and the others obey without question. Solomon became the leader, at some point.
"Gentlemen?" I call, and everyone stops to look at me. My throat is tight, hot, thick. "Thank you."
No one seems to know what to say, for a moment. Except Lash. He comes over to me, gently takes my arms, and holds me at arm's length. "You areours, Sophia. We are yours. We are a family, we and the women back at the hotel. We would take on hell itself for you." He holds my gaze. "We owe you everything."
I shake my head. "No, you—"
Solomon moves up beside Lash, resting a hand on my shoulder. "Yes. We do. You chose us. You branded us. You gave us new lives when we all had nothing to live for. You dragged us all out of the darkness."
"It was Jakob," I say, knowing the time for secrecy has ended. "Our employer. It was his plan. I was merely the first."
"Jakob," Solomon echoes, tasting the name, sort of. "His idea, maybe, but it was you who was there for us. It wasyou, Sophia."
My eyes burn. Silas joins his brother and Lash, and then Saxon, and then Chance and Rev, and then Kane, and then Scarlett, surrounding me the way the women did back at the club. Except these men…theyknow. They know the horrors of war and bloodshed and death. They understand the bond forged in battle. They know the demons that haunt me, because they haunt them too.
They surround me, and their hands touch my shoulders, my back, my head. I find Lorenzo, beyond the circle, waiting. I reach for him, and he takes my hand, and I let them have it all.
