Page 76 of All The Way Under
“Clear,” I say.
Ravelo had to die, I remind myself. Even if he allowed me to live, he had to die tonight. It was the only way to cement this ring into the ground for good. I hate that guilt bubbles up, but I need it to remind myself I do have feelings. I am a human, not a machine. I have a good heart.
“Clear,” comes back from the Team chorus.
They find the hostages zip-tied, blindfolded, and shaking. One of them is bleeding from the shoulder, but alive. We pull them up and haul ass back to the Zodiacs, engines roaring now. The ghost projection shifts as we move, the AI cloaking system adapting to our path, throwing up new false echoes in our wake. I can’t help a small smile.
“They’ll never find us,” Mark mutters as he steers us toward the open ocean.
I glance at the console. Purple. Steady. The cloak holding like steel armor.
Back on shore, an emergency extraction team is rolling in from the operations van. Saylor mobilized them the second our green light pinged on her screen. I didn’t even have to tell her. She knows what every light means.
We land fast. Reyes and Dalton escort the hostages to the med team. I step out last, boots crunching on gravel, body aching like hell from banging against the waves in a low-profile seacraft. They’re tactically perfect and incomprehensibly uncomfortable.
The van door opens.
Saylor stands there, arms crossed across her Navy SEAL sweatshirt, face ashen.
“You’re late,” she says, bottom lip trembling.
I bite back a smile. “Your clock is wrong,” I reply.
“You told me no hero stuff.”
Shaking my head, I say, “I didn’t do anything heroic.”
“You guys killed them all.”
I look away, feeling awkward that the woman I love knows the nitty-gritty about my job. This isn’t a part of myself I readily share with anyone. Not even Nolan. It’s already over, so there’s no sense dwelling now.
“They had it coming,” I reply
Will she think differently of me now that she’s seenthisup close?
Saylor crosses the distance and punches me in the shoulder. Hard. Then she hugs me like I’m made of glass, and she’s forgotten how to breathe. I allow it, in full gear, covered in sweat, smelling of flashbang smoke, diesel fuel, and death. I let her hold on as long as she needs. I inhale her hair, and it calms me like a salve. This is why I do what I do now. Everything is for her.
Mark jogs past us, coming from one of our vans, holding two lobster rolls. “Hey! They had warm butter tonight!”
“Give me one,” I say, my chin resting on Saylor’s head.
“Already ate it,” he replies, shaking his head.
“Then give me the one in your hand.”
He grins, running to Reyes, who has beers in his hands. “Come and take it, grandpa.”
I look down at Saylor, pride beaming. “Your system worked. Like clockwork. On the ride back, all I could think about was how proud I am that this is your brainchild, and it works better than anything I’ve ever used.”
She tilts her head, eyes wet. “I knew it would work. It had to. Your life was on the line. I won’t fail with that. I might mess up in every other area, but I’ll never mess up with that.”
It baffles me that she somehow has low self-confidence.
“Didn’t mean I wasn’t scared,” I say, letting a bit of vulnerability slip. If she can show vulnerability, so can I.
She exhales. “Me too. So damn terrified.”
I pull her close again, content to just be. “But we’re here.”
