By some miracle, I survived.
Between the high CO2 levels, lack of oxygen, water, and food, my chances were slim. Add in all the torture, and I was lucky to be alive. I must have done something right to be granted this gift.
Cole pushed the stretcher up a ramp and into a mobile medical unit. Two men dressed in scrubs rose, waiting, ready to hook me up to an IV line. They pumped something into my veins, and that was the last thing I remembered before losing consciousness.
I wokeup on a bed beside Marcello. He lay on his side, snoring softly, his face cleaned up but still cut and bruised. They had beaten him so severely that his lip was twice the usual size and his eyes swelled.
Turbulence rocked the private jet. At that, a wave of sickness tore through my stomach, bile rising in my throat. I felt slightly better than before from getting IV fluids. By the looks of my arms, they patched me up, but everything hurt like a motherfucker.
I glanced at the interior and realized the plane belonged to Atlantic Airlines, a company owned by Damian and Bastian Salvatore.
Rubbing my tired eyes, I sat up and slung my legs off the bed.
Marcello was here.
Tate wasn’t.
Before I passed out, Cole never responded to my question. He refused to tell me whether Tate was okay.
He was dead.
I could feel it, like a limb severed from my body, reminding me it was no longer there.
Dead.
Dead.
Dead.
Propping my elbows on my knees, I cried so hard my lungs hurt. Each wound felt as if it were tearing open, ripping me apart from the inside out.
“Drake,” Marcello whispered.
His deep voice was rough and scratchy.
I slowly turned my head to face him. “I wish I had died in that cave. It should have been me. Tate didn’t deserve that.” My body shook from crying so hard. “What am I going to tell his sister? Liv will never forgive me.”
Marcello sat up. “Don’t do this to yourself, Drake. Tate signed up for this when he took the job as your head of security. He died with honor.”
“But his death was in vain. He would want it to mean something.”
No one knew Tate was my half-brother. Growing up as the only child of a billionaire, I didn’t have many friends. Only the children of the founding families. But when I met Tate, it was like my life had fallen into place.
“You did everything you could to save Tate. There’s nothing you could have done differently to change the outcome.”
“Those men wanted to punish you. And they used Tate to do it.”
“I gave them access to Lovelace.” I dabbed at my tears with my shirt. “If the cave hadn’t collapsed, maybe he would still be here.”
“No, he wouldn’t. They would have killed us.”
I wanted to tell Marcello the truth about the voice I’d heard on the phone in the cave. But I didn’t trust myself or my memory.
Had I imagined it?
Before the cave’s collapse, I was on the verge of losing consciousness, head pounding, pain radiating throughout my body.
I leaned into Marcello and squeezed his shoulder. “Right now, I’m more worried about telling Liv that Tate is dead. I can’t think about anything else.”
