“Two.”
“Three.”
We jump.
The fall is weightless. The wind tears past my ears. And then—
The cold hits like a sledgehammer. The air leaves my lungs. Salt water stings my wound, and for a second, I can’t think. I can’t breathe, my grip on her loosening before I can stop it. Her legs slip against my hips, and panic crashes through me harder than the cold because I’m losing her, I’m fucking losing her—
I grab her waist and pull her back against me so hard we both go under.
The jacket hisses. The bladder inflates. We rocket toward the surface and break through, gasping, spitting water, fighting to breathe.
“I’ve got you,” I choke out, and my arm is locked around her so tight it probably hurts, but I don’t care. “I’ve got you. Kick!”
The cold is already biting deep, tightening my muscles, making every movement cost twice what it should. I kick hard with one arm locked around her and the other cutting through the waves.
“Where’s the boat?” Anya’s voice is thin, shaking. “Roman, where’s the boat?”
I scan the darkness. Nothing. No lights. No engine. Just black water and distant flames and the sound of people dying on a ship that’s sliding toward the bottom of the sea.
“There.” I point with my free hand, and my fingers are already going numb. “Two hundred meters. East.”
“I don’t see it.”
“It’s there. Luka wouldn’t leave us. Swim, Anya. Fucking swim.”
We fight the sea. Every stroke is a battle. My side has gone numb now, which is bad, and the extraction boat is still too far away, and I can’t feel my legs anymore.
Then I hear it. The growl of an engine. A light cutting through the darkness, sweeping the water.
“Here!” I roar, and my voice cracks on the word. “Over here!”
The light finds us. The engine guns. Luka’s face appears. He grabs Anya first. Hauls her over. Then me. I hit the deck hard, coughing up half the Black Sea.
Wool blankets land on us. I pull Anya into me, wrap her up, bury my face in her wet, salty hair while she shivers so hard I can feel her teeth rattling. She’s convulsing against me.
“You have it?” My voice is ragged, barely human.
She presses her hand to her thigh where the garter holster sits beneath soaked silk. “Still there.”
“Good.”
I lean back against the bench and let the pain come. It’s been waiting, patient, and now it floods through my side with every heartbeat. Luka is saying something about safe houses and extraction protocols, but I can’t hear him over the ringing in my ears.
Fireworks explode overhead.
Odessa is celebrating the New Year. Red and gold bursts paint the sky, casting surreal light over the water, over the blood on the deck, over the woman curled against my chest.
In the distance, the Nerissa groans one last time and slips beneath the surface. The flames hiss out. Vadim’s flagship is gone.
I’m bleeding. I’m freezing. But I have her. I have the leverage. And the sea has the rest.
“You’re hurt bad,” Anya whispers, her fingers hovering over my blood-soaked shirt.
“I’m fine.” I pull her tighter against me until there’s no space between us, until I can feel every breath she takes. “The empire is at the bottom of the sea, solnyshko.”
ANYA — Turkish Safe House, 10:03
