A low rumble rolled through the night. For a heartbeat, everything held still, then a burst of light tore through the port side of the vessel in the distance.
The sound hit an instant later, a sharp, gut-punchingwhumpthat cracked through the storm. A bloom of orange fire flared against the steel hull before vanishing into darkness.
Vivian ducked, shielding Mara. When she looked up again, the ship’s floodlights flickered wildly, casting strobing shadows across the water. Smoke poured from a jagged hole midship, andshe could make out the faint metallic screech of a bulkhead door being torn loose, clattering into the sea.
Her pulse kicked harder. That blast hadn’t come from outside—it was internal.
“Blake,” she hissed.
She needed to move, to help, to save Blake, but she needed to protect Mara.
She squeezed Viv’s hand. “I cold.”
Vivian moved. The padlock gave with a twist from a screwdriver from Thirteen’s bag; the hasp had died long before winter. Inside: coils of rope, a tarp, old vents, the sour smell of trapped salt. Perfect.
Vivian dragged the tarp down and bundled it around Mara like a cocoon. She crouched, wrapped her scarf off her own neck, and tucked it under the girl’s chin.
Plan. She needed a smart play which would be to get as far from here as possible and call in their position, but for once, she didn’t want to follow the playbook. Not when Mara wouldn’t make it five feet, let alone miles to safety. And not when Blake wouldn’t live long enough for her to follow protocol.
She bundled Mara tightly with another tarp and found an old, dirty woven bag and wrapped it around her thin legs.
There was only one idea left; she didn’t like it, but it was their one shot at all of them making it out alive. She needed to pull a Blake and defy the odds, change the rules to her advantage.
“I need you to stay very quiet and very small,” Vivian whispered. “If anyone opens this door, you don’t move. You don’t breathe loud. You’re so brave. And I need you to be brave just a little longer. And the bravest thing you can do now is to just be still.Do you understand?”
Mara’s lips trembled. “Are you coming back?”
Vivian’s throat closed for a second. The thought of leaving this child alone again shredded her heart. But if there wasanother way, she couldn’t see it. So, she did the only thing she could—she smoothed a braid behind Mara’s ear with a hand she made stop shaking. “Yes,” she said, and if the word landed in her own chest like a vow, then maybe that was what it needed to be. “I’m coming back. I have to do something that helps everybody, including him.”
“Blake,” Mara said, like she’d always known the name.
Vivian’s mouth tried a smile, failed, tried again. “Blake.”
Before Vivian could change her mind, she marched out of the shack, determined to get help of some kind. An extraction for Mara at the least.
The storm surged, grinding against the pylons. Waves slammed the supports below, sending shudders through the planks. Somewhere in the distance, the ship’s mooring cables groaned against their locks—strained, warning.
She pulled her jacket tighter and scanned the horizon. Beyond the pier, the world blurred into gray: ocean and sky bleeding into each other, no clear line between safety and nothingness.
Her hand hovered over the pistol at her hip, as if the decision might already be written there. She scoured her mind for a way to save them all.
She took in a large breath. Pain shot from her ribs, but she pushed it aside, realizing adrenaline was her medication against the searing heat.
The tracker.
But the tracker remained miles away. At the lighthouse.
The vehicle hadn’t moved. No signal, no movement, no check-in. If Maddox was still the man she had thought he was, he’d come looking for them.
He’d have to.
For the first time in hours, something that felt like hope flickered in her chest. Maybe he’d already realized the missionhad gone dark. Maybe he had people watching the hospital and knew they were on the run for their lives, He could be en route now, tracing their silence, bringing help.
But they were miles from the tracker, from the hospital, from theWindward Lady.
She turned toward the main dock, the rain needling her face as determination settled back into her bones. There was still time—barely. If she could get Blake out, if they could reach the lighthouse, they’d have a chance.
It wasn’t much. But it was more than running blind through the dark.
