Almost safe.
Almost back to Kaia and my baby girl.
I feel it before I hear it, a subtle disturbance in the air, the kind that prickles across the back of my neck and makes every instinct I own start screaming.
Then she’s on me.
Her weight slams between my shoulders with brutal precision, driving me forward as the railing gives way beneath us. We hit the water hard, the impact jarring my spine as freezing cold explodes around us, ripping the breath straight out of my lungs and replacing it with panic-hot shock.
The bird assassin doesn’t hesitate.
We’re already sinking when her blade flashes beneath the emergency lights, a clean, vicious arc aimed for my throat.
“Too slow,” she breathes, a cruel, bubbling laugh slipping out with the water.
I twist with everything I have, muscles screaming as steel grazes my neck instead of opening it—fire races across my skin.
“Close,” I grunt, the word tearing out of me in a burst of bubbles. “Too fuckin’ close.”
We spiral downward, limbs locking, bodies colliding in a violent knot as the water churns around us. She moves as though she belongs here, fluid and controlled, using the resistance to her advantage while I fight it with brute force and fury. Her knee slams into my ribs, driving the air from my chest again, and before I can recover, her free hand claws at my face, fingers digging for my eyes.
“Big man,” she taunts, her voice distorted but unmistakably amused. “All that muscle and still too slow to save anyone.”
I snarl, forcing my head back as I buck against her grip. “Keep talkin’.”
Her knife drops low, precise and merciless, driving straight for my gut. I catch her wrist at the last second, fingers slipping as the blade punches into my side anyway. Pain detonates throughme, white-hot and savage, radiating across my ribs and down my spine.
“Ah, fuck!” The sound rips out of me, useless underwater.
She twists the knife slowly and deliberately.
“There it is,” she purrs. “That’s the sound I wanna hear.”
Stars explode behind my eyes as blood blooms warm and slick around us, clouding the water in dark ribbons. She wrenches her arm free and slashes again, fast and efficient, cutting shallow but vicious, carving me up piece by piece while conserving her strength.
“Hold still,” she mocks. “You’re making this messy.”
My lungs burn. My movements are slow.
I feel the tide shifting in her favor.
I feel the calculated patience in the way she waits for me to weaken, to panic, to drown.
“You’ll sink,” she tells me calmly. “Men always do.”
Something feral snaps inside my chest. “Not me,” I growl, even as my vision blurs.
I slam my forehead into her face with everything I have. Then I do it again. The crack of bone vibrates through my skull.
“Gah,you fucking bastard!”
I hit her a third time before she can recover, driving her backward through the water, then surge forward and slam her into the concrete wall beneath us. The impact rattles my teeth, blood running down my temple, and sends a fresh wave of pain through my side, but it buys me a second.
“Stay. The. Fuck. Down!” I grunt, pressing the advantage.
She laughs, dark and broken. “I thought you were stronger,” she taunts.
Her legs snap around my waist, crushing, locking me in place as she surges up, the blade flashing toward my throat again. Her grip tightens, using leverage and body weight, turning my size against me while my lungs scream for air.
