“Skye, no! You don’t know how deep—” Her eyes flick to our left at a commotion, and she grabs her pistol from her jacket. “Oh, no, the fuck you don’t!”
Bang.
“You made me live on that God-damned island!”
Bang.
I rip my arm from her grasp. The cold, the current, none of it exists. The only thing that exists is the spot where the bubbles were moments ago.
I take one last breath of air, and I dive.
The shock of the water is absolute. It’s not just cold, it’s like liquid ice driving the air from my lungs. The water is like ink. I kick down, arms sweeping blindly through the murk.
Nothing.
I push deeper, pressure building in my ears. No shape. No form.
My lungs begin to burn. I claw at the water, turning, searching in the void.
A pale glimmer? Fabric?
I dart toward it, my fingers closing around… a shred of floating plastic.
Trash.
The burn in my lungs is agonizing, and spots dance behind my eyes. The weight of the water above me feels like the weight of the world. Crushing and final.
She’s here. She’s right here.
But she isn’t. The blocks took her straight down. She’s in the mud and endless dark.
My body fights for air, so I kick upward, breaking the surface with a ragged, desperate gasp. The world rushes back, as does Ollie’s pale, terrified face. She has blood on her cream pantsuit as she hovers over Cassie, still screaming profanities toward the hill behind the warehouse.
How did I get to this point in my life? How did I go from being a world-famous hockey player to saving someone’s life from a group of murderous freaks?
Focus, Skye. Save her life now and panic later.
Giving Ollie one last look of desperation, I suck in another breath and prepare to dive again.
Ollie is kneeling, reaching for me as her voice cracks. “Skye. Skye, listen to me! You can’t find her like this!”
Her words are a distant echo. The only thing I can hear is the silence of the water. The silence of where Violet should have been.
I fill my lungs, the air tasting of death and failure, and then I plunge back into the black.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Violet
The cold is the first truth. It swallows the shock of the impact, seeping into my skin. A final embrace. The second truth is the pull. An iron grip on my ankles, dragging me down into the blackness so complete it erases the world.
I hear the faint sound of a thud or a bang. It’s hard to tell with the pressure building in my ears.
Panic is a bright flare that consumes the last air in my lungs. I thrash, a silent scream trapped behind my lips, bubbles free toward the surface. Then, the burn subsides, replaced by a heavy, terrifying calm.
My mom’s face, smiling.
Goodbye, Mom.
