Chapter 28 Getting Things Done
Emily
The water of the lake doesn’t just feel cold because of the temperature. It’s because of the dangerous stunt I’m attempting to pull. I feel like a thousand icy needles piercing every inch of my exposed skin.
When I shiver, I don’t know if it’s from the pain or if it’s from the cold. Lives are literally
Despite the shaking hands, despite the pounding heart, I just keep moving. I have to move because lives are literally at stake here. Lily’s life, Alistair’s, and mine. Every single second matters and I can’t afford to hesitate.
I move with the agonizing slowness of a ghost, my nose barely breaking the surface as I weave through a thick carpet of lily pads. The smell is a stagnant mix of rotting algae and damp earth, a scent that clings to the back of my throat. I keep my eyes fixed on the pier, the dark wood of the pilings looming like the ribs of a sun-bleached carcass.
My fingers are numb, clutching the heavy weight of Alistair’s pistol, but the adrenaline is a white-hot current in my veins that keeps me from shivering as much as I should be.
I pull my head up a fraction more, peering through the drooping, tangled branches of a willow tree.
I look at the kidnapper’s back and then I look around. This whole plan would go down the drain if he had backup somewhere.
While looking, my gaze connects with Alistair’s.
For a heartbeat, the world stops. He’s standing on the bank, a silhouette of hard edges against the dying orange light of the sun.
Once he sees me, his eyes go wide. They shift from the cold detached gray I’m used to. They’re wide, burning with a frantic, silent disbelief.
He’s seen me. My heart gives a sharp, uneven thud against my ribs, but I force myself to stay still. I give him a tiny, sharp nod, a signal for him to keep the man occupied.
*Give me the cover I need to reach the ladder.*
Alistair’s shock only lasts a second. His face hardens into something even more terrifying than the man with the knife.
The kidnapper looks back and I duck.
"Don’t play games with me," the man says looking towards Alistair again.
"I told you, I’m not," Alistair says and raises his hand. It looks like a simple raise of hand but because I’m looking for some kind of signal from him, I notice the small wave of his fingers.
I frown.
What does that mean?
"I’m just waiting for my man to get back to me," Alistair says to the kidnapper. "For now, you need to be calm and don’t do anything that’ll make the shaggy in worse."
It hits me then that his words are not just for the kidnapper. He’s telling me to get out. He’s telling me to retreat.
What exactly can you do to help?
His words from earlier at the cafe echo in my head. He still doesn’t believe I can do anything. He still thinks I’ll be a liability. He thinks my interference would reduce the chances of getting Lily back, not increase them.
"Your time is running out, Alistair."
"You just need to be calm."
He holds his hands out in front of him, palms open, his shoulders dropping in a way that looks like a total surrender.
Wait. He’s not asking me to back off? He’s...surrendering?
Am I misreading things?
I watch him, my jaw clenching so hard it aches. He’s backing off. He’s stepping away from the pier, his voice taking on a placating, almost submissive tone as he talks about the money and the helicopter.
To any outsider, it looks like a negotiator losing his nerve. To me, it looks like a betrayal. He’s clearing the path. He’s giving this animal an exit strategy just to play it safe. He’s compromising with a man who has a blade to a child’s throat.
Maybe I’m overthinking it. Maybe the situation is blurring my sense of reasoning and I’m assuming wrong.
Or maybe that’s what’s happening to him too.
I thought he was the predator who would do anything to protect his own. Seeing him yield like this, seeing that open-palmed gesture of compliance, makes a bitter taste of disappointment rise in my mouth. He wants me to go back to the shore so he can hand over a bag of cash and let a monster walk away.
Well, I didn’t crawl through a freezing lake to watch a criminal escape. I disregard his frantic "withdraw" signal and duck back under the green scum of the water. If Alistair won’t be the predator this situation needs, I will.
Alistair
If I weren’t currently staring at a serrated hunting knife pressed against my niece’s jugular, I’d be in that water dragging Emily out by her throat.
What is she thinking?
I know she understood my hidden signal to withdraw but she’s obviously not doing that.
She’s not even supposed to be here in the first place. She’s supposed to be miles away, tucked safely in the mansion where I won’t have to worry about her.
Instead, she’s bobbing among the weeds like a water lily with a death wish.
Under the water, I saw something black in her hands and it hit me that it was probably my pistol that I kept in the suite. She’s never fired a weapon in her life, and yet here she is, trying to play commando in a stagnant lake. She’s going to get herself killed. Or worse, she’s going to spook this rat, and he’s going to slip that blade right through Lily’s neck.
I try to signal her to withdraw again. I put every ounce of command I possess into a single, sharp flick of my wrist toward the bank. She doesn’t budge. She just stares at me with those stubborn, defiant eyes before vanishing beneath a patch of lily pads.
She isn’t leaving. She’s getting closer to the pier.
A cold, concentrated fury settles in my gut. I have to adapt. My original plan was to wait for the rifle and take the shot myself, but I can’t wait three minutes if Emily is about to haul herself onto those wooden planks. If the kidnapper looks down and sees a wet, armed woman emerging from the lake, he’ll panic. And a panicked man kills the hostage first.
Because I keep looking at the water, he turns to look again. I have to pull his eyes away from the water. I have to make him believe that I’m the only threat he needs to worry about.
"Look at me!" I shout, my voice a blunt, heavy command that echoes across the dark water. I step further down the bank, moving away from Emily’s position among the pilings. "I just got information that the money is being verified at the gate. You want your ten million? Then keep your eyes on me and put the knife down. I’m the one with the power here, not the girl."
I hold my hands out, making myself look larger, more vulnerable, and more interesting all at once. I walk further into the clearing, drawing his line of sight toward the trees on the far left.
"I’ll go check on the status of the pilot," I say, taking another step away from the pier. "Don’t move. If you touch her again, the deal is off."
I walk away, forcing my heart to maintain a steady, rhythmic beat even as my skin pricks with the knowledge of what’s happening behind me. Out of the corner of my eye, I see a small, dark shape emerge from the shadows of the boat house. A wet hand reaches for the wooden ladder of the pier.
Emily is up.
Emily
The wood of the pier is rough, splintered, and covered in a slick layer of green moss that smells of old fish. I pull myself up inch by inch, the wet fabric of my shirt clinging to my skin like a cold, heavy lead weight. My muscles are shaking so violently from the chill that I have to bite my tongue to keep my teeth from chattering.
I reach the top of the ladder and peer over the edge of the planks.
Leo is standing near the black SUV on the shore, his face a frozen mask of absolute, slack-jawed shock. He’s staring at me as if I’m a vengeful spirit rising from the depths. I don’t give him a second glance. I don’t care about his surprise. I only care about the man five feet away from me.
The kidnapper is still screaming at Alistair’s retreating back. "Two minutes! You hear me? If that chopper doesn’t break the tree line, she’s done!"
He’s so close I can smell the stale, sour scent of cheap cigarettes and unwashed sweat clinging to his hoodie. He has Lily pulled tight against his chest, her small yellow dress a bright, heart-wrenching splash of color against the grime of his clothes. The knife is still there, the silver blade glinting in the twilight.
I stand up. The water drips from my clothes, making a soft, rhythmic pat-pat-pat on the wood. The man doesn’t hear me over the sound of his own frantic, wheezing breath.
I don’t feel like a healer anymore. I don’t feel like the girl who was locked in a storage room. I feel like a surgeon about to remove a tumor.
I take a step forward on the mossy planks. Then another. My bare feet are silent on the wood. The weight of the pistol is a comfort now, a solid, heavy extension of my own arm. I reach out, my movements practiced and steady, and press the cold, matte-black muzzle of the gun directly against the base of the man’s skull.
"Don’t move," I bark.
My voice is a low, jagged rasp that sounds nothing like me. It’s a sound born of the lake and the rage.
The man freezes. I can feel the sudden, violent tremor that goes through his entire body. The smell of his fear is a sharp, metallic thing in the air.
"Drop the knife," I say, pressing the barrel harder against his head. "Drop it now, or I’ll find out exactly what the back of your brain looks like on these floorboards. And trust me, I’m a doctor. I’ve wanted to see a specimen like you for a long time."
I don’t even know what the line means. I’m just saying anything to make myself look and feel tight.
Lily’s eyes go wide. She looks at me, then at the gun, and a tiny, knowing smile touches her lips.
"Do it," Lily whispers. "She’s a Wolfe too."
The knife clatters to the wood, the sound a bright, final chime in the silence of the lake. I have the lever. Now, I’m going to move the world.