Lap of Luxury (Love Don't Cost a Thing)

I’m so fucking over this. I stand up and stride along the deck to our cabin, grab my workout gear and head into the gym. I need a hard, long workout and a good sweat to keep my temper from boiling over.

After fifty minutes of weights and half an hour on the treadmill, I’ve managed to burn through most of my anger. Most of it. I’ll feel better when Mikhail and that grasping little bitch of his are dead.

The sight of Bethany huddled in her seat, pale and shaking, returns to me, but I push it away. She’ll feel better when this is all over, too. Maybe she’s squeamish right now, but she’ll take it in her stride.

She’ll have to. She has no choice.

I check on the cabin after I’ve rinsed off in the gym shower. Bethany has gone back to bed, without attempting to barricade the door this time. I want to go in and shake her awake, because there’ll be no sulking about this now or after they’re dead. Why doesn’t she understand that you have to cleanse disloyalty from your life like cutting off a gangrenous limb?

I stand up on deck at sunset as the yacht enters the Suez Canal. It’s a flat, sandy landscape. There’s an enormous container ship in front of us, and one behind us as well. On the other side of the canal is the Red Sea, and beyond that, it opens into the Indian Ocean.

Once we pass through the canal, there’s nothing to do but watch the horizon, and wait.

Bethany doesn’t speak a word to me. Once or twice a day she emerges from the cabin to force herself to eat something. Her cheeks are still pale, and are growing thinner. My chest aches with the need to wrap my arms around her, but every time I try to touch her, she flinches away from me.

On the evening of the fourth day, at the time we’re scheduled to arrive in the Seychelles, I head to the bridge. Boris stands up eagerly when he sees me and turns his laptop screen around.

“Our agent has sent in his report,” he tells me. The moment we discovered where Mikhail was hiding, I got in contact with a private investigator I’ve used in the past. One who doesn’t let scruples stand in the way of getting a job done.

“He bribed some immigration officials at the main Seychelles airport to show him the security guards’ landing cards. Mikhail’s address is here, by the beach.” Boris points to a satellite image on Google maps. A house stands just back from the shore.

“I brought the yacht in close,” Boris goes on. “We’re just three miles offshore.”

My eyes snap to the horizon, and as I’m opening my mouth to ask whether Mikhail might see the lights of our vessel, I hear a faint scuffing sound outside. When I go to the door and peer up and down the deck, there’s nothing there.

“Don’t worry,” Boris says behind me. “He won’t be able to see us at this distance. Shall we act tonight?”

I stare out into the darkness. I’m a mere three miles from my brother, and so close to my goal. So near to ending this. “No. Not tonight. I need to plan. Thank you, Boris.”

“Of course, boss.”

I go back and check the main cabin. Bethany is sound asleep, in the same position I left her in an hour ago. She’s been going to bed earlier and earlier lately.

I lay down in the dark next to her, but it’s as if I’m laying on a bed of nails. My whole body is strung so tight I feel like I’m about to snap in two. Tomorrow I’ll be free from the past once and for all, and I’ll have everything I ever wanted.

A small voice speaks in the dark. “Don’t do this, please.”

I take a deep breath as anger threatens to overwhelm me. “Why shouldn’t I?”

“If I have to tell you why you shouldn’t take revenge, then you’re not the man I thought you were becoming. And I don’t love you.”

“I’m the man I always was and always will be. You’re a little fool if you thought I was ever going to change.”

I wait for her to argue with me, to rise up and rake me with her nails or try to slap me, so I can take hold of her and pin her down. But she doesn’t reply or move, and her silence is a vast, lonely chasm.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Bethany

I’ve wondered idly in the past which is more important to spies: nerves or brains. Turns out it’s neither. What you actually need is complete and utter despair. That way you don’t have time for terror or doubt. You just act.

I don’t even feel any morning sickness as I force my breathing to be slow and regular as Damir turns over in bed beside me. I’ve been nauseated non-stop for days, ever since I discovered I might be pregnant.

Hope that I’m not is shrinking fast. I’ve been off the pill for four days. Still no period.

Beside me, Damir’s breathing evens out.

The final girl survives. I overheard earlier that we’re three miles from Mikhail and Ciara, and land is just over the horizon. Maybe surviving means keeping my head down and letting Damir do whatever bat-shit things he think he needs to do, but somehow I don’t think so. Ripley goes back for the cat before the refinery explodes. Laurie saves the children from Michael Myers. Sidney kills the bad guys herself rather than running screaming into the night. Surviving means doing everything you can to thwart the killer, otherwise you’re not the final girl. You just dead. Worse than dead. You’re nothing.