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I suspected he meant Blake. “Yeah. Blake’s here.”
His face twisted into pure rage. He turned, and punched the wall.
Wasn’t the wall made of metal?
His skin split. The first two knuckles on his hand began to bleed. He glared at the now-dented wall, unfazed by the blood blooming on his hand.
A mix of emotions made me hold my breath, wedging myself into the small space between a pipe and the wall. “We came back to help,” I said. “We came to find out…”
He turned back to me, his eyes wide, desperate. “My little thief,” he said, a growl in his tone. “How could you?”
How could I what? What was he saying?
He touched my face, cupped my cheeks between his palms. “I knew you’d live,” he said. “I knew you would. I knew with him…” He took a deep breath through his mouth. He leaned in, pressing his forehead to mine. He was too close then for me to look at him directly. “You should have stayed away.”
“I came back to help,” I said. “I didn’t want anyone else hurt…”
He shifted his head, kissing my lips once briefly before tilting his head again to press his forehead to mine. “Sumasshedshaya devushka.”
“I don’t know what that means,” I said, my voice getting higher pitched. I’d never seen Raven afraid of anything, but in this moment, I felt it from him. Fear. The bear was afraid.
“You should have stayed on shore.” He drew his head up and looked me in the eye. “It was the hardest thing I ever had to do.”
I gasped. No way. No… “You…”
Pain took over his eyes and he brushed his fingers across my cheek. “You weren’t supposed to come back.”
“You threw Blake over? And…me?”
“I had to,” he said. “We were close enough to shore that I knew you would make it.”
Time seemed to stop as I processed this.
Raven, with his sorry and tortured big brown eyes, his body so close, his touch so gentle. Now.
But last night up on deck, it had been him. It had been him who had ripped the tracker off me before he had thrown me over the side of the ship, possibly to my death.
I couldn’t believe it. How could he?
Before I could even think, my fist flew right at his face.
It happened before I realized what I was doing, but once I struck his nose, the anger boiled over and my other fist sailed out, colliding with the side of his head.
He backed off, covering his nose with one hand, lifting his other arm in defense.
He didn’t fight back. He wasn’t fighting me. He would take everything I would give.
Curses flew from my mouth as I whaled on him, hitting his face, arms, and torso. I pounded and clawed at him with every ounce of energy I had.
He did nothing but stand there and protect his face and take it. Blood trickled toward his mouth.
I stopped, seeing the blood, angry at him still and yet shocked at what I’d done, surprised at the throbbing in my hand.
But I wasn’t done with him. “How could you?” I cried. I backed up to the wall, tears flowing. “I can’t believe it. You threw us over? Raven, you…”
When he spoke, his voice was nasal. “I had to,” he said, lowering his arm but keeping his hand at his face.
“You wanted to get rid of us?” I demanded. I pointed to my chest, unable to catch my breath. “I never would have thought you’d stab me in the back like that.”
His hand lowered from his face, blood flowing from his nose, which was already swelling. His eyes widened. “Fuck that shit. That’s not what I did.”
“What happened?” I said, seething.
“They were going to kill you,” he said. He backed up, pressing his body against the wall. He gently touched his nose and winced. “They were going to kill you both.” He looked me in the eyes over his hand. “Where’s Blake?”
“I don’t know,” I said, my anger turning to panic. “I haven’t heard from him since earlier today. But who was trying to kill me? How does that explain what you did?”
He frowned and then winced again. “I might be too late.” He turned his attention to the wall again to glare at it. “I’m sorry. I tried.”
I slid down the wall to the floor, too weak to stand anymore. No matter how much I tried to control my breathing, it felt like I couldn’t get enough air. My head was swimming. I wrapped my arms around my knees. “You…” I’d heard him say it but still couldn’t believe it. “You threw us over because someone wanted to kill us? So, what, you were beating him to it?”
“I stopped him.” One fist was clenched at his side. Every muscle on his body was tight. “We got too close and you were in the middle of it. Blake was getting too cocked.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Cocky?”
“Sam,” he said. He uncovered his nose and looked at the blood on his hand. His broad nose was swollen, completely red, and a little crooked. There wasn’t as much blood as I thought there would be if I’d really broken his nose, but I wasn’t a doctor either. He lifted the hem of his shirt, pulling it up to his face and using the fabric to wipe it. “He thought he could waltz in and make up all sorts of lies, but he pushed the wrong people.”
“I can’t believe you did that. I could have died. I almost did.”
He turned to me, letting go of his shirt. “It was the only choice. You needed to disappear from this ship before they found you. Now I have to go find Blake, but I can’t promise he’s still alive.”
I pushed a hand against the wall to steady myself and stand again, ready to go find Blake. “Why? They probably don’t even know we’re here. And why did you set fire to the room?”
“They knew,” he said. “They were listening.”
“Who?”
“Last night, they found the signals. They’ve got this radio down in security that can pick up the…” He rolled his eyes. “Waves. I think. Corey would know.”
I got the gist. The radio frequencies that Doyle had set up to transmit our conversations from the earpieces to the headset had been discovered. Crap. “Why kill it now? Why didn’t you just tell them last night to shut things down?”
“Because they were listening,” he said. He grumbled, picking up his shirt again to wipe the blood from his upper lip around his nose. “And I only learned after I found out they were going to kill you. After you and Blake were gone, I kept quiet.”
“You were going to let them continue to listen in?”
“At first, it was working. Our team was looking for you, so when I told people you were gone, they just watched them scramble around. They made it believable you were really gone. It was safer.”
“How was any of this safer?”
“It’s not now if you’re here. They might catch up to us. They’ll know I lied and they’ll kill you and me. They might already try to come after me if they find Blake.”
“How do you know all this?”
“I’ve been listening, too.” He pulled an earpiece out of his ear and dropped it on the floor. “It’s dead now.”
I pressed a palm to my forehead. The medicine was fading, or the stress, or getting jostled over Raven’s shoulder, was getting to me—it could be any or all of those things, but the result was the same: my head was beginning to throb. “You should tell Axel,” I said. “They’ll be looking for us. He needs to know.”
“No. Too many people are watching. We’ve been compromised.”
I frowned. I braced my back against the wall, pushing my body up to stand against it. “Who all is involved? Just security? They just wanted to protect their hookers?” That didn’t make much sense. Prostitution was nothing compared to murder on your rap sheet. They couldn’t have a trail of bodies floating outside the ship just because someone got a little too close.
Sirens began to blare in the hallways. People were asked to go to their rooms for the moment and they would be released when all was clear. There was a reminder not to smoke on the ship. Sounded l
ike people had found out about the fire.
Raven waited until the announcements ended. His thick lips twisted. “You and Blake stirred up too much trouble. You exposed yourself.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You called yourself the investor. Someone found out you weren’t who you said you were.”
Not good. “How long have they known?”
“I’m still working that out. If I made you and Blake disappear, then security would stop looking for you both. It was working for a while.”
I waved my hand, trying to follow him, but either my concussion or the pure shock was making it difficult. “Axel’s not going to stop looking for us,” I said. “Not now that we’re both gone.”
“Good. We need to let Axel and the others think you are missing and have them look for you. They’ll just have to do it without the radios. They shouldn’t trust anyone.” He brushed his fingers around his nose, wincing. “They knew I did it, but they wouldn’t admit it to themselves. I should smack them all. It was so obvious. They should have known there was a reason.”
