It rushed back in, thick and total. Worse than the crash, because at least that meant someone was alive and fighting.
Her nose itched. She rubbed it against her sleeve without loosening her grip on the gun because letting go of it felt like letting go of the last solid thing in the world. The quiet stretched and pressed against her eardrums, making the room close in around her.
Nothing.
Except.
A shift of weight outside the door. Air displacing. The faintest scrape against the floorboards, so quiet it could easily be her imagination.
She raised the Glock. Both hands. The way Wyatt had shown her.
Wyatt.
She squeezed her eyes shut to stop the stupid tears.
Her arms shook so badly the barrel trembled in small circles. “Wyatt?”
A soft shuffling noise. “Chief Engineer James.”
She knew the voice. Knew it the way you know a sound stitched into your nightmares.
Akilov.
Her stomach dropped and kept falling.
“I know you’re in there.”
She clamped her tongue between her teeth until she tasted blood.
“You’re alone now.” His weight settled against the doorframe as if he had all the time in the world. “He can’t hear you.”
She didn’t know if that was true—that was the worst part.
She couldn’t speak. Her jaw locked, every muscle in her body pulled so tight her bones might snap.
“Open the door. Your man is in the kitchen.” His accented English was gentle. Almost kind. “He’s losing blood.”
No raised voice. No urgency.
“If you don’t, I’ll go finish him.”
No.
The word detonated inside her, but she didn’t say it because believing it meant the world she’d just begun to imagine was already gone.
But she couldn’t be sure. And the uncertainty was worse than knowing.
“You shouldn’t have come back.” Her voice came out as a raw whisper. But it came out, and that was something.
A soft sound on the other side of the door. A breath. Maybe a laugh. “You knew I would.”
Her hands were slick. Sweat ran down the grip and pooled against her palms. The gun was trying to slide free of her fingers. She licked her lip. Salt. “No.”
Silence.
One second. Two.
A sigh?
