Page 200 of Deadfall

I nodded. “I get that.”

Kaelin shook her head, the look of amusement once more on her face. “A therapist once told me I needed to be the bigger person and let things go.”

My lips twitched. “Ah, a violence-is-not-the-answer type.”

“Yeah. She asked me: Where do you draw the line? When do you stop?”

“What’d you say?”

Kaelin sighed. “I told her you don’t. There’s always another name on the list.”

“Bet that went over well.”

“I got a new therapist,” she said with a wink.

We watched my father and Graham approach.

“Darlin’.” My father kissed Kaelin on the cheek as she greeted him, while Graham wrapped his arm around her waist. He whispered something in her ear and she blushed. Graham put a hand on my father’s shoulder—a gesture he made seem intimate.

“Go, I’ll be right there,” he said.

Once they were gone, my father studied me intently. I had no idea what he was thinking, but decided to wait him out.

“Do I need to bring out my shotgun? Or are Deathwing and Seven behaving themselves?”

I blinked, then I couldn’t help it—I laughed. It was soft and brief, but my father’s face lit up and a crack appeared in his stern facade. Like a window into the past when he was easy to smile and quick to laugh. An image of him chasing Cole and I around the lake house flashed through my mind, and my smile lingered after my own laugh faded.

“They’re behaving,” I answered.

“Good,” he grumbled, but his eyes still held that light in them. “They ever step out of line, you let me know. Still not sure they’re good enough for you, but I guess I understand. I do know a thing or two about Stockholm Syndrome—”

“Dad!” I exclaimed.

The smile broke the mask the rest of the way and he laughed—

And it was real.

Come back.

Even as a shadow, even as a dream.

EURIPIDES

96

EMERSYN

I stepped out of the SUV and the harsh northern wind cut through my clothes. I inhaled the wildness of it and let it sink into my bones. We’d just spent the last twenty-four hours traveling. First by SUV convoy, then on a large transport aircraft, and finally another long drive to get to the staging area my father’s team had constructed. It was on the coast of the mainland, as close to the island as we could get, which was roughly thirty-six hours by boat.

There were a few large tents constructed in a small, cleared space between the trees. Through which I caught a glimpse of the boat we’d be taking the rest of the way. I stopped and stared, because honestly, at what point did a boat become a ship?

I heard Nyx’s voice as he spoke to Atlas behind me.

“When I said I wanted to go out on the boat,” Nyx said. “I meant it more romantically than tactically.”

Knight whistled low in appreciation. “That’s your boat?”

My father chuckled. “That’s the boat.”