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“He hasn’t been quite as much of an asshole.” Nick laughed a little before his expression grew serious. “I think maybe he’s started to believe that something good could happen for him again, but like you, he feels guilty that it’s come at your sister’sexpense.”
“We didn’t exactly meet under normal circumstances,” she said. “Everything’s been upside down since thebeginning.”
Nick closed the grill and turned his eyes on her. She wasn’t prepared for the worry she sawthere.
“Thing is, I’m not sure he’d make it through another mindfuck.”
She blinked, surprised to hear Nick use the figure of speech. “I’m not fucking withhim.”
“I’m not implying it’s intentional,” he said. “But I know this is a difficult time for you — believe me, I know — and it can make it hard to think about how it affects the people around you.” Her face grew hot, and she opened her mouth to defend herself only to have Nick hold up a hand to stop her. “I’m just doing my due diligence for my brother. He’s head over heels for you, Julia. It’s a lot of power to have over someone. I just want to make sure you know you’re wielding it, whether you want it or not, and that you’re being straight withhim.”
She wanted to protest, to say of course she was being straight with Ronan. That she loved him, that she’d told him she loved him and meantit.
But the words rang hollow because deep down she knew Nick’s warning had been issued for a reason. She’d been holding something back from Ronan since the beginning, that tiny part of herself that worried what they had was like a comet, an anomaly born out of Elise’s disappearance that wouldn’t hold up under the weight of everydaylife.
She’d told herself it was because of Ronan. That he was a danger junkie, a man who would never be happy with one woman, a man who would never be satisfied coming home to sit around the dinner table with a wife and kids when bad guys were still running around waiting to be caught. That their relationship worked because it was conducted within the confines of the danger that was a part of hislife.
But that was a cop-out. The truth was she was scared. Scared of her own ability to stick it out, to do what her mother had never done and build a life with someone that was built on somethingsolid.
Somethingreal.
Deep down she wondered if maybe she was her mother’s daughter after all, less flighty than Elise on the surface but every bit asweak.
Nick picked up the platter of fish and smiled. Any anger she’d felt dissipated. Nick was looking out for his family. She’d done the same a hundred times forElise.
“I like you,” he said. “It’s been awesome having you around, and I hope you’ll stay. But if you don’t plan to, it would be better for Ronan if you told him sooner rather thanlater.”
25
Ronan spreadthe blueprint out across the table on the terrace and used the salt and pepper shakers, a napkin holder, and Nick’s empty bottle of beer to hold down thecorners.
“This is the Oceanco LR 100,” he said. The blueprints illustrated two views of the yacht, the exterior measurements and the interior layout. “It can carry a crew of up to thirty-one, plus twenty-two passengers at onetime.”
“A crew of thirty-one?” Julia repeated. “How many of those will be securityguards?”
“We don’t know,” Ronan said. “There’s a lot we don’t know, but we’ll go over that in a second. You should all take a mental snapshot of the ship’s interior, because we’ll need to move fast once we’reinside.”
They’d come to the conclusion that the Oceanco vessel named Elysium was the boat that belonged to Manifest when it moved into position over the exact coordinates listed on Elise’s asset sheet in Florence. It had been anchored there for the past two days and showed no sign ofleaving.
Tomorrow was June25th.
“You can see the primary lounge area here.” He pointed to a large open space at the craft’s stern. “Not ideal, because it means we’ll have to board the ship from the bow to avoiddetection.”
“Is that even possible?” Julia asked. When they dived, they dropped off the side or rear of the boat, but they were always pulled back aboard at the stern, which sat lower in thewater.
“It’s possible,” Nick said. “We’ll have to throw up a line and rappel up, but it’sdoable.”
“We just have to make sure we aren’t spotted before we’re on board,” Bradensaid.
“That’ll be the hard part,” Ronan agreed, “especially since we don’t know more aboutsecurity.”
The satellite imagery had helped, showing a rotating series of guards patrolling the deck of the Elysium, but the images didn’t tell them anything about the total number of guards on board, or about other security measures like cameras oralarms.
“Someone will have to surface and get a look before you board,” Nora said. “It’s not foolproof but if you take a minute, you should be able to get a sense of the timing of thepatrol.”
Nora had agreed to stay in the boat that would act as their dive point. They needed somebody who could work the satellite feeds in order to know if and when she should call the authorities for help, and they needed someone who was ready to drive the boat once they got Eliseonboard.
If they got Elise onboard.
