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“Took you longer than I would have thought,” Natalya said, gaze over my shoulder at him.
He was drenched and smelled like the water.
He’d… swam over?
In potentially infested waters?
With a cast on his hand and aching ribs?
“Maeve, go,” Donovan demanded, reaching for me, trying to move me. “Take the airboat back.”
“No,” I objected, reaching behind me to grab his waist, holding on. “She really doesn’t want to kill me. But she definitely wants you dead.”
“Don’t want to,” Natalya said, cocking her gun. “But willing to if you don’t get out of my way.”
“Maeve, go. This has nothing to do with you.”
“It really has nothing to do with you, either,” I said, shaking my head.
“He…”
“Yes, we know,” I said, surprising even myself. “And if you would turn that keen mind and devoted heart of yours inward for two minutes, you would see that your anger is misdirected at Donovan. You’re mad at yourself for not saving Iosif. And Rolan for killing him. Donovan had nothing to do with it.”
“He still betrayed Iosif,” Natalya said, clearly trying to hold on to her anger, but in the face of the rational facts, it wasn’t as easy as it used to be.
“So what?” I asked, standing firm when Donovan tried to move me. “He paid for that. Almost died, you said so yourself. Seems like enough of a penalty to me. And you could have killed him too. I think you should be focusing all this anger on Rolan. Who deserves it.”
Even as I said it, I heard a gun cocking.
But not behind us.
Behind Natalya.
She heard it too, judging by the way she stiffened.
Somehow, Seeley had made it onto the wrap-around porch and came up behind her, standing in the open window with his gun pointed at her.
“Of course,” Natalya said, rolling her eyes. “Heaven forbid you face me alone like a man.”
“I didn’t want to face you at all, Natalya,” Donovan said. “You might want me dead, but I don’t kill women,” he said.
“How gallant,” Natalya mumbled, unimpressed.
“Don’t, Nat,” Donovan said when something clearly happened that I missed.
When I looked closer, I saw that her finger was on the trigger of the gun.
“Don’t make us shoot you. Because we won’t kill you. And it will fucking hurt. And you’ll have to drag your bleeding ass down the stairs, across the water, and to your car with all the alligators.”
“Crocodiles,” I said. “Carl the crocodile.”
I think all the insanity of the day was catching up to me.
Luckily, the men were kind enough to completely ignore me.
“I’m not afraid to bleed,” Natalya said, starting to raise her arm.
But it was right then that Cato rushed in through the window, grabbing her wrist, and pointing it toward the ground just as a gunshot rang out.
It took me a long moment to realize where the bullet had gone.
Through the floor of the cabin and into the water beneath.
It all happened so fast from there.
Natalya tried to wrench away. Cato yanked her arm up and behind her back, pulling it up between her shoulder blades in a move that made me wince.
“Stop fighting,” Cato demanded as the gun hit the floor and he wrapped his other arm around her waist. But Natalya wasn’t a woman who would go down without a fight, yanking up her legs, and trying to use the momentum to slam her feet down and break free.
But Cato was a big guy.
She wasn’t getting away.
“Get those cuffs off of Maeve,” Seeley called, stepping inside of the cabin, and tossing a keyring at Donovan. “We need them for her,” he said, jerking his head to Natalya who was shooting daggers at us.
“Are those handcuff keys?” I asked, slow blinking down at the keyring.
“Yes,” he told me, slipping the key into the lock, making them click open.
“He just carries around handcuff keys?” I asked.
“Never know when you’re gonna need them. Seeley is always prepared for everything,” Donovan said, pulling off the bracelets, then leaning his head down to catch my gaze. “You okay?”
“I… yeah,” I said, a little surprised how true it was. “I reserve the right to lose my shit later, though,” I said, giving him a wobbly smile that he returned as he pulled me against his chest, holding out the handcuffs for Seeley to take.
I was vaguely aware of Natalya letting out a string of harsh-sounding Russian words. I didn’t need to speak the language to know they were threats and curses.
“I was worried fucking sick,” Donovan told me, his hand running up and down my back. Like he was inspecting me for injuries.
“She didn’t hurt me,” I assured him. “Actually, we kind of had a little therapy session,” I admitted as I pulled back a bit.
“A… therapy session? For you or her?” he asked.
“Both of us, maybe,” I said, shrugging, as I looked over at Natalya who was now cuffed to the chair I had been sitting on. “Hey, you’re dry,” I said, blinking at Cato and Seeley.
