Chapter 22
FALCO
Sleep escapes me.
The cabin itself is too unfamiliar with its creaking walls, settling floors and windows that, despite their apparent bulletproof nature, are warped with age.
I keep myself busy by washing up the dishes, scrubbing the oven after cooking, and washing every single utensil in the drawers.
If I’m not busy, I start to think.
Thinking leads me to Aerin.
And Aerin leads me down a path of no return.
I’ve never doubted my strength in any regard. I’ve fought in wars, engaged in vicious hand-to-hand combat, survived torture on both sides of the line, even been buried alive, and kept my wits about me in order to survive.
But when Aerin stepped outside in that swimsuit, her entire body wrapped up in tight, flesh-toned material with her hair scooped up and flowing around her face?
Never have I felt so weak.
Those poor fish didn’t know what hit them as I fought to keep control of my thoughts and my urges all while keeping up the facade that everything is completely fine.
Inside, I was a wreck.
Jealous of the water wrapping around her, the bubbles kissing her skin and the strands of hair lightly touching her shoulders. It should be me. I want it to be me.
Breaking down would give me one fantastic, glorious night with her, and it would be completely worth the wrath Guido would rain down on me the moment he found out. It’s a miracle he doesn’t know what I did to her in the shower.
I wash and I scrub, keeping the single light on low so that the cabin remains dark and quiet. Occasionally, the wooden structure cracks and settles as it gets used to the warmth Aerin and I bring to the place, and each noise makes the nerves along the back of my neck jump.
We’re fine.
I’m fine.
Aerin’s fine.
The only text I make is to Pidge, asking if he’s taken the dog to the vet.
It’s a coded text just to be on the safe side.
He replies telling me that the vet will be free to see the dog within the hour.
It calms me enough that I return to my washing and distract myself until I’ve been through every drawer and scrubbed everything available.
Three times I approach Aerin’s room when my thoughts get the better of me.
Three times I walk away.
Each time, it’s like something is drawing me toward her that I’m not in control of, and opening her door and invading her space feels like the best idea in the world.
I could hold her, tell her I regret pushing her away when she kissed me, then tell her how madly I’ve fallen in love with her.
I could kiss her and tell her it happened so quickly that it took my breath away and I still haven’t been able to get it back.
Thankfully, I talk myself out of it each time.
Aerin’s been through enough.
She certainly doesn’t need her only lifeline turning into something she can’t handle. I shove her from my thoughts and bury myself in the bathroom to clean up.
Turning on the shower risks being too loud so I fill the sink with hot water—and it’s insane that this place even has hot water on tap—and settle for a rushed sink bath.
Tomorrow when Aerin’s awake, I’ll shower properly. Stripping out of my shirt and remaining in just my jeans for now, I rummage through the mirror cupboard above the sink until I find what I need.
I’m halfway through working up shaving lather in a small wooden bowl when the floorboards outside the bathroom creak subtly. I pause, focusing on my peripheral. Just as I’m about to chalk it up to the cabin settling once more, the floorboard creaks again. Twice in succession.
Not settling wood.
Footsteps.
Aerin?
The thought barely finishes when the wood subtly creaks once more, longer this time as weight shifts across the weak joint. Not Aerin. I know her steps and I know her weight.
That’s not Aerin.
Setting the bowl down carefully, I drop to my haunches and remove the blade from my left ankle. Then I turn on the tap, which halts the footsteps outside.
Like a ghost, I move away from the sink and climb up into the edge of the bath, flipping the knife in my hand until the hilt is in my palm and the blade aligns with my arm, tip pointed at my elbow.
A second later, the door handle dips very slowly, just once as whoever is on the other side tests the lock. Finding the door unlocked, the handle dips the whole way and the door very slowly swings open toward me.
Raising my other hand, I grip the top of the door and guide it open wider, keeping the motion smooth as if it’s the natural arc of the door.
A black balaclava-clad head pokes around the door, focusing on the sink and then peering around the bathroom.
I hold my breath and count the three seconds it takes for them to scan to the edge of the bathtub.
The stranger spots my bare feet on the tub just as I throw my weight against the door, crushing them between the door and the frame.
The stranger lets out a strangled cry that immediately muffles as I grab the balaclava with my hand and pull it tight against their face.
I grip it and swing my opposite elbow down against their face, then leap down from the bath and haul them into the bathroom.
In the same motion, I let myself fall forward while keeping my grip on their black jacket.
They yell in surprise.
I land on my back and force them to topple over me. My bare feet collide with their hips and force them to flip over.
The silence of the cabin is shattered as the assassin crashes into the toilet and porcelain cracks under the impact of his body.
Water explodes from the cistern, masking his cry of pain, which ends abruptly as I drag the blade across his throat and leap to my feet.
I need to get to Aerin.
His cry alerts the numerous other people in the cabin and my desire to reach Aerin is met with blockage the second I step out of the bathroom.
A blinding flashlight catches me right in the eye. Wincing, I turn and duck, narrowly avoiding a fist that collides with the wall where my face was a second earlier.
Crouching, I leap forward and slam my shoulder into the gut of whoever is next. He collides with a man behind him, and the three of us topple like a stack of cards.
“Fuck!” yells the man beneath me as my knife embeds deep in his thigh. I rip it out and plunge it in again, an inch away from the first wound. His yells turn to screams, then the butt of an assault rifle collides with my temple and sends me crashing to the floor with a grunt.
Someone’s on top of me.
I throw my elbow back and catch a soft thigh. A fist lands square between my shoulders and pain shoots up my neck.
Bracing both palms flat on the ground, I surge upward with a roar and dislodge the man on my back.
He topples off me and crashes into a side table, sending his flashlight clattering to the floor with shards of vase and stems of fake flowers.
The bleeding man already on the floor is clutching at his thigh, screaming in pain.
I leap over him, sparing only a second to slam my heel into the hilt of the knife and truly drive it home, then I tackle the second man.
Hot pain explodes in quick succession all the way down my forearm, but I ignore it, punching the assassin twice in the face.
He punches my ribs, winds me with a knee to the gut, and grabs my hair to wrench my head back.
I slam the junction of my thumb and forefinger into his throat, choking him.
He gags and jolts, then punches me hard in the face. Dazed, he dislodges me with a roll and scrambles to his feet.
I follow.
We exchange blows all the way down the hallway as I use punch after punch to force him away from Aerin’s room and back toward the living room.
My punches grow sloppy as blood spurts from his face through his mask and weeps from painful cuts on my forearm from his blade.
“You can’t prevent this,” snarls the man, gargling on his own blood. “She’s ours.”
My vision goes dark as the fallen flashlights behind me flicker, but I still catch the gleam of blood on the man’s mask. It’s the only pinpoint I need.
Leaping up against the wall, I launch myself off and dive down on the bastard with my fist balled.
It smashes directly into his face.
As he goes down, I catch his flailing wrist, twist it hard, and wrench the blade from his grip.
A second later, it’s embedded in his throat.
I’m panting, out of breath and slightly dizzy, but it’s all second to the cold fear about Aerin.
Turning on my knee, I rise to sprint back down the hallway and freeze as heat spreads out from my abdomen at a sudden punch from the other man I thought was down and out in the hallway.
No… That’s not a punch.
I glance down.
The knife I embedded in his thigh now protrudes from my abdomen, the hilt firmly in his grip.
He rasps in my face, spraying speckles of blood with the cigarette stank from his breath.
Ow.
My stomach rolls. In a flash, I’ve ripped the knife out of myself and plunged it into the juncture of his shoulder and neck.
His eyes widen in surprise, and his mouth opens, but all that spills out is a dark crimson waterfall.
“Fucker,” I growl as my old captain’s voice echoes in my head at my stupidity.
Shouldn’t have pulled that knife out.
Fuck.
He crumples and I take one step over his body. But before I can do anything else, a heavyweight tackles me from behind and attaches to my shoulders like a backpack.
A fourth man.
I lift my hand in time to catch the thin, sharp wire this fourth assassin tries to wind around my throat.
Hot agony rears up in my forearm as the sharp wire cuts into my flesh, forcing me to draw my own forearm against my throat to protect it.
I stumble back, then I throw myself back.
My attacker and I crash into the wall, and the hallway floods with light as he knocks the light switch.
Away from the wall I drag us both, turn, then slam him into the next wall. Deeper and deeper the wire cuts into my arm as the assassin frantically winds it around me again and pulls it so tight.
My arm might as well be on fire.
Think, Falco. Think!
Keeping him away from Aerin is my only goal so despite the pain, I surge toward the living room and break into a run toward the couch.
The stranger yells and I mirror him as I charge forward, slamming myself into the back of the couch at full speed.
The jolt of stopping is enough to dislodge the assassin from my shoulders, and they fly over the top of my head, wire and all, and land on the coffee table that immediately crumbles under their weight.
I sag to my knees, gasping raggedly through the white-hot pain spearing through my abdomen.
The stab wound, previously weeping sluggishly, is now pouring with blood that soaks into my jeans.
Blood streams in a river down my arm from more slices than I can count.
Gun. Need my gun.
Aerin called me paranoid. I call it prepared.
The assassin picks himself up from the remains of the table and laughs, pulling the razor-wire taut between his hands and grinning at me through a balaclava that’s barely covering his face.
“They told me you’d be difficult,” the man rasps. “But when I hear difficult, I hear fun.”
“Oh shut up,” I gasp wetly. “I don’t…give a shit.”
A terrified scream rises up from deeper in the cabin and my heart jolts painfully as if shocked by an outside source.
Aerin!
I don’t have time for this fucker.
Turning, I lunge for the sideboard and hit the floor with a yell.
Just behind the ornately carved leg helping balance a sideboard that’s surely worth more than my entire life savings, I snatch up my stashed gun and roll over.
Two bullets fire and collide with the wire assassin just as he lunges over me, weapon raised.
He hovers for just a second, then he collapses down onto me and aggravates every agony currently blazing through my body.
Aerin continues to scream.
No time, Falco. Get up. Get the fuck up.
My legs wane as if I’ve been sitting on them for too long and they’ve grown numb.
Blood on wood makes the floors slippery, and it takes all my strength to push the body away, haul myself to my feet, and sprint down the hallway toward Aerin’s room.
If she’s screaming, she’s alive.
It repeats in my mind as her door draws closer and closer.
I slam my shoulder into it and crash into Aerin’s room.
She’s standing on her bed, brandishing her bedside lamp, swinging it wildly at the masked assassin dancing and laughing around the edge of her bed. He turns just as I raise my gun, and I shoot him twice right between the eyes.
“Falco!” Aerin gasps through her tears. The relief on her face lasts half a second, quickly morphing into a look of utter horror. “Oh my god, Falco!”
I take a step and my leg gives way.
Crashing to the floor, I’m barely able to put my good arm out to catch myself and stop my face from smashing into the wood.
“Aerin, you have to c-call for help!” My chest grows tighter and tighter with each word. In a sluggish blink, Aerin’s over the top of me. Her hair sweeps down like an amber curtain, and I’m struck suddenly by how simply beautiful she is.
“Falco? Falco, oh my god there’s so much…what do I do? Falco? Falco!”
“Call,” I gasp, reaching for her.
Her warm, trembling hands cup my face, but the touch feels impossibly far away. There could be more assassins. A bigger threat. She needs to call for help.
I can’t speak.
Darkness sweeps in and the last thing I see are her tear-filled, panicked eyes.
I’ve failed her.
Again.