Chapter 27
Indian Ocean
Groaning from the bite wound above and below his knee, Dillon fought to control the bleeding. It was a flat-out miracle SharkTooth hadn’t bitten off his leg completely!
Faraji rushed to the side and grabbed the medical kit.
“No!” Rasulov shouted, “He gets no help until I have the triggers.”
Dillon ground his teeth. “The shark tore the pack. They’re at the bottom of the sea.”
“Then your father dies,” he snarled and motioned to Galtieri. “Get the American.”
Shutting out the blinding pain and the warmth of his own blood spilling over the deck, Dillon dragged himself to the side. “Don’t.” Thank goodness the billionaire didn’t have a weapon, but if he brought Dad out here… “I can go back down. Just let me tie this off—”
“Why are you not moving?” Rasulov demanded of Galtieri. “You know we have your daughter—”
“They don’t!” Dillon barked, levering himself up, feeling blood slick down his leg. “She’s safe. With my team.” Not exactly his team, but…
“You swear…”
The man had asked him that earlier. “I didn’t want her in danger, so I left her with them. She’d had surgery to save her life from the bullet he put in her!”
Galtieri’s gold eyes flashed but he looked down.
“Don’t do this,” Dillon growled.
But the man kept staring at the deck.
“She believed in you. She—” He faltered when the billionaire looked at him, then down again, deliberately.
Dillon glanced at the wet deck. Why…? Holy fire—a weapon.
“Get Jacobs. He needs motivation.”
Even as the guy spoke, Dillon threw himself forward. Dove into a roll, and came up, staggering, blinding pain putting him off-kilter, but he still managed to aim at Rasulov. Fired.
The Bloody Sword became…bloody.
More shots echoed through the air. Unibrow’s body rattled beneath the spray of rifle fire by the two submersibles that had surfaced, bearing Dante and Crow.
Dillon careened into Galtieri as a firefight erupted between the team and Rasulov’s remaining thugs. Staring over the long deck, he saw a large cutter bearing down on them. Knew that Cove was on that ship. He held her father in a death grip. “Tell me you were not helping them.”
Galtieri shuddered beneath him. “They killed my Saveria,” he said, plainly grieved. “Vowed to kill Cove, too, if I did not help them.”
“And she almost died anyway.” Head swimming, he felt his strength draining. “You watched them starve my father…”
“No, Dillon.”
He glanced to the side, stunned to see his dad staggering toward him. “Dad!” He tried to get up, but the pain drove him back down.
Dad collapsed next to him. “Massimo”—he coughed hard—“kept me alive.”
“You are nearly dead!” But Dillon still released the billionaire.
“I would have died had he not snuck me medicine.”
“I tried…” Galtieri cried. “But then they moved him. I could not find him.”
He couldn’t reconcile the truth, his dad’s horrible condition, nor the fact it could’ve been so much worse. Dad could have died. And Cove too… But…
“Rasulov’s dead,” Dad rasped, reaching for Dillon. “The triggers.”
His gaze hit the dead butcher on the deck, then gritted, holding his leg. “Safe. Omen should have them by now.” The pounding of feet on the deck told him Omen and Pike had boarded. “We’re going home, Dad. We’re going home.”
“Sydney…” Slumped against the deck, Dad gave a wistful smile.
A bright, beautiful face hovered over Dillon even as his vision ghosted. “Cove…”