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Her instincts had been right. Getting in a gun battle here wouldnotbe advisable.
But the night had come to her aid. The darkness would conceal her movement. This, like always, was why she’d chosen theblackdress. One could never be too prepared when it came to camouflaging one’s movements under the cover of night.
And now, as the three men moved past, she moved onto the deck, rolling low and into the shadows beneath a set of stairs.
No sign of the woman with the hood nor the man with the knife who kept off camera.
She glanced towards the stairs and looked up. A light was coming from the bridge. She peered along the edge of the pool. Besides the three heavily armed men, four more guards were positioned aft. She cursed, biting her lip.
She pulled the knife from her thigh strap, hefted it, and then moved, keeping low still. The three men reached the end of the swimming pool. Two of them paused, while one of them turned and began moving back towards her.
Once he drew near, he’d spot her. She went still, frozen in the shadows, like a doe just waiting for the high beams.
The man approaching her was the one with the C4. She waited, certain that at any moment he’d shout. He’d spot her. He was going to take the stairs.
The other two were still lingering at the edge of the pool, looking across the prow. The one with the C4 was nearly on her.
She resisted the urge to close her eyes. Sometimes, eyes would be the give away, reflecting light in such a way to draw attention. In the shadows at night, under the staircase, she hoped the man would just keep going.
Maybe he wouldn’t spot her.
Maybe she was too quiet and too poised. The black dress would certainly help.
His footsteps clanged against the deck. He was five feet away. Four. He passed her hiding spot, moving towards the stairs, one hand gripping the rail to help swivel.
And then two eyes peered through the night, staring directly at her.
The eyes bugged.
She moved.
His gun raised. Her knife buried in his neck. She didn’t even wait. She carried himoverthe edge of the ship, the two of them plummeting into the water, her knife still in his neck.
Salt water got in her nostrils and in her mouth. She held her breath as she was submerged but ripped her knife free, gasping as her head broke the surface of the water. The dead man was like a weight, trapped in her hand where she held on.
The bulletproof vest would come in handy, so would the C4.
She took both, gasping and splashing as she extricated the loot from the man. And then, with a push, she shoved the dead figure off, allowing the ocean to take him. At the same time, she had to move fast. Already, the yacht had nearly passed her. She wasn’t going to reach her boat in time, but rungs were still passing by.
She reached out, rising on a sudden surge of water, gasping as she did. She snatched a rung and began—wearily—to clamber up again.
This time, when she pulled herself onto the deck, she gripped body armor in one hand and C4 in the other—her knife back in her sheath.
Sprawled on the deck, she considered her next move.
She needed to find the source of that video stream. Make sure the woman was safe. And then... then she could hunt.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Cora adjusted her body armor over her dress, deciding this was a better fashion statement than the ammo belt had been. Knife in hand, she moved away from a second body she had stowed under the stairs, neck also cut. The warmth from the blood stained her fingers, but she didn’t even glance down.
Some things she was simply too accustomed to.
She moved up the stairs now, cautiously, following the source of the brightest light from the bridge.
And that’s when she heard it.
A yelling, high-pitched voice. The sounds of an unhinged soul.
