“What I’ve done? My beautiful cousin, who you set up to look like she’d killed herself, is now someone’s property? I’m going to get her back, Theo, if it’s the last thing I do.”

“It may very well be. If she went where I think she did, her master is a powerful man.”

“He doesn’t scare me.”

“He should.”

Yes, he probably should. But right now my anger was taking over.

“Those other kids who were taken around the same time that Talon was… Where are they?”

“I don’t know.”

“You’re lying.”

“Ruby, that was twenty-five years ago. Kids are sold, but they eventually grow up. I don’t know what’s done with them after that. It’s not my business.”

“Not your business? These are human beings!” I stood and threw the tray still holding ramen onto the ground. I fought back more retching. “How did you get like this? How, for all of these years, have you been able to treat people like things to be bought and sold? Used and abused? How?”

He sighed, his countenance resigned. “It’s a long story.”

Chapter Thirteen

Ryan

Raj went down first, and then Talon. Because Talon had freaked a bit during practice, we’d decided to let him go in the middle. Finally, I dropped into the dark water. We were using lights since we’d otherwise be basically blind. I’d been prepared for the noise. Breathing through a regulator was loud, and it had startled me during our practice runs. Inhale, and then exhale fully. I’d done okay during practice, but now my nerves were frazzled. I had to stay calm, or I’d hyperventilate. I turned my head to look to each side. My mask cut off part of my peripheral vision, and I was surprised at how much I missed it. Raj had taught us some hand signals to communicate with each other underwater, but vision would be limited because it was nighttime. He was taking us toward the island. I tried to control the urge to continuously adjust. He’d told us to relax and let the water take us where we needed to go.

Talon swam ahead, between Raj and me. I kept my eyes on his fins and followed.

I tried to calm my rattling nerves by making Talon my anchor. Keep your eyes on Talon.

He seemed to slow down. When my mask bumped his fins, though, I knew something was amiss.

I stared at him, looking for hand signals. I gave him the okay sign, questioning him.

He didn’t “okay” back. Was he even looking at me?

One of his arms flailed out suddenly. I went closer, and when I saw his eyes through the glass of his mask, sheer panic looked back at me.

What was wrong?

Raj was ahead of us, but if something was going wrong with Talon, I couldn’t afford to take the time to alert Raj. I tried the okay signal once again, and again Talon offered no response. Bubbles rose from his mouth in a constant stream instead of shutting off between breaths.

When his arms started flailing, I knew I had to act.

Was he breathing? I couldn’t tell. He hadn’t used the “out of air” signal, but then he hadn’t used any signals at all. I ripped my octopus out of its holder and offered it to him.

Talon spat out his regulator and grabbed the octopus, inserting it into his mouth. He took what looked to be two long breaths.

I gave him the okay sign again, and this time he returned it. I pointed upward, indicating that we should rise to the surface.

His tank must have malfunctioned. When we reached the surface of the water, I pulled the regulator out of my mouth. “What the hell happened?”

Talon removed my extra regulator and took a long, deep breath. “I don’t know,” he said, still breathless. “My air started coming really fast. Like a fire hose. I didn’t know what to do.”

Raj rose to the surface and swam back toward us. “Everything okay?”

Everything was not okay, or we wouldn’t have come up. But I didn’t say that. Talon was still a little breathless, so I spoke. “He had a problem with his tank and regulator. The air started coming really fast.”

“Free flowing. Shit,” Raj said. “We’re close enough that we can swim from here.”

About ten minutes later, we reached a point where we could stand on the ground and get our shoulders out of the water. Although we removed our fins, walking with all the equipment was arduous, but we soon reached the sandy shore.

Talon was still visibly shaken up, his body rigid and tense.

“Why didn’t you signal?” Raj asked him.

“He was frantic. He forgot. We only just learned this shit a few hours ago,” I said. “Leave him alone.”

“Hey, mon, I didn’t mean anything. I admit I went through everything quicker than a dive instructor would. Don’t you remember what I said about a free-flow malfunction?”

“I said he was frantic. You don’t know his past.” No way was I going to let him give Talon a hard time.

“Ry,” Talon said, his eyes pleading with me.

I said no more about his past. “What do you suppose happened?” I asked Raj.

“Could have been a simple malfunction,” he said. “It’s certainly not unheard of. Or…someone could have tampered with it.”

I didn’t want to think about the latter option. Only four others on the yacht besides the three of us. Did one of them want to keep us from reaching this island?

Talon was still shuddering. I touched his shoulder.

“Hey. It’s okay. We’re okay.” I looked ahead. “We’re going to make it.”

“I’m never doing that again,” Talon said.

I clutched at the waterproof container strapped to my hip. It contained a change of clothes and some supplies. It also contained a loaded gun and as much extra ammo as would fit—not much. Raj and Talon each had one as well. We’d be safe. And I wasn’t leaving Talon’s side.

We trudged along the deserted beach. The moon and stars in the clear night sky gave adequate guidance. My nerves were a mess, and I didn’t take my eyes off my brother. He’d been my hero for so long. My anchor. Now I needed to be his.

Someone on that boat might have just tried to kill him.

I didn’t take that lightly.

We pulled off our fins and changed clothes quickly.

“We need to find a place to stash our tanks and snorkels,” Raj said.

I looked around and squinted. Trees blanketed the land, surprisingly.

“Before settlement, the Caribbean islands were a diverse forested ecosystem,” Raj said when I asked about the foliage.

I looked around the coastline. It was dark, but I sure couldn’t see any ending. This wasn’t a small island. A faint light shone in the distance through the trees. “Do you see that?” I asked, pointing.

“Yah, mon,” Raj said. “Go toward the light, as they say. But first let’s hide our stuff somewhere out here where no one will look.”

“Why not bury it in the sand?” Talon said.

“Good idea,” Raj said. “But we have to be able to find it again if we need it. I’ll be in touch with the captain on the boat, but we need to be cautious. Someone may have tampered with your tank. We don’t know who we can trust now.” He looked around. “I don’t see a cell phone tower anywhere around, but I do seem to have service.” He fidgeted with his phone. “So there’s something around here somewhere. There are Wi-Fi networks too.”

I turned to regard my brother. He was still pale.

“Hey.” I grabbed his forearm. “You okay?”

He nodded.

“You sure? You don’t have to do this. We can leave right now.” Though I wasn’t sure how, since someone on the boat possibly wanted us dead.

“We have to do this. I have to do this. I have to put an end to this once and for all.” He stiffened and inhaled. “Let’s do it.”

I nodded, sending up a message of thanks to whoever was listening. I didn’t want to leave Talon in Raj’s care, but that’s what I would have done.

Whether Talon went forward or not, I had to.

I had to find Ruby.

Chapter Fourteen

Ruby

“Seems we’ve got time,” I said, looking out the window. “It’s dark now, and I have no desire to go back to that cell you had me in. So tell me the long story.”

He opened his mouth to speak when his phone buzzed on the desk. He glanced at it. “They’re here.”

“Who?”

“Who do you think? Three men have been spotted on the outskirts of the island.”

Three men. The Steel brothers.

A lump formed in my throat. “Don’t you dare hurt them.”

“I told you they’d follow the bread crumbs. That they’d come for you. Didn’t you believe me?”

I tried swallowing the lump, to no avail. I hadn’t doubted him. Ryan would have come for me through a blinding snowstorm. Nothing would stop him, even though I’d wished so hard for him not to follow me. I couldn’t bear the thought of him being in harm’s way.

“Haven’t the Steels been through enough?” I said.

“Not nearly,” he said.

“What do you have against them, anyway?”

“My beef is with Brad, not his sons.”

“Then why bring them here? I don’t understand.”

“I have my reasons.”

“You have Brad Steel. He’s somewhere here. You’ve obviously been keeping him here for seven years, letting his children think he’s dead. Why not just let the family be?”