The medical bay of the Leviathan smelled sharply of iodine and ozone.
Elara pushed through the heavy sliding doors, her heart hammering a frantic rhythm against her ribs. The room was a state-of-the-art sterile suite, bathed in stark white light. In the center, hooked up to a dozen monitors, lay Marcus.
He looked terrifyingly fragile. His collarbone jutted sharply against his pale skin, and a thick white bandage was wrapped securely around his abdomen. But as Elara stepped to the edge of the bed, his head turned, and his eyes—the exact same shade of stormy gray as hers—crinkled at the corners.
"You look..." Marcus's voice was a dry, scraping rasp, "...expensive."
Elara let out a sound that was half-sob, half-laugh. She leaned over the railing, burying her face in the crook of his neck, being incredibly careful not to press against his chest.
"You idiot," she whispered, hot tears finally spilling over her lashes. "Four years, Marcus. You let me think you were at the bottom of the Atlantic."
"I was," he breathed, his hand coming up to weakly grip her shoulder. "For the first year, anyway. Until I realized the crash wasn't an accident. I had to stay dead, El. If Thorne or Elias knew I survived, they would have come for you and Mom immediately."
At the mention of their mother, Elara went rigid. She pulled back, her eyes dropping to the pristine white sheets.
"Mom is gone, Marcus. Richard poisoned her," Elara said, the words tasting like ash. "And Richard... Richard is dead, too."
"I know," Marcus said quietly. There was no shock in his voice, only a profound, heavy sorrow. "I read the encrypted comms, Elara. I watched it happen from the digital shadows, and I couldn't stop it. But I saw you tonight. On those steps. You didn't just survive them. You took our family back."
He shifted his gaze past Elara.
Alexander stood just inside the sliding doors. He had given the siblings their space, standing perfectly still with his arms crossed over his broad chest. The sheer, overwhelming aura of the billionaire seemed too large for the sterile room.
Marcus let out a weak, breathy chuckle. "You married the Grim Reaper, little sister."
"He prefers 'CEO'," Elara murmured, wiping her eyes as she stood up straight. She looked back at Alexander, who stepped forward, his pitch-black eyes locking onto Marcus with a look of intense, assessing respect.
"You have a titanium spine, Vance," Alexander said, his voice a low, steady rumble. "You gave us Elias. You gave us the entire map. When you recover, the Cross Holding Group will owe you a debt."
Marcus shook his head against the pillow. His expression suddenly turned razor-sharp, the lethargy of the painkillers burning away.
"You don't have the whole map yet," Marcus warned, his voice dropping to a tense whisper. "Elara... what happened at the pier tonight? When you met Chloe?"
Elara frowned, exchanging a quick glance with Alexander. "Richard found us. The fog was too thick to see the perimeter. A sniper shot Chloe in the head right in front of me, and then Richard tried to kill me."
"Did you check her pulse?" Marcus demanded.
"Alexander was being shot at. I grabbed the vial of neurotoxin from her hand and Richard ambushed me. There was no time," Elara explained, her stomach tightening. "Why?"
"Because Elias Cross doesn't leave loose ends," Marcus said, gritting his teeth as he pushed himself slightly upright. "I hacked into Thorne's secondary ledger two days ago. Richard was a greedy idiot, yes. But Elias would never trust a man like Richard to execute a multi-billion dollar corporate destabilization without a handler."
The temperature in the room seemed to plummet.
"Chloe wasn't Richard's pawn," Elara realized, the blood draining from her face. "Richard was hers."
"She's an asset," Marcus confirmed. "Elias groomed her. He paid for her elite schooling, funded her lifestyle, and planted her in our house to manipulate Julian and push Richard into action. She was never the crying, pathetic victim."
Alexander uncrossed his arms, stepping right up to the edge of the bed. The lethal predator was instantly awake. "The sniper."
"It was a blood squib," Marcus said grimly. "A theatrical exit. The suppressive fire wasn't meant to kill you, Cross. It was meant to keep your security detail pinned down just long enough for Elias's 'cleaners' to drag her body away into the fog. Elias needed Elara to hold that vial so the FAB could frame her for murder."
Elara felt sick. Chloe, the girl who had sobbed hysterically, the girl who had played the terrified victim in two different lifetimes, was a sociopathic phantom acting on Elias's direct orders.
"If she's alive," Alexander said, his voice vibrating with absolute, murderous intent, "then she is the only living witness who can definitively tie Elias to your mother's murder and the federal conspiracy. The ledger proves financial fraud. Chloe proves homicide."
"Exactly," Marcus said. "And she hasn't left the country yet. She can't. The FAB put the city on lockdown to trap you two. She's waiting at a secondary extraction point for a falsified diplomatic passport."
"Where?" Alexander demanded.
"An abandoned FAB black site in the industrial district. Pier 18," Marcus said, falling back against the pillows, entirely spent. "They're moving her at dawn."
Alexander looked at his matte-black watch. It was 3:00 AM.
He didn't say another word to Marcus. He turned on his heel and strode out of the medical bay.
Elara squeezed Marcus's hand. "Rest. We're going to finish this."
She ran out into the hallway, catching up to Alexander as he stormed toward the yacht's armory. The sheer violence radiating off him was suffocating.
"Alexander," Elara called out, grabbing his arm as he punched the keypad to the armory door.
He stopped, looking down at her. His eyes were entirely black, a void of lethal calculation.
"She played you, Elara," Alexander growled, his jaw locked so tight a muscle ticked in his cheek. "She stood in your house, ate at your table, and helped Elias murder your mother. I'm going to tear that black site down to the studs."
"No," Elara said, stepping into his space. She wasn't holding him back; she was sharpening him. "If you go in guns blazing, Elias's men will put a real bullet in her head to silence her. We need her alive for the boardroom on Monday."
Alexander paused. The armory door hissed open behind him, revealing walls lined with matte-black weaponry and tactical gear.
"What's the play?" he asked.
"Elias thinks we're running. He thinks the DOJ is about to freeze Thorne's accounts, but he doesn't know we know about Chloe," Elara said, her mind working with terrifying speed. "We don't send a strike team. We send a ghost."
Alexander raised a dark eyebrow.
"Liam takes a squad to hit the front gates of Pier 18. Make it loud. Make them think it's a desperate cartel hit," Elara instructed, her eyes burning with icy vengeance. "While they're distracted, you go in through the water. Quietly. You don't fight her guards, Alexander. You steal her."
A slow, devastating smirk spread across Alexander's face. He reached out, his large hands gripping her waist, pulling her flush against him.
"A distraction and an extraction," Alexander murmured, his lips brushing hers. "You would have made a terrifying general, Mrs. Cross."
"I'm a Vance," Elara corrected softly, her eyes glinting. "I'm making a hostile acquisition."