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“There.”

He pointed, and I could see the outline of a crescent-shaped island with a large, central hill. There was a structure on one side — what amounted to a sprawling little compound, complete with gated walls. On the other, a long sand bar stretched out into nothingness, dissolving into the ocean.

“You sure you can land this thing?” I asked, probably for the fourth or fifth time.

Dakota just shrugged. “We’re gonna get wet either way,” he said. “Be ready. Once I set her down, we need to make the beach pretty fast. And then…”

He looked at me, and his words trailed off. I leaned over and kissed him hard. Harder and more forcefully than I’d ever kissed him before. Passion welled up in my heart, flowing through my body. Passion and love and adoration, driving away the last hints of uncertainty.

“It’s gonna work out,” I practically shouted into my headset’s microphone. “Trust me.”

I thought it oddly amusing, me reassuring him. After all this time, things really had come full circle.

We descended, lining up with the far end of the little island until we were parallel to the beach. I saw the concentration in Dakota’s eyes as he engaged the flaps. Eased off the throttle…

… and glided the aircraft’s pontoons downward, toward the smooth glass surface.

Thirty-Two

SAMMARA

I was winded from the climb, but no less worse for wear as I approached the stuccoed walls of the little compound. They were as smooth and white as the sand, stretching upward to two covered towers on either side of a large, iron-banded, oaken gate.

That gate opened as I approached, swinging wide on enormous hinges. I was open-armed, hands at my sides. Not so much for the two men who emerged to meet me, strapped with visible holsters and sporting automatic rifles which were thankfully pointed at the ground.

Holy shit, Sammara…

The gravity of the moment slammed me at once, its crushing weight attempting to trip me up. But I didn’t trip. I just kept walking, slowly closing the distance between me and the walls of the compound. Ea

ch step seemed heavier than the last, my brain screaming its danger warning as I abandoned the safety of the beach behind me.

About fifty yards from the gate I stopped. They stopped.

Time stopped.

“Markus Ladrone!” I called out. A slight breeze blew my hair into my face as I scanned the walls. More men stood in the towers, armed to the teeth. It was a good sign.

“Right here.”

A man emerged from the gate, looking shorter and squatter than the others. He had a thick mop of shiny dark hair. Hair that appeared only marginally less greasy than the last time I’d seen it.

Still, the man looked different overall. He was thinner now, and even healthier-looking. The scowl I remembered so vividly was all but gone. The lines were still there, but…

“Sammara.”

He walked between his two men and continued onward. One of them grunted something — a warning maybe — but he waved them off.

“That’s your name, isn’t it?”

I nodded, standing motionless as he approached. I tried not to look stiff. Tried not to appear nervous. The man strutting so casually up to me now could see past all that, though.

“You might be the last person in the world I expected to see today,” he grinned. His teeth were whiter than they were last time. His smile was almost… handsome.

He kept walking, not slowing his pace as he reached me. It was an intimidation tactic. I refused to back down a single step.

When he was three steps away I put my hand up. “That’s far enough.”

He took another step anyway, just because he could. I almost laughed.