The car had barely stopped when Aidan was jumping out. Dozens of vehicles were scattered around the parking lot, one of those being the van that had driven Cassie away in the CCTV footage.
His stomach contracted. He pushed himself to run down the trail faster than he’d ever run in his life. He’d studied the trail on his phone during the drive. For a normal man, the trail to the waterfall would take an hour or more of walking.
He leaped over a tree root. Tyler’s feet pounded the ground behind him. He also heard the distant sound of another car pulling up. Of more feet hitting the path. Callum and Flynn.
Fear was a familiar ball in his gut. Fear that he’d be too late. Fear that he’d never hold Cassie in his arms again. Kiss her. Marry her and fill their home with their children.
Fuck. He wanted to do all that. He’d barely survived losing her the first time, and he’d only been able to do that because she’d been alive. She’d existed in this world, and he’d thought she was happy.
He moved faster, ignoring the branches that whipped his face and the way his feet sank into the dirt. The footprints in the ground had the unease inside him intensifying. The assholes had forced her to the waterfall. Every last one of them would pay.
When the top of the waterfall came into view, he shut off his emotions. All of them. The anxiety. The fear. The goddamn churning of his gut.
He stopped at the top of the falls and looked down just in time to see Elijah shove Cassie beneath the surface of the water.
Every muscle in his body went cold.
He pulled out his gun but before he could shoot, the man cried out and dropped below the water as well. Shit! He couldn’t shoot at the water. Not while Cassie was under.
Shoving the gun back into the holster, he began the climb down.
Sampson stood near the pool. When he spotted Aidan, he lifted a gun. He only got it halfway up when a shot sounded from the top of the falls.
Tyler.
Sampson dropped to the ground, bullet to the chest.
Screams erupted and people started running. Not all of them, though. Some ran into the water—aiming straight for Cassie and Elijah. Whether they were trying to drown Cassie or save their leader, he had no idea.
Hands grabbed at Cassie’s feet, but she kicked them away. The waterfall wasn’t far from where they’d been standing. That was her goal. Get there, find something, anything, that she could use to save herself.
She felt the hard pelting of the waterfall. She gave two more kicks. Then, finally, she propelled herself up.
The second her head broke through the surface, she sucked in a lungful of air and grabbed on to the rocks. There was a gap of space between the falls and the water. The space was tiny, but it was something. A small sanctuary.
She scanned the rocks, almost crying out in frustration. There was nothing here. No hiding spaces. No objects to use as a weapon. Except…
She reached over and grabbed a medium-size rock.
That was it. All she had. Now she had to fight and hope like hell that help was coming. She was not going to give up, and she certainly wasn’t going to remain docile while Elijah tried to drown her. She had too much to live for.
She was just turning back to the falls when Elijah rose from the water, a vicious sneer on his face.
He dove forward and shoved her under.
She narrowly avoided water flooding into her mouth. She kicked and pushed at him from beneath the water, the rock still in her hands. The man didn’t budge.
Her limbs started to ice, and darkness tried to hedge her vision from the lack of oxygen, but she forced herself to keep fighting. To do anything and everything to get away. To survive.
Gripping the rock tightly, she flung her hands out of the water and hit him as hard as she could. She had no idea what part of him she connected with, but his hands slipped, and she rose up, sucking in big gulps of air. Her mind was going fuzzy, and she wasn’t sure if it was the lack of air, the cold, or her hypotension. Maybe all three.
The water from the falls pummeled them both. She threw back her arm and slammed him in the head with the rock. Elijah cried out. She tried to hit him again, but he yanked the rock from her grasp. Before he could grab her wrists, she flung her roped hands around his neck and yanked him under. He immediately grabbed her waist, pulling her down with him.
Her lungs screamed for breath. She swung and punched him, desperately trying to swim up for air, but the man wasn’t letting go. He was going to drown them both.
She tore at the arm around her. She was vaguely aware of the falls pounding above them. When she couldn’t hold her breath any longer, she opened her mouth and sucked in a gulp of water.
Aidan dove into the water. Two guys jumped on his back to try to stop him, but he kicked them away. The assholes were trying to slow him down so Elijah could drown Cass.
No fucking way.
He plunged beneath the surface and swam. His team would take care of the others. They’d already shot a few people swimming toward Elijah and Cassie. Several of Elijah’s guards had pulled their guns, but his team took care of them too.
His eyes were open as he propelled himself forward. When he finally spotted Cassie and Elijah, his stomach clenched.
Her eyes were closed—and she was drifting to the bottom of the pool.
Elijah released Cassie and pushed away from her, but his movements were slow, sluggish.
He hadn’t breached the surface by the time Aidan reached them.
Aidan didn’t give a damn. He ignored the other man and grabbed Cassie’s arm. The second they surfaced, he swam for the nearest bank and laid Cassie on the cold ground.
Bile rose in his throat at the sight of her, so still and pale, lips blue. He shoved the hair from his face, held her nose and leaned down. Then he breathed into her mouth two times.
Come on, Cassie. Come back to me.
When the breaths didn’t work, he began compressions against her chest.
“Come on, Cass! Breathe! I need you to breathe for me! I can’t lose you. I won’t lose you!”
He stopped compressions and breathed into her mouth again, just as Tyler appeared beside him. Aidan lifted his head and pressed once more on her chest—and her back arched as she coughed violently, water spewing from her mouth.
His heart damn near stopped. He quickly rolled her to her side. He pressed one hand to her back and used the other to hold her forehead. The blood in his veins stopped racing, and finally he could breathe, because she breathed.
“You’re okay! You’re alive,” he whispered. He wasn’t sure if the words were meant to comfort her or him. Maybe both.
Finally, the coughs stopped racking her chest, and air wheezed in and out of her. She looked at him, her eyes watering. “Aidan!”
She reached for him, and he tugged her against him. He held her tighter than he’d ever held her before, pressing his face into her hair, breathing her in.
“You’re alive,” he repeated. He couldn’t stop saying the words.
She dug her head into his chest. “I’m alive.”
