Alena Boudreau went past them, headed the wrong way.
“What are you doing?” Voss shouted.
“Not leaving his gun behind!” Alena replied, snatching up Josh’s gun and then racing to keep up with them.
Then the hillside they had just descended came alive with white, undulating flesh — the sirens that had nearly taken them underground, at last giving chase. Alena and Voss fired in motion. Tori shouldered as much of Josh’s weight as she could, but Voss held him up as well, still managing to shoot at the things churning down the hill behind them.
“Let’s go!” Sykes called from up ahead, as if they were dragging their feet and not one hundred eighty pounds of bleeding FBI agent.
Then they burst out of the trees and onto soft sand that gave way beneath Tori’s boots, making it hard to run and even harder to drag Josh. Stone and Crowley had run ahead to the chopper, which waited on the beach with its door open. She saw Agent Nadeau leap out, beckoning and shouting, though his voice could not be heard over the chopper and the sirens. He helped them load David onto the helicopter.
Sykes and Mays and Gabe Rio had waited for them, and now all three of them raised guns to cover their race for the chopper. Tori saw something rise from the water and looked into the waves. They were there as well, emerging from the darkness of the deep water, rushing through the surf, mouths opening to reveal those needle teeth, faces split by rictus grins — as if the things could smile.
And they sang.
Mays fell under the onslaught from the water in seconds. He tried to shoot, tried to tear the creatures off, but arms and tentacle-like bodies wrapped around him, and the sailor went down amidst the teeth and the screaming melody of the sirens.
Gabe spun, took aim, and tore up the water and the sirens slithering from it in a hail of bullets. White flesh and splashes of dark ichor spattered the waves. Mays was already dead, but Gabe killed as many as he could and kept the line back.
Sykes and Crowley, who came back from the chopper to help, took aim at the creatures surging from the undergrowth and opened fire. Tori did not even turn to look. Her eyes were on the helicopter, on the open door, and she barely even saw the three men with their assault rifles now, two Navy heroes and one gun smuggler who seemed to have forgotten who he’d once been. And she realized that she had forgotten as well. The past didn’t matter anymore, only tomorrow. Only the next sunrise.
Nadeau rushed to meet them, and helped Tori and Voss half-drag and half-carry Josh the last dozen feet, and then they were scrambling into the back of the chopper. Nadeau and Voss slid Josh away from the door, their focus on their fellow agent, and that left Tori alone to reach for Alena’s hand, helping the woman in beside her. She went immediately to David and began to investigate his wounds, shouting for a med-kit.
Gabe and Crowley jumped onto the helicopter, but Sykes shouted something none of them could hear over the roar and kept firing into the dozens of creatures even as the chopper began to lift off. Only then did the lieutenant commander throw himself into the back of the helicopter. The gunfire ceased for a second or two, and then he and Crowley were both hanging out the door, firing again as they rose into the air.
Several of the leeches clung to the undercarriage and one crawled up the door on the other side of the chopper, but as they picked up speed and roared away from the shore, out over the dark water, they peeled away and tumbled into the sea.
Tori heard a voice, shouting, and looked up to see the pilot barking something into his headset, radioing the Hillstrom with the news. The first explosion came three seconds later, punching the air and rocking the chopper, propelling them toward the small cluster of ships a mile or two offshore. In the space of several heartbeats, hundreds of charges blew, spewing black stone and dust and chunks of earth into the air, lighting up the sky, and setting fire to the trees.
They were out of the caves. They’d have nowhere to go when the sun rose except into the water, and tomorrow morning, the extermination would begin. Those who weren’t crushed in collapsed caves or burned by the flames or the sun would have to be killed, and that would take time. Eventually, Alena’s people would destroy them all. Tori found comfort in that, and in the knowledge that when they finally killed the last of the creatures, she would be far, far from here.
She turned to look at Josh and saw that he had fallen unconscious at last, passed out in Rachael Voss’s lap. His partner stroked his hair, her own clothes stained with Josh’s blood, and Tori knew she was alone.
But alone didn’t scare her anymore.
EPILOGUE
Gabe sat in the dark, in a chair he had never used when he and Maya had shared this apartment. Its plush burgundy fabric gathered dust in the far corner of the living room, near the windows, where Maya had intended to use it for reading or for extra seating when they had company. A floor lamp arced from behind and the windows would have provided light during the day; it really was the perfect reading chair, though she had only rarely used it for that. As for company, they’d had very little over the past couple of years.
The window looked out at the lights of Miami. Even with the air-conditioning up too high, the way Maya liked it, the view of the sparkling city warmed him. He relished it, knowing that tonight would be the last he ever spent in Miami. The window also looked down on the street that ran by the front of the apartment building, and he could see the dark sedan parked across the road, and even the orange flicker of a burning cigarette inside. Agent Nadeau smoked. His partner, McIlveen — Mac, they called him — gave him shit about it: a constant stream of banter that Gabe would not miss.
He wanted quiet now.
Outside the apartment door there came the jangle of keys, followed by the scrape of one seeking the lock. With a click, the door swung inward and Maya entered, silhouetted in the light from the corridor, which made the red highlights in her hair glow. Just watching her move, the shape and gentle, familiar curve of her, Gabe felt his heart break all over again. His breath caught in his throat and he wondered if it had been a mistake coming here.
Maya dropped her keys on the little table under the mirror beside the door and set down her purse as she flicked on the light.
As she turned, Gabe breathed her name.
She jumped, and might have cried out if she hadn’t brought a hand up to her mouth to silence herself. The gesture broke him a little more inside, for she had always done the same while making love, embarrassed by the noise her body wanted to make.
“Gabriel. What are you doing here?” she asked, not approaching, eyes full of questions.
He wondered if she could see the broken pieces of him in his smile. “So, you missed me then?”
Maya exhaled, walking over to the sofa but not sitting. Instead, she stood behind it as though using it as some kind of shield, tracing her fingers along the sofa’s back.
“You blame me for being surprised? Last time we talked, you made your feelings pretty clear,” Maya said, fresh hurt and the old frustrations coming together in her tone. “Now I find you sitting in the dark, and … seriously, what the hell are you doing here? Something you left behind that you can’t live without?” Bitterness had crept into her voice.
“Miguel’s dead.”
The words startled her, like someone had slammed a door. And Gabe thought maybe that was near enough to the truth. Maya paled and stared at him, her breath coming a bit quicker. Her makeup was just so, her hair perfect, her hoop earrings the perfect accent for her face. Denim hugged her legs and ribbed cotton clung to her breasts and flat belly, all propped up on expensive heels. All in all, Maya Rio had the air of a woman confident in herself, the sort of woman who would draw stares she would pretend never to see.