Nearly eight hours later, I sit in a large chair on the bridge of the yacht, swirling around a glass of the thousand-dollar vodka I found in the bar while I listen to the ringing of the phone against my ear.

I’ve scoured the ship for the source of the noise, but I can’t find another soul aboard. If there’s an assassin with me here, he’s both well-hidden and incredibly patient. But regardless of whether he’s here to kill me, the ship needs fuel, and it doesn’t particularly care who wants to kill who when it runs out of gas and leaves us stranded in open waters.

After a few long rings, I hear a gruff, tired male voice pick up the line.

“Who the fuck-”

“Nikita,” I say in a pleasant tone. “Nice to hear your voice after so long.”

“… Vladimir?” he says, suddenly sounding a lot more alert, almost alarmed. I can’t blame him. My calling at this hour of the night usually isn’t a good sign for any of my contacts, and I do not mind having that kind of effect on people.

“You know I hate to call this late,” I said, keeping up the pretense that this is just a pleasant conversation between friends. “I’ll keep this brief, and I’m hoping you can do the same. Are you still working the docks at Sevastopol?”

“I… of course I am,” he asked, sounding more reluctant by the second. “Listen, if you have a drop off-”

“Nothing like that,” I laugh mirthlessly. “This is much more, let’s say straightforward. I’ll be at your dock in half an hour. I have a large yacht that needs refueling. In addition to that, I need enough for a very, very long trip—New York. I’ll pay twice the market rate in cash, plus an early Christmas bonus. I’d really rather keep this between us, you understand.”

There’s a pause on the line, and I can perfectly see Nikita’s disbelieving face in my head. Finally, he stammers for a few moments before finding his tongue again.

“Yes, yes, of course! I ahh, think I can have that ready for you. Just you?”

“Just me.”

“Right, right, always the private man. Let’s keep it that way, yes? But ahh, should I expect anyone to come asking questions about your trip? Just so I know what I’m, ahh, dealing with, of course.”

“Nikita, you won’t be hearing from any of the Gregorovitches for a long time,” I say casually. “In fact, you can think of this as severance pay. They won’t be harassing you and your wife anytime soon. And ideally, you won’t hear from me anymore at all. Think of it as our parting gift.”

“Understood,” Nikita says almost feverishly, and I can hear the sounds of clothes being put on in a hurry over the phone. “I’ll have it ready for you. You won’t even need to get off the boat.”

“You’re a good man, Nikita,” I say mildly, and I end the call before taking a swig of vodka.

Over an hour later, I’m handing over a staggering amount of cash to Nikita in the bowels of the ship, watching him unzip the bag and nearly go bug-eyed at the sight of the stacks of money.

“You can count it, if you like, I won’t be offended,” I say politely.

“That… won’t be necessary,” Nikita says, trying to contain his excitement at the amount of money he’s running his hands over. “This looks more than adequate. You’re a generous man, Vladimir.”

“Don’t mention it,” I grunt. “How much longer? I’d like to get moving the instant you’re finished.”

“Just a few more minutes,” Nikita says, standing up with his payment and nodding hurriedly at me. “I’ll head to the fuel lines outside and text that number you called me from so you can pull out of here the second that last drop has hit the tank.”

“Perfect. Go.”

Nikita turns to leave, but he pauses, spinning back around with his mouth open as if hesitating to say something. I arch an eyebrow at him, and he runs a hand through his hair.

“There was… one other thing I wanted to mention. I’m sure you already know about it, but… is this yacht a… recent acquisition?”

I do not reply.

“I don’t say that to imply anything, of course,” Nikita says hastily. “It’s just that, this is a very nice yacht, but when I was loading some of the fuel, I noticed that some of the ship’s design overhead was a little abnormal.”

“Abnormal how?” I ask, stepping forward.

“Shaped a little oddly,” he says meaningfully. “I couldn’t say exactly how, but when you’ve worked around luxury yachts as long as I have, you just tend to notice signs of custom additions when you see them. That’s all.”

I nod slowly at him as he takes his leave, and I glance up at the ceiling before heading up above deck.

The first thing I do is move to the bridge and wait for Nikita’s signal. Once I have it, I watch him wave to me from the dock, and I slowly move the yacht away from the coast and set the course in the ship’s computer.

If there’s a rat to deal with on the ship, I don’t want him to have an easy escape from me.

I keep my hand on my pistol in my jacket and move all the way over to the master bedroom, where I freeze as soon as I enter.

This was where I heard the sound when I got here. At the time, I was sure there had been someone nearby, but I questioned whether I’d just been hearing things when my search turned up nothing.

But Nikita’s tip that there might be something hidden on the yacht makes me second-guess myself.

My eyes scan the walls, looking for any abnormality. What really alarms me is that my first search of the yacht didn’t show me anything that stood out as an obvious custom design on anything. Yes, the yacht is over-the-top luxurious in every way, but there’s a kind of harmony and smoothness to the whole design. Later additions usually stick out like a sore thumb, especially when absurdly rich Russians are in charge of construction.

All that adds up to hinting that there’s a hidden room on this ship.

It could easily be just a panic room, but it could also be more elaborate than that. I didn’t think my ears had deceived me, and what I heard sounded like human movement. I would not put it past the late Mr. Gregorovitch to have an additional security room squirreled away somewhere on the ship.

Bang bang bang!

I freeze, holding my gun out in front of me at the sound of three hard bangs against metal. My eyes widen the next moment as I hear… a scream? It’s muffled, and if there was a word in there, it is now lost. But my heart is pounding, and my instincts are on high alert.

I am definitely not alone, but now, I’m starting to doubt the “secret guards” theory.

Moving to the bed, I start checking the nightstand for signs of a switch, anything that could either open the door I’m looking for or activate it remotely. I hear the banging again, and I can tell it’s coming from the wall directly across from the foot of the bed. But while I’m investigating the bed, I find a few things that give me pause.

There’s a blindfold in the nightstand, as well as multiple pairs of handcuffs of different kinds. In the drawer below that is a number of other assorted sex toys and lube. I kneel down to look under the bed when my foot brushes against something, and I pull out what appears to be restraints—bondage gear.

My gaze snaps to the ceiling, and I see what are obviously cameras aimed at the bed at various angles, and I spot a few on the walls, too. My jaw tightens.

The boss was planning to do some depraved shit in this bed.

Then comes the banging again, and I look to that wall, almost trying to see through it. The shout comes again, and my heart does a somersault as I pick up on the voice’s pitch.

It’s a woman. I’m sure of it.

I hurriedly start feeling around the walls and the occasional piece of art hanging in the room, mind racing. Who could he have locked up here? The why seems obvious enough, given what I see on the bed. But this has gone from a potential threat to something very different, and I don’t know what to make of it just yet. All I know is I need to find a way into that room.

Finally, I notice a light fixture within arm’s reach that’s fastened in by a ring with small metal screws, but one of the screws looks peculiar. I run my finger over it and find that it’s smooth—not a screw, but a subtle button.

I press it, and I hear a click from behind me.

My gun goes back into my jacket, but I keep my grip on it as I watch a secret door reveal itself, slowly sliding aside right where the banging had been coming from.

There, I see her, and my jaw drops.

She has rich brown hair tied back in a loose ponytail, and her eyes are the same shade. A simple skirt, a blouse, and a vest over it completes the picture of a young woman in her early twenties with a kind of simple dignity, probably educated, and probably relatively well-off up until now, because she looks absolutely terrified.

There’s so much beauty in that face that it stuns me to silence. My first look at her is cold, analytical, like a hunter sizing up his prey. It’s what this life has trained me to do. As soon as that first glance is over, though, I see a vulnerable young woman who was about to meet a terrible fate at the hands of some very powerful men.

And now, her fate is in my hands… and she is a major liability.

Neither of us have spoken. Her gaze has been locked on me. And my hand has been on my gun the whole time.

The only question now is whether I’ll have to use it.