my left hand beneath my right. Cradling the grip of the pistol in my palm, I absorb the cool metal into my skin.
The blood on my wrists and hands has dried into cracked rows along the creases of my skin. My palms flake crimson.
Aksel’s voice is concerned. “Sophia, you don’t have to do this.” His large hand wraps over the top of mine. I know what he isn’t saying: Do not engage.
“I’ll do it,” he says.
But he is wrong. I have to engage—I have to end this. Here. Now. No one is going to do it for me. Bekami forfeited his life when he took mine, three kilometers from this pier. And again, when he killed my father.
Vendetta.
Bekami is not going to hurt anyone else. Not now. Not ever.
I hold Todd’s pistol in my hand—taut but loose.
I force my breathing into a steady rhythm: inhale … hold … exhale …
I no longer feel pain. Or anger. Only a heightened alertness. If I want to hit him accurately, I have to control my heartbeat, like my father has been teaching me for years.
With my finger on the trigger, I stare at Bekami. I recall his features: coal-black eyes, manicured hands, the smell of sweat and Yves Saint Laurent cologne. I feel his slithery hands on my neck. I feel the burning of the rope tying me to the copper pipe. His crass voice. His oily lips against my skin …
My father is right. He won’t haunt me any longer. I am stronger than him, stronger than any of them.
I close my eyes. Open them.
Bekami pulls something small and metal from his pocket. He is holding the briefcase in one hand. Though I’ve been watching him for ninety seconds, I’ve been so concentrated on the Louis Vuitton in his right hand, I hadn’t noticed the second, smaller briefcase he’s been carrying in his left.
A tattered leather briefcase, the same color as his pants.
“No …,” I gasp.
Rapidly, I calculate the terminal occupancy: three hundred people now loiter within a hundred-meter radius, some buying last-minute tickets at the kiosk, others jogging toward their cars. Some have begun driving up the ramp. The rope is lowered; the deck is filling with people; the ferry is filling with cars.
… A diversion …
Of course.
Bekami casually steps out of line. He isn’t going to the other side of Istanbul. He isn’t going to Europe. And he has no intention of staying on the ferry.
A glance at the sea confirms this. A dark blue cigarette boat circles in the water, halfway between the ferry and an idling, glimmering yacht.
To escape, Bekami only needs a way to occupy the Turkish Coast Guard, who monitor water traffic out of the Bosphorus Strait to the Black Sea. If Bekami can reach the open waters of the Black Sea, he can travel anywhere undetected … Bulgaria, Ukraine, Russia, Georgia … We’ll never find him.
Bekami sets the tattered leather briefcase down, so discreetly he barely bends his knees. He steps in front of it, wedging himself in between a group of chatting Turkish men, and proceeds back down the ramp.
“Todd’s here,” Aksel breathes.
At the far end of the pier, Todd speeds toward the ferry on his motorbike, weaving between the rows of cars filing up the ramp.
My eyes flash from the tattered leather briefcase to the Maybach to Todd.
“Todd, NO!” I sprint for him. “Todd!” I scream.
“Sophia!” Aksel grips my forearm, yanking me back. But I pull loose and run.
“We have to stop him!” I shout to Aksel.
Bekami must hear my screams. He looks over, expectant almost.
Todd reaches the swags of rope partitioning the line to board the ferry.
Bekami steps off the ramp and down the platform onto the dock. He carries the Louis Vuitton briefcase securely in his left hand; a silver detonator is snug inside his right.
Aksel mutters into a mouthpiece.
The cigarette boat speeds toward the pier.
Todd drops his bike at the edge of the pedestrian ramp and runs onto the ferry.
I look between the Maybach and Bekami, knowing what’s coming. Bekami planned this expertly. Timed his diversion perfectly.
Aksel leaps over the metal barrier and races for Bekami. A man inside the cigarette boat raises a submachine gun and aims it at Aksel.
Bekami steps carefully off the pier and onto the boat. Teetering briefly, he sets the fragile briefcase down and turns.
He looks straight at me with a proud, silky smile on his face—a look that says I won.
Triumphantly, he thumbs off the cap on the silver detonator.