Chapter 71 Nikolai
The fight spilled out onto the beach and I pulled Marlena with me through the shattered back door while bullets kept coming, wood and glass exploding around us as we ran across the sand toward the rocks where we might have some cover.
Damien's men were right behind us and I could hear them shouting coordinates and positions to each other like this was just another operation and not our lives falling apart, and I kept Marlena in front of me using my body as a shield because if anyone was going to get shot it was going to be me and not her and not our baby.
We made it to the rocks and I pushed her down behind the biggest one and crouched beside her while bullets hit the stone above our heads and sent chips flying, and I could see her face was white with fear and her hands were shaking as she held the gun she'd used to shoot Damien.
"Stay down," I told her, "don't move unless I tell you to."
Then I heard it, the sound of more boats coming fast from the other direction, and for a second I thought it was more of Damien's people and we were completely surrounded, but then I saw them and my chest went tight with something that felt almost like relief.
Irina and Katya.
They came in on two small boats with maybe eight people total, all of them armed and moving like professionals, and they hit the beach running and immediately engaged Damien's men with precision fire that drove them back toward their own boats.
Katya spotted us behind the rocks and ran over in a crouch while bullets zipped past her head, and when she reached us she was breathing hard but her eyes were focused and clear.
"We need to get you out of here," she said, looking at Marlena and then at me, "there's a boat waiting on the north side of the island, can you make it?"
"Yes," I said, but even as I said it I knew we'd have to cross open ground to get there and Damien's men weren't giving up, they were regrouping near their boats and setting up better positions.
Irina appeared beside Katya and she looked at me with fierce determination and said "Go now while we cover you, don't stop no matter what happens."
I nodded and grabbed Marlena's hand and we ran.
The sand made it hard to move fast and every step felt like it took forever while the sound of gunfire got louder behind us, our people and Damien's people shooting at each other with us caught in the middle running toward safety that felt impossibly far away.
I could see the boat ahead, just a small fishing boat with an outboard motor, and we were maybe fifty feet from it when I felt the impact.
It hit my chest like someone had swung a sledgehammer and knocked all the air out of my lungs and sent me stumbling forward before my legs stopped working right and I went down hard onto the sand.
Marlena screamed and I heard it from very far away like I was underwater, and then she was there kneeling beside me with her hands on my chest and I could see blood spreading dark and fast across my shirt.
"No," she was saying over and over, "no no no, Nikolai stay with me, please stay with me."
I tried to breathe but my chest wouldn't cooperate, something was wrong inside where the bullet had gone in, and when I coughed blood came up warm and metallic.
The fighting continued around us but it sounded distant now and everything was starting to go soft at the edges, my vision getting blurry and my thoughts moving slow like they were pushing through mud.
I grabbed Marlena's hand with mine and held it tight even though my grip was getting weaker, and I needed to tell her things before it was too late, important things she needed to know.
"Listen to me," I said and my voice came out wet and wrong, "the money, all of it, the account numbers are in my phone under the name Thomas Reid, password is your birthday, take it all and run as far as you can."
"Stop," she said, crying now with tears running down her face and mixing with the blood on her hands, "you're going to be fine, we're going to get you to a doctor and you're going to be fine."
"Take care of our baby," I continued because I didn't have time to argue with her about whether I'd be fine, "raise her safe and happy, tell her about me but don't let her make my mistakes, don't let her build her life on revenge."
"Please don't leave me," Marlena said, and her voice broke completely, "I just got you back, you can't leave me now."
"I love you," I said, and I needed her to hear that more than anything else, "I love you more than I've ever loved anything, you're the best thing that ever happened to me and I'm sorry I wasted so much time being angry instead of being with you."
My eyes were getting heavy and it was harder to keep them open, the world was going dark around the edges and Marlena's face above me was the only thing I could still see clearly.
"I love you too," she said, and she leaned down and kissed me and I could taste salt from her tears, "I love you so much, please don't go, please."
The darkness was pulling at me now insistent and strong and I didn't think I could fight it anymore, my chest hurt too much and breathing was too hard and I was so tired.
I tried to squeeze her hand one more time to tell her it was okay, that she'd be okay, that I was sorry for all of it, but I don't know if she felt it because everything was fading fast now.
The last thing I heard was shouting in English, Damien's voice calling for a ceasefire and medics, and then hands were pulling Marlena away from me while other hands pressed down on my chest trying to stop the bleeding.
"We need to move him now," someone said, "he's losing too much blood, if we don't get him to a hospital in the next twenty minutes he's not going to make it."
They lifted me and I felt myself being carried and the movement sent pain shooting through my whole body but I couldn't cry out because I couldn't get enough air, and then I was being loaded onto something hard and flat, a stretcher maybe.
Marlena's face appeared above me one more time and she was still crying but she looked determined now, fierce in a way I'd never seen before.
"Don't you dare die," she said, "you promised to protect me forever and you can't do that if you're dead, so you fight, do you hear me, you fight."
I tried to nod but I don't know if I managed it before the darkness took me completely.