Up ahead, Alex dropped onto the glass bridge and started running in the opposite direction—toward Zoe and Italy. Toward safety and home. But Sergei wasn’t far behind her, gun out and closing fast. Sawyer saw it all from his place in the sky. In fact, he was probably the first to realize—
The bridge wasn’t finished—it just dead-ended in midair.
“Alex!” he yelled as she slammed to a stop, staring out over the cold, empty void. The drop was at least fifteen feet, but Sergei was barreling toward her. There was no place to go. She looked up at Sawyer and, for a heartbeat, she looked like Zoe—like at any moment she was going to roll her eyes and call him a jerkface.
But before he could drop to the bridge to help, she yelled, “Go get my sister.” Then she spread out her arms and jumped.
“Alex!” Zoe was running across the ancient glacier that was really just a field of ice and snow—extremely unstable ice and snow—and Sawyer died a little with every step she took.
“Zoe! Stay there!” he shouted, but she kept running. Infuriating woman. And then, worse, she stopped.
Her eyes filled with terror as she looked behind him then shouted, “Alex!”
Sawyer glanced back in time to see Sergei jump from the unfinished bridge and onto Alex. They crashed to the surface, rolling and fighting, and Sawyer watched in horror as the drive flew from Alex’s hand and across the icy ground.
The drive that he’d searched for. The drive that he’d killed for. The drive that wasn’t just his job—it was his future.
That drive was the end of Kozlov and the thing that was most likely to keep Zoe safe, so Sawyer stopped thinking and just . . . let . . . go . . .
He felt himself flying through the air and crashing to the top of the glacier. He heard the ice crack beneath him, felt the slide as the snow began to roll down the steep slope like a wave.
The wind blew around him, stinging his skin with icy pellets. Dusty snow was like smoke, filling his lungs. But he could see an outcropping of rocks poking up through the glacier’s surface, so lunged for them, grabbing hold and stopping his fall, but the drive wasn’t so lucky. It was twenty feet behind him and still sliding. Almost to the edge now. Almost gone.
“Sawyer!” Alex shouted, but he couldn’t even turn; he was too busy clawing and crawling toward the drive that was slipping closer and closer to the edge. Grappling for balance. Desperate for traction. But he couldn’t stop. He’d given five years of his life to stopping Kozlov. He had to get there. He had to get it. He was so close now. He just had to—
The moment Zoe screamed the world stopped.
The wind stopped blowing and his heart stopped beating and everything he’d ever loved or wanted or feared converged on the place where Collins was dragging Zoe to the ground. Hands on her throat. Squeezing. And everything—literally everything—changed.
The drive was nothing. Kozlov was nothing. His career . . . His father . . . They were all nothing compared to the terror of watching the woman he loved die.
“Zoe!” he yelled, charging back up the glacier, trying to climb and claw his way toward her, but the slope was too steep and the ice was too slick and she was just too far away.
She was too far away, but Sawyer had to reach her and save her and tell her . . . He had to tell her that she was the only thing on this earth that mattered. So he clawed harder, faster until—
He hadn’t gotten to see her use The Move on the boat. He’d been too late to watch her free herself from that Russian assassin, but this time he saw her twist and kick and push until Collins was off her—until she was free. Kind of. Because Collins was still right there—just a foot or so away.
“You fucking bitch!” he shouted, but Zoe kicked again—not at the man. At the ice. Her heels pierced the snowy surface then pushed, and when he lunged again, the ice shifted. Just a little. And then it was crumbling and Collins was sliding. Falling. Washing away on a wave of ice and snow.
Zoe’s cheeks were pink and her hair was wild, but when she smiled down at him, she was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen, and for the first time in his life, Sawyer believed in happy endings.
But then the smile faded. The snow shifted. And crumbled. And in the next second, Zoe was sliding too—faster and faster toward the edge.
“No!” Sawyer roared, diving for the rocks again, anchoring himself with one hand while he stretched out with the other. Straining. Praying. Reaching—not for her hand but for his future. For his everything.
“Zoe!” he shouted over the sounds of Collins’s screams—