BEYOND THE EMBERS OF VENGEANCE

The rush of freezing wind tore the screams from their throats as the heavy steel cable swung out over the cavernous dry dock in a terrifying, parabolic arc.

Below them, the mercenaries opened fire, muzzle flashes flickering like strobes in the dark. Bullets ricocheted off the massive steel hook above their heads, sending showers of bright orange sparks raining down through the wind.

The swing carried them eighty feet across the open expanse, clearing the perimeter fence and the concrete barricades of the dry dock in a fraction of a second.

"Brace!" Matteo roared into Anna’s ear.

At the apex of the swing, Matteo released the secondary quick-release latch on the strap.

They plummeted twenty feet down into the open bed of a massive industrial gravel barge moored in the adjoining canal. They slammed into the mountains of loose pea-gravel, tumbling down the slope in a chaotic tangle of limbs and flying dust.

Anna scrambled to her feet instantly, coughing out grit, dragging Elena up beside her. "Elena, are you hit?!"

Elena checked herself with trembling hands, covered in gray dust and bruises, but unpunctured. "I'm... I'm okay! I'm alive!"

Matteo rolled to his feet, groaning as his previously fractured ribs screamed in protest, but his weapon remained leveled toward the dock behind them.

On the pier, the mercenaries were scrambling toward their patrol trucks, headlights flashing across the water.

"Lev!" Matteo bellowed into his tactical radio. "Bring the van! Pier forty-six!"

The gravel barge’s diesel tug was idling at the stern, its crew having fled when the gunfire began. Matteo sprinted to the wheelhouse, smashed the window, and slammed the throttle forward.

The heavy tug groaned, its massive propeller churning the black water of the canal into white foam as the barge pulled away from the dry dock wharves, drifting into the open shipping lanes of Port Phillip Bay just as the mercenary trucks skidded to a halt on the pier.

The contractors fired frantically from the edge of the wharf, but the thick steel plate of the gravel barge deflected the rifle rounds like harmless rain.

Anna collapsed against the steel coaming of the barge, pulling Elena tight against her chest. Both sisters sank into the gravel, tears cutting clean streaks through the dust on their faces, laughing and crying in the cold Australian wind.

Matteo walked back from the wheelhouse, dropping his empty rifle onto the deck. He knelt beside them, his large, calloused hands coming to rest on their shoulders, anchoring them against the storm.

"It's over," Matteo whispered, his voice cracking with emotion. "The Consortium’s servers are wiped. Sterling is dead. There are no more files, no more accounts, no more ghosts."

Elena looked up at him, her eyes filled with awe and reverence. "You destroyed an entire empire for me?"

Matteo looked at Anna, his dark eyes filled with an infinite, tender warmth that belonged only to her. "I would burn the entire world to keep this family safe."

Anna reached up, her dirt-caked fingers tangling into Matteo's hair, pulling his face down to hers. Her lips crashed against his in a kiss that was fierce, desperate, and taste of salt, copper, and absolute victory.