“This wasn’t how I expected things to go,” he said. “But I’ll take it.”
Diana had to buy them and herself some time. Her eyes flashed around, searching her environment for something she could use. Almost nothing except for a small spider crawling across the dirt, scrambling away from the house. She watched it skitter on to Cameron’s shoe but moved her eyes back up to his so his attention wouldn’t be drawn to it.
“You did all you needed to do here,” Diana said. “You can walk away from this now. Start over.”
“That is what I’m doing,” Cameron said. “Just got a few loose ends to tie up first.”
“You got the money.”
“Not what I was promised.”
“I wasn’t the one who betrayed you,” Diana snapped.
“Sure you were.” Cameron grinned—his father’s smile. “Of course, you were. Everyone betrayed me. It wasn’t just Zabójca and Asher taking the money. You and Laird and all these other soldiers that think this shit isn’t affecting them right now and into their future. Your ignorance betrays me every time you open your goddamn mouth.”
“Your dad,” Diana started, “wouldn’t have wanted this for you, Cameron.”
“How would I know, Diana?” Cameron yelled, his voice falling flat against the back of the house and the desert around them. A tumbleweed, bobbling in the wind, caught on the edge of the garage. “How would I know what my father wanted? He died when I was fifteen. He was gone for almost my whole childhood. I didn’t know him because the military took him away from me. Ratanake took him from me. You took him from me!”
“Kushkin took him from you, Cameron,” Diana said. “Not us.”
“And then you partnered with Kushkin,” Cameron continued. “You showed your allegiances, Weick. They certainly don’t lie with anyone but yourself. You’re selfish. Just like every other fucking soldier out there, so worried about the way they’re perceived or their families. Too afraid to stand up for what’s right.”
“People can change,” Diana said. “Taras changed. You can change, Cameron.”
“I already did change!”
“Cameron—”
“Shut the fuck up.” Cameron pointed the barrel at her head. “I will paint the back of Laird’s house with your brains, Diana.”
She pressed her lips together, glaring up at him. He took a step closer; the spider crawled up his boot and onto his bare ankle.
It bit him, its tiny pincers latching on to his skin.
He barely noticed, shaking off his pants like he’d been scratched by a cat and not just bitten by a Brown Recluse spider. Diana recognized it from spending some time at the Louisiana base for basic training where they’d put up posters of the small orange-brown spiders to remind them of the dangers of its bite and to shake out their cot blankets before bed. It would take a few hours for him to feel that bite—if he survived that long.
The cool barrel of the gun pressed against her forehead, and Diana closed her eyes, really hoping that Cameron was done talking and if he was going to do it, he should just do it already. It wasn’t the way she wanted or planned to die, but it was one she was okay with.
Her family was safe. The Readers were virtually eradicated aside from the one in front of her. The Kushkins were all dead.
Death would be less comfortable than the retirement she had planned, but Diana had made her peace. She was no longer just the first woman SEAL or the one that had taken down the Kushkin organization. Now, she was an independent, working to protect her family and those close to her, making the choice of who to work with without orders and hand-holding. Whether those choices were right or wrong didn’t matter. The consequences of those decisions would come down on her, and she was prepared for that. She would not be Ratanake’s star pupil, heeding his every order, killing every bad guy he put in front of her. She would not be Amita Voss’s personal revenge puppet, set out by forced motivations and unstable relationships. Diana would live in her repercussions as a mother with no other need than to protect her family.
“Hey!” the familiar Texan accent called from above.
Both Diana and Cameron turned their heads. Laird was sticking his head out the window from the upstairs bedroom, rifle in his hands, pointing it right at Cameron’s forehead. His face was pale and his lips were gray and chapped, a burning joint hanging between them, as a drop of blood dripped from his mouth, staining the paper.
Laird cocked the gun and said, “I got dibs on the Ferrari.”
There was the shuffle of several boots, the whir of helicopter blades lowering down toward them. Marianna Axtell led a group of soldiers from around the side of the farmhouse. Amber and his group closed in from the other side. Lieutenant Branscomb dropped down from a ladder hanging from a helicopter, a fresh SEAL team behind him.
All of them pointing their guns at Cameron Snowman.
“Your backup,” Cameron muttered to Diana and shook his head, still holding the barrel against her. Diana supposed he was considering if it was worth dying in order to kill her. He said, “I thought you were working alone now.”
“These are just old friends,” Diana replied.
Before Cameron could consider Diana’s life any longer, Branscomb had taken him down from behind. His huge arms, trained and controlled, slammed Cameron into the dirt, facedown, sputtering against the desert ground.
She considered not telling him. That way, if he didn’t kill himself in his cell, the spider bite could kill him over the next day or so. Cameron was a violent and passionate kid with a one-track-mind, and a man of conviction like his father was. And she felt that same pity as she had with Taras—she didn’t want him to die.
“Better get some ice on that ankle,” Diana whispered to him as he lay on the ground, Branscomb cuffing his wrists together. “That Recluse bite is going
