A D R I A N

The wheel bucks like a wild thing under my palms, salt spray needling my face until my skin burns raw. Every time the RIB drops from crest to trough, the impact shudders through my bones, rattling the hull like the sea wants to tear it apart plank by plank. My shoulders lock, muscles straining to keep her bow from slewing broadside into the next breaker.

Ethan’s voice crackles steady in my headset, clipped with military precision. “Starboard swell incoming—hold her bow high.”

I register it, but it isn’t what keeps me from losing control.

It’s her.

Elara’s breath hisses in my ear, quick but measured. “Adrian. Focus. Breathe in, slow. Out, steady. Shoulders down.”

Her tone is sharp, not soothing. Like she’s talking to a patient about to crash in front of her protocol, not panic.

She doesn’t know boats. Don’t pretend to. She knows me, knows the signs of adrenaline overload, hands clenching, breath hitching.

And damn it if it doesn’t work. The chaos sharpens into rhythm. I feel my grip steady, shoulders loosening as the next wave slams us.

Lightning splits the sky, a whiteout flash. For a heartbeat the world is nothing but glare, spray, and her voice anchoring me in my headset.

That’s when it hits me, she isn’t afraid of me. Not my control, not my temper, not my name. Her fear is failing. Missing a chance to save whoever’s out there calling mayday.

Her steadiness isn’t submission. It’s defiance against the storm, against death itself.

For the first time tonight, my hands stopped shaking.

The next flash of lightning burns the horizon into stark relief, and that’s when I see it.

A skiff, caught in the jagged mouth of a cave. Its hull smashes against stone with every surge, groaning like a dying thing. Fuel fumes drift thick on the wind, chemical and choking.

“Contact visual,” I bite out.

Ethan swears through comms. “That boat’s seconds from splintering.”

Elara leans forward, gray-green eyes locked. “There’s someone inside.”

Through the rain I made him out, slumped across the bench, half-submerged. A man. Blood streaks from his temple, mixing with seawater. His chest rises shallow, hitching uneven. One twitch of an arm. Alive.

“We don’t leave him.” Elara’s voice cuts like a scalpel. She’s already dragging the med kit across her lap, knuckles white.

My jaw snaps tight. “We put this RIB any closer, we’re next on those rocks. Look at that current, it’s chewing the cave alive.”

She turns on me, eyes blazing, headset hissing with static. “He’s hypoxic. Unconscious. Pupils sluggish, he’s bleeding into his skull. If he slips under that fuel, he doesn’t have five minutes. You want to calculate risk? Fine. I’m calculating a code blue.”

The storm roars around us, waves booming like artillery. But it’s her voice that drives into me.

She doesn’t flinch. Don’t hedge. No optics, no hesitation. Just one patient. One life.

And against every instinct screaming pull back, I hear myself growl, “Strap in tight. We’re going in.”

The rocks loom like black teeth, spray exploding white against their faces. I gun the throttle, then ease off, threading us closer.

“Hold on.” My voice is iron.

The RIB leaps a crest, belly slamming down into a trough so hard my spine jolts. Ethan curses in my ear. “Adrian, you’re piloting suicide!”

“Shut it.” My focus is a tunnel. One line, one chance: wedge us against the skiff without shattering both hulls.

The bow swings too wide; I wrench it back, muscles tearing fire through my shoulders. Whitewater blinds me. The taste of ozone and fuel burns the back of my throat.

Through it all, Elara doesn’t scream. She braces, one hand iron on the rail, the other fisted around the med kit strap, her breath rough but even. She trusts me, or she refuses to consider any other outcome.

Spray blinds. I feel more than seeing the next surge, the boat tipping, hull kissing stone with a deep, shuddering groan. My hands feather the throttle, every move instinctive, carving us into a pocket of murderous calm.

“Jesus Christ,” Ethan mutters, but I’ve already cut the engine. The RIB holds, pinned but steady, close enough for the skiff’s bow to knock against ours with a hollow thud.

Elara’s face is pale, soaked, but her eyes are fire. “We’ve got him.”

My jaw locks. No time to celebrate.

The RIB grinds with each surge, threatening to shear us apart. I lock the wheel one-handed, bracing with everything I have, while Elara lunges forward.

“Careful!” I bark.

She ignores me, crawling over slick fiberglass, spray lashing her hair loose. She doesn’t hesitate, doesn’t even look down at the black water foaming beneath us. She reaches into the skiff, fingers pressing against the man’s throat.

Her lips move fast, headset crackling as she mutters triage to herself. “Pulse, thready. Glasgow score maybe eight. Pupils sluggish. Cap refill delayed. Shock’s setting in.” Her voice is clipped, relentless. “He’s losing blood fast. “Pressure dressing, immediately. Oxygen the second it’s here.” The RIB jolts hard, pitching her sideways. Her knee slips.

Instinct tears through me. I release the wheel with one arm and catch her waist, hauling her against me before she’s swallowed into the surf. For a breath, she’s flush to my chest, soaked hair plastered to my jaw, her breath searing my throat.

Her hand catches mine on the rail, grip fierce, anchoring herself with me.

Lightning cracks overhead, searing white. And in that blinding instant, I feel it, electricity between us sharper than the storm. Her pulse kicks against my palm where I grip her waist, and my own heart stutters in answer.

She doesn’t look at me, doesn’t acknowledge it. She only drags in a breath, voice steady despite the tremor in her body. “We don’t have minutes.”

I drag her tighter against me, my gaze fixed on the cave’s black throat. “Then we make them.”

Ethan’s voice cuts sharp through comms. “You’re pinned against a rock. You try to reverse out, you’ll rip the hull open. You’ve got sixty seconds max before another surge slams you.”

I know he’s right. Every instinct screams it. The RIB isn’t built for this kind of punishment.

Elara doesn’t even look back at me, she’s bent over the deckhand, hands moving fast. “I need gauze, compress here.” She slaps my wrist hard enough to sting, dragging my hand to the man’s wound.

For a second I freeze. Me. Obeying her orders. Then the heat of blood surges against my palm, sticky, hot, terrifyingly fast.

“Hold pressure. Don’t let up,” she commands. “I don’t care if the storm drowns us both, he bleeds out faster.”

Her hair whips against my face, salt and rain. She’s fire in the middle of a drowning hell. And I realize with a jolt that the storm doesn’t scare her half as much as losing this stranger does.

My jaw locks. “Then neither of you are dying on my boat.”

For one razor-thin moment, I almost believe I’ve got us balanced. My palm is locked over the deckhand’s wound, Elara braced against me, the RIB wedged steady against stone.

Then the ocean decides otherwise.

A roar builds behind us, louder than thunder, a freight train made of water. Ethan’s voice punches through comms: “Breaker incoming!”

Too late.

The wave slams the stern with a force that wrenches the wheel out of my grip. The RIB lurches, shuddering violently as the surge shoves us straight into the cavern’s throat. Black water crashes over the bow, drowning my roar, ripping Elara half-off her feet.

I grab her, anchoring us both as the boat hurtles deeper, swallowed whole by jagged rock and darkness.

The skiff smashes against us, ricocheting into the cave with a sickening crack. Fuel fumes choke the air. Stone walls close around us, echoing with the storm’s fury.

No retreat. No way out.

The RIB slams hard against a hidden shelf, metal screaming, and sticks fast. The surge recedes, leaving us trapped in the cave’s gullet, water swirling black around our knees.

Elara twists toward me, eyes wide, wet hair plastered to her cheeks.

“Adrian—”

“I know.” My voice is a growl through clenched teeth.

The ocean has us now.