Chapter 6
Kristen watched as the federal agents escorted Sterling away down the secure hallway toward the awaiting squad cars outside. He looked back at her once, his eyes filled with defeat, terror, and total, humiliating ruin.
She took a long, steady breath, feeling an invisible weight that had crushed her chest for years finally lift away. The memory of the freezing sea, the terrible darkness, and the survivor's guilt began to loosen their grip.
As the crowd dispersed, a tall, weathered man stepped out from behind the pillar of the adjacent boarding gate. He wore a heavy wool jacket, dark jeans, and had silver hair cut in a familiar, razor-sharp military fade.
Across his weathered face ran a pale, jagged scar identical to the one traced beneath Kristen’s own shoulder blade. He held a steaming paper cup of black coffee in his scarred hands, looking directly at her with a gentle smile.
Kristen’s breath caught in her throat as she stopped dead in her tracks, unable to believe what she was seeing. “Marcus?” she whispered, the name slipping out like a quiet prayer after years of mourning.
“You always did make too much noise in first class, Commander,” Marcus Vance said, his voice deep, gravelly, and whole. He walked toward her, setting the coffee on an empty chair, his eyes shining with unspilled tears.
Kristen closed the distance between them and pulled him into a fierce, desperate embrace, clinging to the living truth. He was alive, real, solid, and standing under the fluorescent lights of the terminal instead of beneath the Arctic ice.
“They told me you were dead, Marcus,” she choked out against his shoulder. “I searched the perimeter for forty-eight hours until my oxygen reserves gave out. I thought I left you down there.”
“You didn't leave anyone, Kristen,” Marcus murmured softly, patting her back with a scarred, protective hand. “You completed your mission. You brought Reynolds' crew out of the dark, and you gave me the time to fight back.”
They stepped apart, taking each other in after six years of silence, secrecy, and solitary burdens carried in the shadows. Marcus looked older, weathered by salt and hardship, but his clear blue eyes burned with unbroken dignity.
“The Justice Department secured our dive unit's clearance this morning,” Marcus explained quietly. “The records are unsealed. Our team’s names are going on the Wall of Honor where they always belonged, completely exonerated.”