Chapter 5: The Woman Who Was Supposed to Be Gone
Reyes got them to push the intercept by ninety minutes.
That still left a window.
A gap between when Flynn would expect me on the aft deck and when the authorities would reach us.
Forty minutes, maybe less if the storm slowed their approach.
Forty minutes where anything could happen and no one outside this yacht would know.
"He'll go to the suite first," Reyes said.
"When he finds Elena, he'll have maybe thirty seconds of confusion before he understands something is wrong.
That's our window to move you."
"Move me where?"
"The bridge.
Locked from inside.
Steel door." He paused.
"And I'll be with you."
"What about Elena?"
"Elena knows to get out the moment he opens that door.
She's faster than she looks."
I almost said something that wasn't useful.
Instead I said, "Okay."
We moved at eleven forty.
Reyes went first, checked the corridor, waved me through.
We took the service stairs up — the same ones I'd used hours ago, descending in the dark with the dr*gs still heavy in my blood.
Now I was going up, and the dizziness was thinner, more manageable, replaced by something that felt almost like clarity.
The bridge was one level below the aft deck.
Through the forward windows, I could see the storm — real and close now, the sea running in long dark swells, the horizon gone.
Behind us, above us, the aft deck was a rectangle of pale deck light.
Flynn was up there.
I could see his silhouette at the railing.
Reyes locked the bridge door and took his position at the helm.
He kept the lights low.
"Don't look up," he said quietly.
"Let him come to us."
We didn't have to wait long.
At eleven fifty-two, the suite intercom crackled.
Flynn's voice came through — and the ease was gone.
"Reyes.
Where is she."
Not a question.
Reyes pressed the intercom button.
"I don't know what you mean, Mr.
Flynn."
"Don't." A pause.
The sound of movement.
"I know she's not in the suite.
I know Elena was in that bed.
Where is my wife."
"Sir, I'd suggest you calm—"
"Open the bridge."
"I'm afraid I can't do that during a weather event.
Maritime regulation—"
"Open the door, Reyes, or I will have your license pulled before we dock.
I know people.
You know I know people."
Reyes looked at me.
I nodded.
He pressed the intercom again.
"Mr.
Flynn.
I think you should know that I made a call tonight.
To people who outrank the ones you know."
Silence.
Then: "What did you do."
"My job," Reyes said.
"The job Mr.
Sterling asked me to do."
The silence that followed was different from the ones before it.
It had weight.
I watched Flynn's silhouette on the aft deck through the forward windows — he'd moved to the railing that faced the bridge.
He was looking down at us.
Then he moved fast.
Off the aft deck, down the exterior stairs, toward the bridge door.
He hit it hard.
The steel rang.
"Open this door." His voice had changed completely.
The lazy warmth was gone.
What was underneath it was something I had never heard before — flat and precise and very, very cold.
"Open it now, or I promise you, neither of you makes it to port."
I stepped to the intercom myself.
"Flynn."
A pause.
"Vivienne." My name in his mouth.
He was recalibrating.
I could almost hear it.
"Sweetheart, I don't know what Reyes has told you, but—"
"I heard you," I said.
"On the lower deck.
All three of you.
The pills, the power of attorney, the mountain road." A pause.
"My parents are safe, Flynn.
The intercept team is twenty minutes out.
And everything you put in that safe has been photographed and transmitted."
Nothing.
Not a sound from the other side of the door.
Then: "You can't prove any of it."
"The pills are still in the nightstand," I said.
"The document is still in the safe.
And Reyes recorded your voice on the intercom just now." I looked at Reyes.
He held up the recorder — small, digital, already running when Flynn had first spoken.
"You just threatened to kjll us both.
On tape.
In international waters."
The door handle moved.
Stopped.
"Vivienne." His voice had gone quiet.
Almost gentle.
The performance of gentleness.
"Think about what you're doing.
Think about your father's reputation.
A scandal like this — it touches everyone.
You, him, the Sterling name.
I can make this go away.
All of it.
No charges, no press, no public humiliation.
Just—"
"Just what?" I said.
"Just pretend I didn't hear you planning to push me off this deck?"
Silence.
"Walk away, Flynn.
Sit down somewhere and wait.
It's over."
He didn't walk away.
He hit the door again — once, hard — and then his footsteps moved.
Back up the exterior stairs.
Back to the aft deck.
I watched his silhouette return to the railing.
He stood there looking out at the water for a long time.
Reyes touched my arm.
"Twelve minutes," he said quietly.
I kept watching Flynn at the railing.
The storm moved around him.
The yacht rolled.
Then Aidan's voice came from somewhere below — urgent, hissed.
"Flynn.
Flynn, get down here.
Something's wrong."
Flynn turned from the railing.
Looked down at the bridge windows one more time.
Then he disappeared from the deck.
Reyes picked up the satellite phone.
"They need to know Flynn is moving," I said.
"Already calling." He paused, then spoke into the phone.
"Subjects are mobile.
All three.
Intercept needs to come in fast."
May you like
I pressed my back against the console and looked at the dark water ahead.
Eleven minutes.
