Chapter 4 - The Fire Below DeckThe first thing Daniel did was grab my wrist.
“Don't open that door.”
Smoke was already curling beneath it.
My instinct screamed at me to run.
His training told him something else.
He checked the panel.
“No heat warning in this compartment.”
“Meaning?”
“Fire isn't here.”
He pulled up another system.
Two suppression alarms were flashing near the auxiliary generator room.
Daniel frowned.
“That makes no sense.”
“Why?”
“Nothing there should ignite without another failure first.”
Sabotage.
Again.
Everything Flynn couldn't control, he destroyed.
Daniel activated the suppression system remotely.
Nothing happened.
“Disabled.”
I almost laughed.
It was becoming absurd.
The entire yacht had turned into a floating crime scene, and somehow my husband was still upstairs pretending to be concerned about my seasickness.
Daniel reached into an emergency cabinet and handed me a breathing mask.
“If this becomes real, you stay behind me.”
“What about Captain Reed?”
“We get him first.”
We entered the corridor.
Smoke thickened rapidly.
Visibility dropped.
Daniel moved toward the generator room while I returned to the storage compartment.
Captain Reed had managed to get himself upright.
“Fire?”
“Apparently.”
He looked at my face.
“Apparently?”
“They're forcing us upstairs.”
Captain Reed muttered something under his breath that I was glad I couldn't hear.
I put his arm over my shoulders.
He was heavy.
We moved slowly.
Then the yacht lurched violently.
The storm had reached us.
Everything shifted.
A metal cart rolled across the corridor and slammed into a wall.
Reed almost fell.
I tightened my grip.
“We're not dying down here.”
“Strong preference of mine too.”
Despite everything, I almost smiled.
We found Daniel near the stairwell.
“Fire's controlled.”
“How?”
“It wasn't much of one. Fuel-soaked rags beside an electrical panel.”
“Deliberate.”
“Absolutely.”
“They wanted smoke, not an explosion.”
Daniel nodded.
“They wanted people moving.”
Toward the upper deck.
Toward Flynn.
Captain Reed said, “We use the aft service stairs.”
We climbed.
One deck.
Then another.
At the second landing, Maya appeared.
Her eyes widened when she saw Reed.
“Captain!”
“Later.”
She looked at me.
“Flynn is losing his mind.”
“Good.”
“No, not good.”
She lowered her voice.
“He knows someone accessed the security server.”
My chest tightened.
“How?”
“Grant checked the admin logs.”
Daniel swore.
Maya continued.
“They know you aren't drugged.”
There went my biggest advantage.
“Where's Fiona?”
“With Flynn.”
“So she knows?”
Maya nodded.
“I heard them arguing. She told him they should never have involved your parents.”
Never have involved.
Not shouldn't.
Never should have involved.
Fiona knew.
All of them.
My new family had spent my wedding smiling beside people they intended to kill.
A wave hit the yacht.
Maya grabbed the railing.
“We need the radio.”
Captain Reed looked at Daniel.
“Emergency beacon?”
“They've disabled external communication, not hardware.”
“The EPIRB.”
Daniel's eyes brightened.
I didn't understand.
Reed explained.
Emergency Position-Indicating Radio Beacon.
A device designed to transmit distress signals and location information through satellite networks.
“Can Flynn stop it?”
“Not easily once activated.”
“Where is it?”
“Upper aft deck.”
Of course.
Exactly where Flynn wanted me.
I looked at the three people around me.
“We go.”
Maya shook her head.
“You'll be walking into the trap.”
“I’m already inside the trap.”
The question wasn't whether Flynn would try to kill me.
The question was whether I could force him to expose himself while doing it.
I pulled my phone from my purse.
No connection.
But the camera worked.
So did audio recording.
I started recording and slipped it into the top of my bikini beneath the cover-up.
Maya understood immediately.
“Evidence.”
“If they take the phone afterward, we lose it.”
Daniel removed something from his pocket.
A tiny maintenance body camera.
“Use this too.”
I clipped it beneath my necklace.
Two recordings.
One visible if you knew where to look.
One hidden.
Captain Reed said, “If Flynn sees me, he knows everything has collapsed.”
“Exactly.”
I had a plan.
A dangerous one.
Possibly a stupid one.
But we were out of time.
“You three stay below.”
“No,” Reed said.
“Captain, he thinks you're tied up.”
“I am the captain of this vessel.”
“And right now you're more valuable alive and invisible.”
He hated that.
I continued.
“I go upstairs alone. Flynn thinks he has control again.”
“And then?”
“Make him talk.”
Maya stared at me.
“You want him to confess?”
“I want enough.”
Daniel shook his head.
“He could push you before you get anything.”
“Then don't let him.”
I told them what I needed.
Daniel would reach the beacon through the opposite service access.
Maya would find two crew members she trusted.
Captain Reed would stay near the emergency helm and regain command when the moment came.
My job was simple.
Survive long enough for the signal to transmit.
The plan sounded cleaner than reality felt.
I climbed the final staircase alone.
Rain hammered the windows.
Thunder shook the yacht.
I removed my cover-up and left it on the stairs.
Flynn expected a drugged woman in a red bikini.
That was what I would give him.
When I entered the main lounge, Fiona was standing near the bar.
She saw me first.
“Oh, thank God.”
She rushed toward me.
I stepped back.
“Don't touch me.”
Her face changed.
Behind her, Flynn slowly stood from the sofa.
Aidan stood beside him.
Grant guarded the exterior door.
Four against one.
Flynn stared at my face.
Then smiled.
“There you are.”
I looked at the man I had loved for two years.
“Were you worried?”
“Terrified.”
“Because you thought I might get hurt?”
His eyes sharpened.
“You've been confused.”
“Have I?”
He took one step closer.
“Those pills—”
“What pills?”
Silence.
Tiny mistake.
I saw it.
Flynn saw that I saw it.
He tried again.
“The seasickness medicine.”
“I never told you I took pills tonight.”
Aidan swore.
Flynn's expression went cold.
The mask dropped.
Not completely.
But enough.
“Where's Reed?”
“Who?”
“Don't do this.”
“Do what?”
His jaw tightened.
“Evelyn.”
I smiled.
“Is this the part where the loving husband disappears?”
Lightning illuminated the windows.
Fiona whispered, “Flynn, stop.”
He ignored her.
“You heard us.”
“Every word.”
Aidan moved toward me.
Flynn lifted one hand.
“Dad.”
Aidan stopped.
My phone was recording.
The maintenance camera was recording.
All I needed was for Flynn to keep talking.
I looked at Fiona.
“Were you going to watch?”
Her eyes filled with tears.
“Evelyn—”
“Were you?”
“No.”
“But you knew.”
She closed her eyes.
That was answer enough.
Flynn said, “My mother has nothing to do with this.”
“That’s generous.”
“Leave her alone.”
“You're planning to murder my parents and you're giving me moral instructions?”
Grant glanced toward Flynn.
There.
A reaction.
He hadn't known about my parents.
Interesting.
Flynn saw it too.
“It's complicated.”
“No. Complicated is marriage. Murder is pretty simple.”
The yacht rolled sharply.
Rain blasted against the glass.
I moved gradually toward the exterior door.
Flynn noticed.
“You don't want to go outside.”
“Actually, I think that's exactly where you want me.”
His face hardened.
We both knew the performance was finished.
“Give me your phone.”
“No.”
“Evelyn.”
“Come take it.”
He moved.
I ran.
I shoved through the door into the storm.
Wind hit me so violently I nearly fell.
Rain blinded me.
The ocean looked black beneath the yacht.
I grabbed the railing and moved aft.
Behind me, Flynn shouted.
“Evelyn!”
I kept going.
Aidan came out.
Then Grant.
This was it.
The stern deck stretched ahead.
The same place where Flynn planned to kill me.
I could barely hear over the wind.
Then a red indicator light flashed near the emergency equipment housing.
Daniel.
He had reached the beacon.
I needed thirty more seconds.
Flynn caught my arm.
His fingers dug into my skin.
“You've made this so much harder than it needed to be.”
I turned toward him.
“Sorry my murder has been inconvenient.”
“Give me the phone.”
“No.”
His eyes were wild now.
Not the Flynn from our wedding.
Not the charming businessman who brought my mother flowers.
This was the man underneath.
“You don't understand what happens if you walk away from this.”
“Explain it.”
“Your father destroyed mine.”
Aidan shouted, “Flynn!”
But Flynn was too angry to stop.
“He took everything from us.”
“My father barely knows you.”
“He knew my grandfather.”
I froze.
What?
“He knew exactly who we were.”
Flynn leaned closer.
“This was never just about your money.”
A new chill moved through me.
“Then what was it about?”
His grip tightened.
“Revenge.”
Behind him, Aidan looked terrified.
Not of me.
Of what Flynn was about to reveal.
Then Daniel triggered the emergency beacon.
A brilliant strobe exploded above the stern.
An alarm screamed.
Grant spun around.
“What the hell?”
Flynn released me.
Daniel appeared beside the equipment housing.
“Distress signal is live!”
Aidan charged toward him.
Grant hesitated.
That hesitation changed everything.
Captain Reed's voice thundered through the ship's loudspeakers.
“This is Captain Reed. All crew to emergency stations. Grant Mercer is relieved of duty. Mr. Flynn Callahan and Mr. Aidan Callahan are to be confined pending Coast Guard response.”
Flynn stared at the speaker.
Then at me.
For the first time that night, he looked afraid.
“You think you've won?”
I stepped backward.
“No.”
Lightning split the sky.
“I think you just started talking.”
His eyes moved to my necklace.
To the tiny camera clipped beneath the diamond pendant.
His face changed.
He realized.
“Evelyn—”
He lunged.
I stepped away.
My heel slipped on the rain-soaked deck.
Suddenly there was no floor beneath me.
I fell backward.
My hands caught the railing.
My body slammed against the outside of the yacht.
The black ocean raged below.
I screamed.
Flynn reached the rail.
For one insane instant, hope surged through me.
My husband would pull me up.
Then he looked down.
And smiled.
Exactly as he had planned.
He lowered his voice.
“Goodbye, Evelyn.”
May you like
Then he began peeling my fingers from the railing.
One by one.
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