Crew’s heart hammered as he engaged the hoist controls, lowering Church into the storm, watching the basket swing disappear and knowing it swung like a pendulum of hope and terror.
Below, the earth shifted again and the slope unraveled.
Crew stared down at it, throat tight, every prayer he’d ever laughed at bleeding out of him now.
Please.
Let us be in time.
* * * * *
The storm screamed around the cabin like it wanted in.
Fern’s wrists were bound in front of her and her calves braced to the chair legs with thin ropes. Looking down, she noted that they weren’t tied very tight or even knotted. Reed never expected her to escape the zip-ties so hadn’t bothered securing her legs better.
Her advantage.
Pulse pounding, she watched Reed step out onto the porch with her phone in his hand. Rain slammed into him sideways, soaking his jacket even more, but he didn’t seem to notice. His shoulders were relaxed with his goal in sight—destroy Crew, and her in the process.
He put the phone to his ear.
Fern leaned forward instinctively, straining to hear his words—but the storm tore them apart before they reached her.Wind howled through the trees. Rain battered the tin roof so hard it rattled her teeth. Whatever Reed was saying, it was being swallowed whole by the mountain.
But she didn’t need to hear him to know.
Reed was calling Crew.
Her chest hollowed out, everything inside her washing to gray. She wanted Crew more than she’d ever wanted anything in her life—but if he came, he’d be walking straight into Reed’s trap. And Reed wasn’t thinking beyond that moment. He wasn’t thinking about consequences or escape.
He was thinking about revenge.
Fern forced herself to breathe.
Her wrists burned where the single, thick zip-tie bit into her skin. She shifted her hands slightly, testing the tension of the plastic, feeling how tight the tie was cinched.
Too tight to slip over her hands. But not tight enough to be hopeless.
Chris had taught her this cruel lesson without meaning to. Not with instructions. With necessity.
There had been nights she’d had to get free without waking him. Without angering him. Without making it worse. When he woke and found she was free, she showed him the scissors on the floor and told him he drank so much, he didn’t remember cutting the bonds.
She’d learned how to use bone instead of flesh that cut easily, how to twist at the narrowest point and how to endure pain long enough to find the right leverage.
She swallowed hard and began to work the zip-tie against her wrist bone, slow and careful.
Outside, Reed laughed into the phone, the sound broken and half hysterical, snatched away by the wind.
“Come and get her,” he sang.
Fern’s stomach clenched.
She focused on the zip-tie.
Twist. Pull. Breathe.
Pain flared sharp and bright. She welcomed it. Pain meant progress.
She focused inward, her shoulders slumped as she worked to weaken the zip-tie. If Reed glanced back now, he’d see what he expected—a woman broken and afraid.
