Chương 5
Jonathan stared at me.
Then, unexpectedly, he laughed.
It was one short sound.
"You knew."
"Yes."
"How long?"
"Since Tuesday."
His eyes flicked down my body, then back to my face.
"And you got in anyway."
"I wanted to know what you would do."
Something like disbelief crossed his face.
"Of course you did."
"What does that mean?"
"It means this."
He gestured with the pistol.
"Everything has to be yours."
"Put the gun down."
"Your company."
"Jonathan."
"Your house."
"Put it down."
"Your lawyers, your money, your fucking security people."
His voice cracked.
"You even turned my marriage into an investigation."
"You researched killing me."
"Because there was no other way out."
The words stunned me.
Not because they excused him.
Because he believed them.
"No other way out of what?"
He looked toward the blackening water.
"Being nobody."
"You could have left."
"And become what?"
"My ex-husband?"
"You hear yourself?"
His laugh came again, uglier now.
"That's exactly it."
Owen's voice entered quietly.
"Sir, fuel becomes a problem if we keep this heading."
"Shut up."
"I need you to understand the aircraft."
"I said shut up."
Jonathan shifted the gun toward him.
I unfastened my harness.
His eyes snapped back to me.
"Don't move."
"Okay."
"Put it back on."
"Okay."
I did not.
I kept both hands where he could see them.
"Jonathan, you don't want to shoot anyone."
"You don't know what I want."
"I know you haven't done it yet."
His face tightened.
For a second I saw the man who had sat beside me on a bathroom floor years ago, holding a towel around my shoulders because neither of us knew what else to do.
Then he looked away.
"You should've just signed the trust amendment."
"What amendment?"
He froze.
There it was.
A clue I had not known existed.
"What trust amendment?"
"Forget it."
"Jonathan."
"I said forget it."
A gust struck the helicopter.
The cabin rocked.
Jonathan grabbed the door frame with his free hand.
Owen corrected smoothly.
I saw the terror in Jonathan's face.
He was afraid of flying.
I had forgotten.
Not mildly uncomfortable.
Afraid.
He had hidden it for years because he hated appearing weak around me.
And yet he had chosen a helicopter because he believed it gave him the cleanest story.
That told me how long he had rehearsed this.
"We're going back," I said.
"No."
"You're terrified."
"Shut up."
"Your hand is shaking."
"Victoria."
"You can stop."
His eyes filled with sudden rage.
"You always do that."
"Do what?"
"Talk to me like I'm an employee who made a bad presentation."
"I am trying to keep you from ruining your life."
"My life?"
He leaned closer.
"You built a world where everyone needs your permission to breathe."
His finger tightened near the trigger.
"And now you're going to stand there and tell me you're saving me?"
Owen glanced toward the instrument panel.
I followed his eyes.
A green light blinked twice.
The signal.
Marcus's team had our position.
They were close enough.
Jonathan noticed my glance.
"What?"
"Nothing."
He turned toward the panel.
"What did you do?"
Owen stayed silent.
Jonathan struck him across the side of the headset with the gun.
The helicopter dipped.
I grabbed the seat.
Owen recovered almost instantly, blood appearing near his ear.
"Jonathan!"
"Open the door."
My throat closed.
He looked at me.
All the anger had gone out of his face.
Only fear remained.
His fear.
Not mine.
"Open it."
I shook my head.
"Do it."
The gun rose.
I reached for the latch.
The door slid back.
Wind exploded into the cabin.
The sound swallowed everything.
My dress snapped around my legs.
Cold air tore the breath from my mouth.
Below us, the water was almost black.
Jonathan shouted something I could not hear.
I looked at him.
He pointed toward the opening.
Owen began banking.
Jonathan slammed the pistol against the back of his seat.
"Straight!"
The helicopter leveled.
I gripped the frame.
Jonathan came toward me.
For one final second, I thought he might stop.
His hand touched my waist.
The same hand that had rested there during ultrasound appointments.
The same hand that had guided me through crowded rooms.
The same hand that had held mine beneath a hospital blanket.
His mouth moved close to my headset microphone.
"I'm sorry, Victoria."
Then his eyes hardened.
"But you're just in the way."
And he pushed.
For the first fraction of a second, there was no falling.
There was only absence.
The helicopter vanished above me so quickly that my mind refused to understand what my body already knew.
Then gravity took hold.
Wind struck my face with such force that I could not breathe.
The sky and water exchanged places.
My dress tore upward around my thighs.
My arms flailed uselessly.
Somewhere inside the screaming rush of air, I heard Elena's voice from Thursday morning.
Do not reach for the deployment tab unless the automatic system fails.
Trust the sensor package.
I had hated that instruction.
Trusting anything while falling out of the sky seemed like a design flaw.
A violent snap hit between my shoulders.
The Zephyr fired.
For one awful instant, nothing changed.
Then the canopy exploded open above me.
The deceleration crushed the air from my lungs.
Pain shot across my hips where the modified restraints caught my weight.
My vision went white.
I curled both arms around my stomach.
"Baby."
I could not hear my own voice.
The helicopter continued south for several seconds before beginning a turn.
From below, it looked impossibly small.
A black insect against the last strip of orange sky.
Jonathan was still inside it.
Owen was still inside it.
The pistol was still inside it.
I wanted to look up.
I wanted to know whether Owen was alive.
I forced myself to look down.
Water.
Too much water.
May you like
The Zephyr had slowed me, but it had not transformed the ocean into something soft.
My training session with Elena had used a suspension rig six feet above a padded floor.
