The moment my husband forced my head underwater, I knew he meant to break me—but he had no idea what he had just set in motion.

Derek crouched until his face was level with mine. “Yours. We’ll leave it near the Potomac with a note about Noah. A tragic mother who chose the wrong man and couldn’t live with herself.”

He placed a hand on my stomach. The baby recoiled beneath his palm.

I stared at him. “You know Noah isn’t the father.”

“Of course. Noah doesn’t exist.” He smiled. “You invented him to provoke me. I let you believe it worked.”

His glance toward Claire gave him away. He had brought me here to learn how much I knew.

When the men went outside, Claire hurried as close as her ankle chain allowed. “Who are you?”

“Rachel Cole. His wife.”

Pain crossed her face. “How long?”

“Ten months. I found his hidden flash drive—fake invoices, insurance policies, and your recording about Mercer. I took it to the FBI.”

Claire sank to the floor. “Then they know.”

“Some of it. They thought you might still be alive.”

She looked toward the window. “Derek and Mercer stole federal disaster-recovery money through fake subcontractors. I handled the company books. When I confronted them, they staged my death.”

The burned body in Claire’s SUV belonged to missing Baltimore woman Kayla Monroe. Mercer switched evidence labels and supplied false dental records. Derek collected Claire’s insurance and inherited her company shares.

But Claire had encrypted the master ledger. They had kept her alive to unlock it and sign transfer documents whenever an account was moved.

“The FBI needed the cabin,” I said. “That was phase two. My ring was supposed to lead them here.”

Claire shook her head. “Mercer found it.”

“He found the obvious transmitter.”

I turned my bound hands toward her. A narrow red smear marked the inside of my wrist. Beneath it, pressed under a clear medical bandage, was a second tracking chip. Agent Ortiz had called the ring theater. The chip was the insurance policy.

Claire released a breath that sounded almost like a laugh. “How long until they come?”

“They should already be here.”

Silence answered me.

Then pain tightened across my abdomen.

I doubled over. At first I blamed the bathtub, but warm fluid spread beneath my knees.

Claire’s eyes widened. “Rachel, your water broke.”

“Not now.”

Another contraction seized me. I bit my sleeve to keep from crying out, but Derek rushed back inside. He saw the wet floor and swore.

“We move now,” Mercer said behind him.

“She won’t make the drive.”

“Then she dies here.”

While they argued, Claire leaned close.

“There’s a loose nail behind the post,” she whispered. “I’ve been working it out for months.”

My fingers found the nail. I sawed the plastic restraint against its rusted edge while Claire groaned loudly, drawing their attention.

“Please,” she begged Derek. “At least save the baby.”

He turned on her. “This is your fault.”

The restraint snapped.

I kept my hands behind me. Another contraction came, stronger than the last. Mercer crossed the room with a syringe.

“What is that?” I asked.

“Something to make this quiet.”

When he bent down, I drove the loose nail through the back of his hand. He screamed and dropped the syringe. I lunged for his radio, but Derek caught my hair and threw me against the post.

Claire wrapped her chain around his ankle and pulled. Derek crashed to the floor. The gun skidded under a table.

Mercer kicked Claire in the shoulder and reached for the weapon.

Outside, the generator stopped.

Darkness swallowed the cabin.

Three sharp bangs shook the front door.

“FBI! Drop your weapons!”

Relief weakened my knees, but Derek hauled me upright. Cold metal pressed against my temple. He had reached the gun first.

The door burst inward. White beams cut through the dark. Mercer raised his hands immediately.

“Back off!” Derek shouted. “I’ll kill her!”

Agent Ortiz stepped through, blood dried along her face. “It’s finished, Derek. We found Claire and the records. Let Rachel go.”

His arm tightened. “You found nothing.”

Claire crawled toward the wall and yanked a cable from behind the generator switch. The cabin lights flared on. Derek glanced toward her.

I stamped down on his foot, threw my head back into his nose, and dropped my weight. The gun fired into the ceiling.

Agents tackled him before he could aim again.

For several seconds, nobody moved except me. I lay curled around my stomach, counting each frantic kick.

“The baby,” I gasped. “Please.”

Ortiz was beside me at once. “Ambulance is coming.”

Ortiz had survived because Mercer’s men forced the wrong FBI car off the road. The cabin sat in a communications dead zone, so agents followed my chip’s last coordinates on foot.