The last thing my husband did before trying to murder me was kiss my forehead.
It was such a gentle kiss.
That was the part I remembered most clearly.
Not the roar of the helicopter blades.
Not the glittering Pacific thousands of feet below us.
Not even the expression on Richard’s face when he finally stopped pretending to love me.
It was the kiss.
Warm lips against my skin.
One hand resting lightly on my shoulder.
Then he smiled.
“Move a little closer to the door, Amelia,” he shouted over the engine. “The view is incredible.”
I looked at him.
My husband of four years.
The father of the child growing inside me.
The man who had spent the morning telling me how beautiful I looked.
The man who had arranged a private helicopter flight because, according to him, pregnancy had made me “too serious” and I deserved an afternoon where I didn’t have to think about lawyers, board meetings, trusts, or quarterly reports.
Anyone watching us would have seen a billionaire husband taking his pregnant wife on a romantic flight along the California coast.
I saw something else.
I saw the way Richard kept glancing at my harness.
I saw the tension in his jaw.
I saw his fingers trembling.
And I remembered every question he had asked me during the previous six months.
Who controlled the Hayes family trust?
What happened to my voting shares if I died?
Had I updated my will after becoming pregnant?
Would my husband automatically inherit?
What happened if both the baby and I died before delivery?
Questions that sounded innocent when separated.
Questions that became terrifying when placed beside one another.
So I smiled.
And I moved closer to the open door.
Wind tore through my hair.
Far below us, the Pacific stretched toward the horizon, blue and beautiful and impossibly distant.
I put one hand over my stomach.
My baby moved.
Just a flutter.
But I felt it.
For one terrible second, I almost changed my mind.
I almost screamed.
Almost demanded that the pilot turn around.
Almost confronted Richard with everything I knew.
Then his hand closed around my arm.
Hard.
I turned.
The smile was gone.
There was no hesitation in his eyes anymore.
No affection.
No guilt.
Only determination.
“Richard?”
He shoved me.
There was no speech.
No confession.
No dramatic goodbye.
Just one violent movement.
My body went through the open doorway.
The world disappeared.
Then I was falling.
The scream came automatically.
Wind swallowed it.
Sky.
Ocean.
Sky again.
My stomach lurched as my body spun.
Every instinct told me I was dying.
But underneath the terror was something else.
Training.
Memory.
Preparation.
Because Richard had made one catastrophic mistake.
He thought I had come onto that helicopter trusting him.
I hadn’t.
Three months earlier, I had begun preparing for the possibility that my husband might try to kill me.
And that afternoon, hidden beneath the loose jacket he’d insisted looked adorable on me, I was wearing the one thing he hadn’t thought to check.
A compact emergency parachute.
My fingers fought against the violent wind.
For one horrible moment I couldn’t find the release.
Panic exploded through me.
Not for myself.
For my child.
“Come on…”
My fingers found it.
I pulled.
Nothing.
My heart stopped.
Then something ripped violently behind me.
My body jerked so hard I cried out.
The spinning stopped.
The ocean stopped rushing toward me.
Above me, the canopy opened against the California sky.
I was alive.
For several seconds, I couldn’t breathe.
Then I began sobbing.
Not gracefully.
Not quietly.
I screamed into the wind.
“YOU BASTARD!”
The helicopter was already banking away.
Richard never looked down.
Or maybe he did.
Maybe he saw the tiny canopy beneath him.
Maybe that was the first moment he understood that the wife he had underestimated for years had finally stopped underestimating him.
I didn’t know.
All I knew was that I was descending toward the coastal terrain we’d deliberately flown over before heading farther offshore.
Deliberately.
Because that had been part of my preparation too.
Richard had thought he’d chosen the route.
He hadn’t.
Not entirely.
For months, I’d quietly allowed him to believe that every idea was his.
That was something my father had taught me long before he died.
When someone believes they’re smarter than you, don’t interrupt them.
Let them show you exactly what they intend to do.
I hit the ground badly.
Pain tore through my ankle and hip.
I rolled, screaming, clutching my stomach.
“No. No, no, no…”
Everything became my baby.
I didn’t care about Richard.
I didn’t care about the company.
I didn’t care about the billions.
“Please.”
My hands shook as I touched my abdomen.
For a few endless seconds, I felt nothing.
Then—
movement.
I broke down.
I pressed my forehead against the dirt and cried.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I’m so sorry.”
My phone was still secured inside the zippered pocket beneath my jacket.
I pulled it out.
The screen was cracked.
It worked.
I made one call.
Not to the police.
Not yet.
I called the number I had memorized three months earlier.
A woman answered immediately.
“Ms. Hayes?”
I looked toward the sky where my husband’s helicopter had vanished.
“He did it.”
There was a pause.
Then the woman’s voice changed.
Calm.
Professional.
Ready.
“Are you safe?”
“I landed.”
“Are you injured?”
“My ankle. Maybe my hip. I’m pregnant. I need a hospital.”
“Your emergency beacon is transmitting. Help is already moving toward you.”
I closed my eyes.
“And Richard?”
Another pause.
“We proceed exactly as planned.”
I looked down at my wedding ring.
For four years, I had worn it believing it represented the safest relationship of my life.
Now sunlight flashed across the diamond.
I pulled it off.
“Yes,” I said.
“Exactly as planned.”
Because Richard believed that by the time the sun went down, Amelia Hayes would be dead.
And I needed him to keep believing that.
Just a little longer.