Chapter 7

The fire trucks arrived, but it was too late. My mother's house was a blackened, smoldering skeleton.

Helene practically dragged me to the hospital. I was a puppet, my strings cut, moving only when pulled. The doctor who treated my hands was gentle, but I felt nothing.

I just sat there, staring into space, as he cleaned the burns and wrapped my hands in thick layers of gauze.

Helene watched me, her heart in her eyes. "I'm booking the flight for tomorrow morning," she said softly. "You just need to rest tonight."

I nodded, a single, jerky movement. The thought of leaving, of escaping, was the only thing that pierced through the fog of my despair.

Helene promised to fly out and join me in a few days, after she tied up some loose ends. I knew those loose ends were named Conrad and Kassidy.

The next morning, she drove me to a private clinic for a final check-up before I left. She had to take an urgent call from her family's company, so she left me in the waiting room.

"I'll be right back," she promised. "Don't go anywhere."

I waited, a small suitcase at my feet, my passport in my pocket. I was ready.

A sleek black car pulled up outside the clinic. A man I didn't recognize got out of the driver's seat and walked toward me.

"Miss Collier?" he asked politely. "Your ride to the airport is here."

I was so focused on escaping, so desperate to get to the airport, that I didn't question it. I assumed Helene, busy with her call, had arranged it.

I got in the car.

It was only when we bypassed the turnoff for the airport and headed toward the desolate mountains that I realized my mistake.

"Where are you going? This isn't the way to the airport," I said, my voice sharp with alarm.

The driver just smiled in the rearview mirror. "Just a small detour."

He sped up.

Panic seized me. I banged on the window, screaming, "Let me out! I'll call the police!"

The driver took a sharp, violent turn, throwing me against the door. I hit my head, and the world went fuzzy. He slammed on the brakes, reached into the back, and hit me again, hard.

Darkness.

I woke up inside a rough burlap sack, the smell of damp earth filling my nostrils. My phone was gone. My purse was gone.

I was being dragged.

"Who are you?" I screamed, my voice muffled by the thick fabric. "What do you want?"

A rough voice answered from outside the sack. "You're going to die, lady. You messed with the wrong people."

"Who?" I cried. "Who sent you?"

My body was suddenly lifted, then dropped. I landed with a thud in what felt like a shallow hole.

Dirt began to rain down on the sack.

I was being buried alive.

"This is a message from Mr. Ellison," the voice said from above. "This is what happens when you hurt the woman he loves."

Cold, absolute terror consumed me. Kassidy had done this. She had convinced Conrad to not just hurt me, not just ruin me, but to end me.

I thrashed inside the sack, a caged animal, screaming for my life. "I'll give you money! Whatever you want! Please, don't do this!"

The dirt kept coming, heavier and heavier.

"Sorry, lady," the voice said, sounding far away now. "We're professionals. We take pride in our work."

The weight on my chest was crushing. I couldn't breathe. The air in the sack was running out, hot and stale. My lungs were on fire.

My struggles grew weaker. My mind became a chaotic mess of images. Conrad's cold eyes. Kassidy's triumphant smile. My father's rage. The burning house.

So this was it. This was how my story ended. Buried in a shallow grave on some forgotten mountain, a victim of a love that was never mine.

I hope I never see you again, Conrad Ellison. Not in this life, or the next.

The thought was my last. I surrendered to the suffocating darkness.

...

Miles away, Helene ended her call and frowned. She'd been trying to reach Abby for the last twenty minutes, but her phone went straight to voicemail. She checked the flight status. Abby's name wasn't on the passenger list.

A cold dread washed over her.

She called her brother. "Ferris, track Abby's phone. Now!"

She knew something was wrong. She had insisted Abby wear a necklace with a tiny, hidden GPS tracker inside-a gift from a paranoid best friend for a woman who seemed to collect powerful enemies.

A minute later, Ferris's voice came back, tight with urgency. "She's on Blackwood Mountain. The signal isn't moving."

"Get your men," Helene ordered, her voice shaking. "Go now! And hurry!"

They found the site less than an hour later. A patch of freshly turned earth.

"She's in there!" Helene shrieked, launching herself at the mound and clawing at the dirt with her bare hands.

Ferris and his men joined her, digging frantically. They uncovered the burlap sack.

Helene tore it open.

I was inside, my face chalky white, my lips blue. My bandaged hands were stained red with the blood from my desperate scratching. I wasn't breathing.

"Abby!" Helene screamed, her voice a raw sound of pure anguish. "Breathe! Damn you, BREATHE!"

They rushed me to a private hospital owned by the Brooks family. Doctors worked on me for hours.

By some miracle, they brought me back.

I opened my eyes to see Helene weeping by my bedside.

"Hey," I rasped, my throat raw. "Don't cry."

I told her everything. About the car, the men, the message from Conrad.

I also told her about the tiny recording device I always carried in my pocket, another gift from the ever-paranoid, ever-prepared Helene. It had captured the entire conversation with the thugs.

"I'm calling the police," Helene said, her face a mask of cold fury. "He's going to prison for attempted murder."

"No," I said, stopping her. "Not yet. I want to see them destroy each other first."

I stayed one more night. The next day, Helene personally drove me to the airport and watched me board the plane.

As the plane took off, I took out my SIM card and snapped it in two.

I looked out the window at the receding city, a place of nightmares and broken dreams.

I was free.

Helene, back in her car, made a call. "Hey, big bro. She's on her way. I created the opportunity for you. Don't mess it up."