Chapter 3 - The Deeper Water
He didn't return to his seat. Instead, he led me to the very back of the plane, near the jump seats, where the cabin crew were huddled behind curtains. The stewardess looked at us with concern, but a quick, desperate look from me kept her at bay.
"I didn't leave you," he started, his voice a frantic whisper. He was sweating, his eyes darting toward the other passengers as if he expected them to sprout guns and badges. "I was taken. The storm wasn't an accident. I was working for a firm that was doing more than just shipping. I found out they were moving things that couldn't be tracked—human lives, classified technology. I was going to report it."
I felt my stomach churn. "The boat? The jacket?"
"Staged," he said bitterly. "They wanted me gone, but they needed it to look clean. They took me, interrogated me, and then dumped me in a holding facility in a country that doesn't exist on most maps. I escaped six months ago. I’ve been living in the shadows, moving constantly, terrified that if I reached out to you, they’d find you and finish what they started."
"You let us bury you," I said, the rage starting to replace the shock. "You let Ethan think his father was lost to the tide. He draws houses without doors, Daniel! He thinks his life is a trap!"
May you like
"I did it to keep you alive!" he roared, then immediately lowered his voice as a passenger glanced back. "If they thought I had a family, they would have used you as leverage. I had to make sure you were 'widowed.' It was the only way to cut the cord."
I looked at him—this stranger who wore my husband’s face and carried his secrets. He looked broken, a man who had been dismantled and put back together with mismatched parts. But as he spoke, I saw the fear in his eyes. It wasn't the fear of a man lying to protect his pride; it was the hollow, vibrating terror of a man who had seen the abyss and realized it was looking back at him.
