Chapter 4 - The Recording
Darkness changed the yacht.
The luxurious vessel my father had spent years restoring became a maze of shadows, metal, glass and moving water.
Flynn stood between me and the door.
Lightning illuminated his face.
“Give me the phone.”
“No.”
“Claire.”
“No.”
He stepped toward me.
I backed away.
“Your father always said you were stubborn.”
“Don't talk about him.”
“I've listened to Richard talk down to me for a year.”
“My father trusted you.”
“He tolerated me because you wanted me.”
“And you married me because you wanted his money.”
Flynn smiled.
“Now you're understanding.”
He lunged.
I threw the phone.
Not toward him.
Through the broken bridge window.
Flynn stared as it disappeared into the storm.
His face went white.
“The recording,” I said, “is gone.”
“You idiot.”
He grabbed me.
I screamed.
Then someone hit him from behind.
Captain Hale.
Flynn fell.
“Move!” Hale shouted.
We ran.
Only after we reached the lower corridor did I tell him the truth.
“I still have the recording.”
Hale stared.
“How?”
“Automatic cloud draft.”
Not uploaded.
Not transmitted.
But synchronized locally to my smartwatch before I threw the phone.
A tiny copy remained on my wrist.
Hale almost smiled.
“Your father would be proud.”
We found Daniel alive.
Marcus had attacked him, but Daniel had escaped into the machinery compartment.
Together, we reached the auxiliary control room.
Daniel restored partial power.
Then the radio crackled.
A voice.
“Claire?”
My heart stopped.
My father.
“Dad?”
“Claire!”
I grabbed the radio.
“Dad, listen to me—”
Static.
“Claire, we received part of—”
The signal vanished.
But it was enough.
Something had escaped.
My father knew.
Flynn no longer had the luxury of making my death look accidental.
He had to escape.
And desperate people make mistakes.
By 9:00 p.m., we had regained control of one engine.
Hale attempted to change course.
Nothing happened.
“Steering isn't responding.”
Daniel examined the controls.
“Manual override.”
“Where?”
“Aft machinery compartment.”
The same direction Flynn wanted to take me before pushing me overboard.
We went together.
Halfway there, we heard Fiona crying.
I stopped.
She was sitting against the wall.
Alone.
Her perfect hair had fallen loose.
“Claire.”
Hale raised a hand.
“Stay back.”
Fiona looked at me.
“I didn't know.”
I almost laughed.
“I heard you.”
“Not everything.”
“You laughed when Flynn called me an idiot.”
Her face collapsed.
“I knew about the money. I didn't know about your parents.”
“That's supposed to make this better?”
“No.”
For once, she had no answer.
Then she whispered, “Flynn has a gun.”
Silence.
“Where?”
“Aft deck.”
“With Aidan and Marcus.”
“Why are you here?”
“Because my son just told Marcus that once you were gone, there couldn't be witnesses.”
Hale understood first.
“Flynn plans to kill his own parents.”
Fiona began crying.
I felt no sympathy.
But information had value.
“Where is Aidan?”
“He doesn't know.”
Thunder shook the yacht.
Then a gunshot echoed.
Fiona screamed.
We ran.
At the aft passage, Aidan stumbled through the door.
Blood stained his shoulder.
“Flynn shot me.”
Fiona rushed to him.
I looked beyond them.
Marcus stood near the rail.
Flynn beside him.
And behind Flynn, barely visible through the rain, lights appeared on the horizon.
A ship.
Rescue?
Flynn saw it too.
He grabbed a flare gun.
Daniel whispered, “If he signals them—”
“He won't,” Hale said.
Flynn aimed the flare gun.
Not upward.
At the fuel tender secured along the aft deck.
Daniel's face changed.
“He’s going to burn the yacht.”
Flynn looked directly through the rain at me.
May you like
Then he fired.
The flare streaked across the darkness—and suddenly the ocean itself seemed to catch fire.
