Chapter 13
The rail burned cold against my back. My bathrobe had torn at the shoulder when he'd lunged, the white terry cloth split open to the seam, and the night air hit the skin of my collarbone where I'd taped the pouch. I was breathing so hard I could hear it.
Adrian's hands were still out in front of him like he couldn't decide whether to grab me again or pretend he hadn't. His jaw was tight. His hair was damp with spray.
Footsteps hammered the deck. The captain came first, a stocky man in a windbreaker I'd only seen at the wheel, then the deckhand with a flashlight. The beam swung across us, across the wet teak, across my bare feet braced against the scupper.
"What happened!" the captain shouted over the engine. "Get away from the rail!"
Adrian answered before I could. His voice snapped into this flat, reasonable register I'd never heard before.
"She's seasick," he said. "She got dizzy. She wasn't supposed to be out here. I told her to get air and she lost her balance."
The deckhand reached for me. I didn't let go of the rail.
"Don't touch me yet," I said. My throat was raw. I had to pause to get the air back. "Please. Don't move me."
The captain's flashlight held on Adrian's hands, then on me. "Mrs. Villanueva, are you hurt? Did you fall?"
I looked at Adrian. His eyes flicked to my torn robe, to the edge of medical tape just visible under the fold. I saw him calculate.
"No," I said. "I didn't fall. He tried to push me."
Adrian laughed, one short breath. "Mara, you're confused. You took something for the nausea, you said you were seeing—"
"I didn't take anything," I said. I pulled the torn side of the robe just enough to show the small zip pouch taped to my ribs, the skin red around it. "He gave me two white tablets. He said it was for seasickness. I didn't swallow them."
The captain stared. The deckhand lowered his flashlight a little.
Adrian stepped forward, hands up, palms open. "Captain, listen to me. My wife has anxiety. She hasn't slept. This is a delusion. She gets like this—"
"Today at 2:00, we'll push him into the sea," I said. I made myself say it exactly how I'd heard it. My voice shook but I didn't stop. "That's what you said on the phone. That's your plan. At two. You were going to push me and say I fell overboard. For the money. For Villanueva Pacific Logistics. The sixteen billion."
The wind took the words for a second. Adrian's face went still. Not angry. Blank. The way people go blank when a recording matches.
"She's repeating something she heard on TV," he told the captain. He tried to smile. "Captain, we need to get her inside. She's cold, she's—"
"Don't," the captain said. He put an arm out, not touching Adrian, but blocking him. He looked at me. "Ma'am, what is in the pouch?"
"Tablets," I said. "Two round white ones. From tonight. And my phone. It's recording. It's been recording in the cabin since I called my attorney."
I peeled the tape slowly. The adhesive stung. My fingers were clumsy from the cold and the adrenaline. I held the pouch out to the deckhand, not to Adrian. The deckhand took it like it might bite.
Adrian moved then, fast, toward me, toward the pouch. The captain shouldered him back hard against the cabin bulkhead. It wasn't violent. It was firm, practiced, the way you handle a drunk passenger.
"Inside," the captain ordered the deckhand. "Bring that case. The black one."
We went in a tight group, the captain behind Adrian with a hand on his upper arm, me wrapped in a spare blanket the deckhand had thrown around my shoulders, my robe still torn underneath. The cabin's warm light felt too yellow after the dark on deck. The bed was unmade, white linens twisted where we'd struggled.
My phone was where I'd wedged it between the life vest and the paneling, screen dark. The deckhand tossed me the dark hard-shell suitcase from the foot of the bed.
I knelt, my knees shaking. I pressed the corner near the wheel, felt the false bottom give the way it had before. The documents were still there, folded. I pulled them out with the pouch.
The captain took my phone, pressed play. The cabin filled with Adrian's own voice, tinny but clear through the small speaker. His call from earlier. "This is not anti-seasickness, attorney. I plan to kill Adrian tonight." No, that was my voice. I winced. Then his voice came: the logistics, the time, the sea.
Adrian's head dropped. He didn't argue the voice was his. He switched.
"That recording is out of context," he said quickly to the captain. "I was — we were talking about a liability scenario. For insurance. You don't understand our family—"
The captain stopped it. He hit pause. He looked at the tablets in the pouch, at the documents, at my torn robe.
"Enough," he said. He nodded to the deckhand. "Lock him in the forward cabin. Take his phone. No one goes on deck alone."
"You can't lock me up," Adrian said, but his voice had lost its center. "This is my charter. I paid for this yacht. Captain, you work for me."
"I work for the vessel," the captain said. "And right now you are a risk to a passenger."
They moved him toward the door. He looked back at me once from the wooden frame — the same frame I'd peeked around hours earlier, listening — and his expression wasn't fearful anymore. It was flat and assessing, like he was already drafting the next lie for the port.
When the door latched and the deckhand turned the outside bolt, the captain handed me back my phone and the suitcase. His hands were steady.
"Hold these," he said quietly. "Nothing goes over the side. We make for El Nido. No radio chatter about this until we're in signal range and I can get the Coast Guard directly. You understand?"
May you like
I nodded. I was still holding the torn edges of my robe together. The tape mark burned on my ribs. I could hear Adrian shifting behind the locked door, not shouting yet, just breathing.
I had the tablets. I had the recording. I had the case. He was contained.
