Catherine could swim.
So could Travis.
But Hannah….
I took off at a dead sprint, racing down the rocky embankment. I slipped about halfway down and slid the rest of the way on my ass, but I didn’t let it slow me.
“Catherine!” I bellowed as I dove into the frigid water, fully clothed.
Adrenaline had taken over.
It took no less than seven hundred years for me to reach that car. And with every second that passed, when none of their heads popped up from beneath the surface, a part of me died. I was vaguely aware of people yelling from the bridge above me, and then I caught sight of a man diving in from the opposite side of the banks. But I was too focused on my never-ending journey to reach my family to find any relief in the fact that people had stopped to help.
By the time I got to the car, the front end was underwater, the roof only partially visible and the bumper stuck up in the air like a buoy.
My heart was beating so fast I feared it would explode. And that would have been fine by me, as long as it lasted long enough for me to pull them to safety first.
“Travis!” I frantically tried to pull open his door to no avail. “I’m coming, buddy. Hang tight!” I yelled, clueless if he could hear me or not. But I needed him to know I was there. I slammed my fists against the window, but the only thing that broke was the flesh on my knuckles.
My mind swirled to figure a way in until I heard his garbled cry.
“Dad!”
My heart stopped, and the world shattered around me.
“I’m right here! I’m gonna get you out!” Cupping my hands on either side of my face to block the sun out, I peered inside the back window.
Catherine was holding him, his back to her chest, a trail of blood pouring from her eyebrow. Travis’s head was craned back, his hands flailing against the surface, and his mouth hung open, gasping for air as the water rose around them.
“Catherine!” I screamed, beating on the glass. “Unlock the door. Give him to me!”
But she didn’t move. Her cold, glassy eyes stared back at me as her chin disappeared under the water.
“No! No! No!” I chanted. Scanning the inside of the car, I noticed the front windows had been opened an inch and water was pouring in through them.
After sucking in a lung full of air, I went under water. The river was murky and I could only make out shapes rather than details, but I managed to find the front door. Hooking my fingers over the top of the glass, I pulled as hard as I possibly could, using my feet to add leverage. It shattered in my hands, the bite of the glass not even registering amongst the adrenaline.
After climbing into the sinking car, I headed straight up to the air pocket.
“Get out of here!” I yelled at Catherine, shoving her and Travis toward the window.
Panic ricocheted through my system when I saw Hannah’s car seat completely submerged. Frantic, I went straight to her and began the tedious task of getting her out with shaking fingers. Each strap and buckle becoming a victory all of its own.
When I got back to the pocket, I pushed Hannah into the air. She wasn’t conscious, but I prayed that air would miraculously fill her lungs. My stomach dropped when Catherine was still there, Travis kicking and flailing in her arms, his face almost completely under water.
“Come on!” I ordered, grabbing the front of her shirt and pulling her with me as I swam out as fast as I could with my unmoving daughter tucked in the crook of my arm.
When I breached the surface, I lifted Hannah’s tiny body high, treading water while I spun in a circle, waiting to see the tops of Catherine’s and Travis’s heads emerge.
For those seconds, everything stopped.
Nothing around me mattered.
Not the freezing water.
Not the sirens blaring in the distance.
Not the bile clawing up the back of my throat.
Nothing but those two dark heads I so desperately needed to pop up.
“Come on, come on, come on,” I prayed as I swam to the bank with what I feared was my baby girl’s lifeless body.
I didn’t even look at the person I handed her off to before I started swimming back toward that car, my heart in my throat, the weight of a thousand ships on my chest.
Only the bumper was sticking out of the water, and it felt as though my life were slipping away with that car.
Where the fuck were they?
Diving back down, I swam back into the car.
And then, all at once, every single question I never wanted answered became clear when I once again found them inside that car.
I couldn’t make out much, but I saw her arms wrapped around his shoulders, his arms floating at his sides. I grabbed him first, shoving hard off the seat of the car, but he was suddenly snatched from my grip. My lungs were on fire, but getting them out wasn’t an option. I was going to die in that car before I gave up on them.
And as I struggled against her hold on him, I feared that was exactly what was going to happen.
There was no more air pocket, just a sinking car trying to take my wife and son to a watery grave.
It took a second for me to realize what was happening. At first, I thought she had to have been disoriented, maybe injured from the wreck.
But, with every passing second, the truth became unmistakable.
Her hands clawing at mine.
Her feet kicking me in the stomach.
Her hold on him fierce and visceral.
It wasn’t an accident; every move she made was strategic to keep him with her—and to keep them both in that car. The final straw was when I felt the seat belt wrapped around the two of them anchoring them in place. She hadn’t been in that seat belt the first time I’d pulled them out. There was no possible way that could be mistaken as anything except a deliberate and calculated move.
I froze. The day I met her at the local farmers market flashed on the backs of my eyelids. I’d gone to buy tomatoes and come home with a family.
My vision tunneled, darkness surrounding me, my body screaming for oxygen. But what had once been an attempt to save them both became a brawl of epic proportions.
My hands were no longer shaking, and my fears morphed into anger. I cursed and screamed that I hated her, nothing but a few bubbles carrying the message. But I didn’t stop until I was able to pry my son from her arms.
I didn’t look back as I headed for oxygen, leaving her there to die.
Only she wasn’t alone. Porter Reese, the man who’d vowed to love her in sickness and health, the man who’d held her when she’d cried and smiled at her when she’d laughed, the man who had promised her forever, died in that river beside her.
And it took three dark, twisted, and hate-filled years before he was ever found.
* * *
I couldn’t breathe.
I couldn’t talk.
I couldn’t even formulate a rational thought.
Pure instinct took over.
The blood in my veins caught fire as I spun out of Porter’s arms. Lucas—my son, Lucas—screamed as I took him with me. The inherent need to flee overwhelmed me.
Porter was faster though. One of his hands caught me above the elbow, his grip straddling the line between rough and firm. “Charlotte, stop!” he growled. “Don’t do this. He is not Lucas.”
I heard his words, but they felt like hollow syllables filled with weeks of deceit.
Tom appeared beside me, his voice low and sinister. “Let her go, Reese.”
“Give me back my son,” he snarled, his fingers biting into my bicep.
Defiantly, I held his stare. “He’s my son.”
“Dad!” Lucas cried, struggling against me. But there wasn’t a force in the world that could have taken him from me.
Not this time.
Not again.
Not ever again.
Porter snaked an arm down and took his son’s outstretched hand, holding it as he closed the circuit between the three of us. “It’s okay, bud. This is just a big misunderstanding.” His gaze lifted back to mine, his eyes hard. He looked nothing like the man I’d been falling in love with.
Probably because that man didn’t exist. This was the real Porter. The one who’d kept my son from me for the last ten years.
“Back up!” I demanded, my legs shoulder-width apart, my arm latched around Lucas’s chest, my whole body roaring and ready for war.