“Back off!” he yelled. “Back off or she’s dead too.”
Too.
The word rang through the room.
Claire sobbed. “Daniel, please.”
Mara’s voice came from the hallway, calm as winter. “Daniel Briggs, put the weapon down.”
He laughed. “Federal? Jesus, Emily. You stupid—”
I drove my heel down onto his foot as hard as I could.
The gun jerked.
A shot cracked into the ceiling.
Plaster rained down like dirty snow.
Agents tackled him.
I hit the floor.
Claire crawled toward me, reaching. “Em! Emily!”
I scrambled away so fast my shoulder struck the cabinet.
Her face collapsed.
Not anger.
Not fear.
Loss.
Daniel was cuffed on the kitchen tile, screaming about lawyers. Agents hauled him up. Mara took the gun. Someone asked if I was hurt. I could not answer. I could only look at Claire.
She sat on the floor in her soaked coat, hands limp in her lap.
Mara knelt before her. “Claire Briggs, you’re under arrest.”
Claire did not resist.
As an agent pulled her to her feet, she looked at me.
“I didn’t want you in the car,” she whispered.
My whole body went still.
“What?”
Her lips trembled.
“I called you to keep you home.”
The room blurred.
“No,” I said.
She nodded, crying harder now. “Daniel wanted both of you gone. He said it solved everything. Insurance. Trust. Guardianship. No witnesses. But I couldn’t. I couldn’t let you die.”
Mara’s eyes sharpened.
Claire turned toward me like we were the only two people left on earth.
“I thought if Liam died, you’d need me again.”
The words entered the room quietly.
Then destroyed it.
Claire had saved my life for the same reason she had helped take his.
I could not breathe.
She had not spared me out of love pure enough to redeem her.
She had spared me because she wanted to inherit my grief.
Daniel shouted from the doorway, “Shut up, Claire!”
She flinched.
Then she looked at him and something in her finally seemed to break free.
“No,” she said. “I’m done.”
