Chapter 8 - The Night Rachel DisappearedDaniel doubled security.
Rachel hated it.
“I have a guard outside the bathroom.”
“He's outside the hallway.”
“He can hear me brushing my teeth.”
“He has excellent training.”
Rachel stared at Daniel.
“That sentence doesn't help.”
Despite the danger, their marriage grew warmer.
Rachel returned to St. Catherine's after the hospital board formally cleared her and suspended three administrators connected to Northshore.
Daniel drove her on her first morning back.
“You don't have to walk me inside.”
“I know.”
“You're going to anyway.”
“Yes.”
Rachel smiled.
At the entrance, Daniel touched her waist, then stopped.
The bruises had faded.
Still, he waited.
Rachel noticed.
She took his hand and placed it gently against her side.
Daniel's eyes met hers.
“I'm okay.”
He kissed her forehead.
“Call me.”
“You mean every seven minutes?”
“Five.”
She laughed and entered the hospital.
At 4:32 p.m., the fire alarm sounded.
Hospital staff began evacuating patients.
Rachel was helping an elderly woman toward the stairwell when a man wearing maintenance coveralls approached.
“Ms. Moretti? Security needs you downstairs.”
Something bothered her.
His badge.
The photograph was slightly crooked.
Rachel stepped backward.
“No.”
The man's expression changed.
Rachel screamed.
He grabbed her.
She drove her elbow into his chest and ran.
The corridor erupted.
A second man appeared.
Rachel reached the stairwell before someone caught her from behind.
Her phone fell.
The last thing she saw was Daniel's name glowing on the screen.
Daniel arrived seven minutes later.
Too late.
Rachel was gone.
Her phone lay shattered near the service exit.
Daniel stared at it.
Marcus had never seen him look afraid before.
Not truly.
“Find her.”
“We are.”
“Find my wife.”
Every Moretti resource moved.
Police.
Federal agents.
Port security.
Private investigators.
Traffic cameras.
Daniel sat before a wall of screens, refusing food, refusing sleep.
Emma approached him at 2:00 a.m.
“Daniel.”
He didn't look up.
“She needs you thinking.”
“I am thinking.”
“No. You're panicking quietly.”
That finally made him look at her.
Emma sat beside him.
“Rachel isn't helpless.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
Daniel closed his eyes.
“She noticed fake serial numbers nobody else noticed. She stood up to you the first day she met you.”
A faint, broken smile appeared.
“She'll leave you clues.”
Emma was right.
At 2:43 a.m., investigators found security footage of the van.
Rachel had deliberately kicked one shoe out through the rear door.
Twenty minutes later, another camera captured something white fluttering from the vehicle.
A torn piece of her blouse.
She was marking the route.
Daniel understood.
“She's taking them toward the harbor.”
The van disappeared near an abandoned cold-storage facility once owned by Harbor Meridian.
Daniel stood.
Marcus blocked him.
“Federal tactical teams go first.”
“Move.”
“Daniel.”
“If that were your wife—”
“I'd want someone thinking clearly enough to bring her home.”
Daniel stopped.
Marcus rarely challenged him.
Rachel had changed more than Daniel realized.
He nodded.
They went together.
Inside the facility, Rachel sat tied to a chair.
Evelyn Shaw stood before her.
She was sixty-two, silver-haired, elegant, and completely calm.
“You're disappointing,” Evelyn said.
Rachel lifted her chin.
“I get that from women who don't like my clothes.”
Evelyn smiled.
“I understand why Daniel loves you.”
Rachel's heart jumped.
Daniel had never used that word.
Not yet.
Evelyn continued.
“You made him soft.”
“No.”
Rachel looked directly at her.
“I think I reminded him he was human.”
For the first time, Evelyn's smile vanished.
Outside, tactical teams surrounded the building.
Daniel watched through a surveillance feed.
Then Evelyn lifted a gun.
Daniel stopped breathing.
She pressed it against Rachel's shoulder.
“Call your husband.”
Rachel's hands trembled.
But her voice didn't.
“No.”
Evelyn leaned closer.
“He'll come.”
Rachel smiled faintly.
“Yes.”
She looked toward the security camera Evelyn believed was disabled.
“But not the way you think.”
The lights outside went dark.
Evelyn turned.
That was the moment Rachel had been waiting for.
She kicked the chair backward.
Gunfire cracked.
Glass shattered.
Agents stormed the room.
May you like
Daniel heard Rachel scream.
And then everything disappeared beneath smoke.
