THE WIFE WHO CAME BACK FROM THE DEAD

Blythe’s heart stopped. The triumphant roar of the boardroom faded into a high-pitched ringing in her ears.

"Gone?" she demanded, grabbing Agent Torres by the arm. "What do you mean he’s gone? Reed brought him back to the house last night!"

Reed, handcuffed and being hauled to his feet by two agents, looked up with a sickening, desperate smile. "You think you're the only one who plans ahead, Blythe? I knew Arthur was getting jumpy. I knew Chloe was a liability. When the police brought Ellis back last night, I didn't keep him at the house."

"Where is my son?" Blythe screamed, the polished corporate armor finally cracking, revealing the terrified, ferocious mother beneath.

"He's with someone who doesn't care about FBI badges," Reed sneered, blood trickling from where Lorraine had scratched his cheek. "He's with Dr. Evans. They’re at a private facility. If I don't call them by noon to confirm the sale went through... Evans is going to formally admit him to the state psychiatric ward. You'll spend the next ten years fighting the bureaucracy to get him out, and by then, the drugs will have made the diagnosis permanent."

Blythe let go of Agent Torres. She didn't strike Reed. Striking him would be a waste of time.

She turned to Lorraine, who was weeping silently as an agent secured her wrists.

"Where is your brother's private facility, Lorraine?" Blythe asked, her voice dropping to a terrifying, deadly calm.

Lorraine lifted her chin, trying to maintain some scrap of her destroyed dignity. "I'll never tell you. You ruined my family. I'm going to ruin yours."

Blythe looked at the older woman. Then, she pulled her encrypted tablet from the table. She tapped a few keys, bringing up the master control panel for the offshore accounts she had retrieved from her father's watch.

"Lorraine," Blythe said softly. "I know your family went bankrupt twenty years ago. I know you've been skimming off Sutter Medical to rebuild your secret trust fund in the Caymans. I hold the master key to that account right now."

Lorraine’s smug expression faltered.

"If you don't give me the address in the next five seconds," Blythe promised, her finger hovering over the screen, "I will transfer every single cent of your stolen wealth to a dog rescue charity, and you will spend the rest of your life in federal prison wearing cheap shoes and eating off a plastic tray."

Lorraine stared at the tablet. The threat of poverty was far more terrifying to her than the threat of prison.

"The... the old hunting cabin," Lorraine whispered, her voice cracking. "On the Severn River. Gregory uses it when he wants to stay off the grid."

Blythe didn't wait for the FBI. She didn't wait for Agent Torres to coordinate a tactical team. She sprinted out of the boardroom, her heels sinking into the plush carpet, and threw herself into the private elevator.

She commandeered the black SUV she had arrived in, flashing her federal ID at the driver. "Get out."

The driver scrambled out, and Blythe slid into the driver's seat. She slammed the car into gear and tore out of the parking garage, the heavy vehicle fishtailing on the wet pavement before catching traction.

The drive to the Severn River took twenty minutes of reckless, high-speed maneuvering through the gray Maryland rain. The hunting cabin was located at the end of a long, unpaved dirt road, surrounded by dense pines and weeping willows.

Blythe slammed the SUV into park before it had even fully stopped. She threw open the door and ran through the mud.

The cabin looked abandoned. The windows were dark, the porch sagging.

She didn't bother knocking. She drew her tactical flashlight from her jacket pocket, holding it like a weapon, and kicked the front door perfectly at the latch. The rotting wood splintered, and the door flew open.

"Ellis!" she screamed, her voice echoing in the damp, dusty interior.

"Who's there?" a panicked voice called out from the back room.

Dr. Gregory Evans emerged from the hallway. He was a tall, thin man with graying hair, wearing a casual sweater. He looked nothing like a criminal mastermind. He looked like an arrogant academic who suddenly realized he was entirely out of his depth.

"Where is he?" Blythe demanded, advancing on the doctor.

"Ms. Sutter," Evans stammered, holding his hands up defensively. "You are violating a medical quarantine. The boy is unstable. I am monitoring him before his transfer to the state facility."

"You aren't monitoring him," Blythe snarled, slamming Evans against the drywall with a physical strength born of pure adrenaline. She pinned him by the throat with her forearm. "You're poisoning him so your sister could steal my company."

Evans gasped, his eyes wide with terror as he realized the woman in front of him wasn't a fragile housewife. "He's... he's in the back bedroom. The door is locked. I didn't hurt him! I just gave him a mild sedative to keep him quiet!"

Blythe shoved the doctor to the floor in disgust. She ran down the narrow hallway and threw her shoulder against the locked wooden door. It cracked but held. She kicked it twice, the heavy combat boots she wore beneath her slacks shattering the cheap lock.

The room was dark, smelling of dust and mildew.

In the corner, huddled beneath a moth-eaten blanket, was a small, shivering lump.

Blythe dropped to her knees. "Ellis?"

She gently pulled the blanket back.

Ellis was curled into a tight ball. His skin was pale, his breathing shallow. His gray eyes fluttered open, glassy and unfocused from whatever chemical garbage Evans had forced into his system.

He looked at her. He didn't pull away this time.

"Mom?" he whispered, his raspy voice barely audible over the sound of the rain hitting the tin roof.

Blythe felt a sob tear from her throat. It was the first time he had called her that. The first time he had recognized her not as a stranger, but as safety.

"I'm here, sweetheart," she cried, pulling his small, limp body into her arms, burying her face in his hair. "I'm right here. You're going home."

Suddenly, the floorboards creaked in the hallway.

Blythe spun around, shielding Ellis with her body.

Dr. Evans stood in the doorway. He was trembling violently, but he held a heavy, iron fireplace poker in his right hand.

"If you take him," Evans said, his voice cracking with desperate, pathetic panic, "I go to prison for medical fraud. I lose my license. I can't let you walk out of here with the evidence, Ms. Sutter."

He raised the iron poker.

Blythe didn't flinch. She gently laid Ellis back on the floor, stood up, and looked at the terrified doctor with eyes that had seen the worst of humanity in war zones across the globe.