“And Olivia might be dead.”

Hayes waited a beat and said, “Yeah.” His voice was filled with regret. “Christ, I’m sorry, Bentz.”

“We’ll meet you at the marina,” Bentz said stiffly.

“I’m on my way. Already called backup. Got a boat waiting at the marina.”

As Bentz hung up, his partner was already hitting the gas, following the navigator’s voice on the G.P.S. to head west, toward the Pacific, though Bentz knew the route.

Toward Olivia.

Olivia felt a shift.

The boat’s engine changed speed.

Her heart leapt to her throat. This was it!

The engines died, and the big vessel slowed to a stop. For a few seconds within the hold, it was deadly quiet, the gentle movement slow and eerie. Then she heard the creaking sound of the boat rolling softly with the vast, silent ocean.

How far out to sea were they?

How far from anyone?

She bit her lip and listened. No one knew where she was. No one would ever find her. In the cavernous vessel, Olivia felt more alone than she ever had in her life.

Her cramps had eased, though the twisting ache still hit her every few minutes. Pushing herself up from the floor of the cage, she knew she had to fight.

Somehow…

Don’t give up. Do not!

Fighting her fears, Olivia tried to pull herself together. She tried not to think about the fact that she was still bleeding, slowly yes, but bleeding nonetheless. No doubt miscarrying the baby she wanted so desperately.

She forced herself upright as she heard the heart-stopping noise of a running chain, metal being spun out. Oh Lord! The killer was dropping anchor.

For a second, Olivia couldn’t move.

This, wherever it was off the shore of California, was where the killer had planned for her to die. A slow and torturous death.

Think, Olivia, think! You’re not dead yet!

She reasoned that the boat couldn’t be too far out to sea if the killer expected the boat to be found, her body located, the camera intact.

Her captor was, if nothing else, precise, her plans comprised of minute details, her timeline plotted to the last second. A control freak to the nth degree, she’d chosen this particular spot carefully, had anticipated and savored this moment for years, fantasized exactly how Olivia’s death was to be executed.

“Like hell,” Olivia said. She wasn’t going down without one helluva fight. What was it Grannie Gin had always said when Olivia was growing up?

Where there’s life, there’s hope.

And Olivia wasn’t dead.

Yet.

There had to be a way to outsmart this twisted maniac…maybe fake that her spirit had been crushed, pretend that the killer had “won,” breaking her psychologically, so that her captor would become overconfident, perhaps slip up.