“LET GO! YOU WERE NEVER SUPPOSED TO SURVIVE!” my husband screamed as I hung from our luxury yacht above the freezing Atlantic. My best friend crushed my bleeding fingers beneath her high heel, laughing as she whispered, “He's mine now.” They watched me plunge into the darkness, never realizing the tiny red light beneath my wrist had already alerted someone who could destroy them both.

Two hours before the grand gala, chaos erupted inside the Whitmore penthouse.

Daniel had just received an urgent notification from his bank: the Swiss account he had attempted to set up for Nereid had rejected his digital signature. Worse, an internal alert indicated that an unauthorized $14 million bond authorization had been initiated from a secondary IP address—an address registered to Vanessa’s private laptop.

“YOU STOLE FROM ME!” Daniel’s roar echoed through the marbled foyer as Vanessa walked in, holding a shopping bag from an upscale boutique on Fifth Avenue.

Vanessa froze, then scoffed, setting her bags down on the console table. “What are you screaming about now, Daniel? Did another ghost pop up on your monitor?”

Daniel stormed toward her, his face purple with rage, waving the printout in her face. “You signed an offshore transfer authorization behind my back! Fourteen million dollars! You tried to take the money and leave me holding the bag!”

Vanessa’s expression hardened from amusement into pure, venomous contempt.

“And what if I did?” she hissed, stepping into his personal space without an ounce of fear. “You think I did this because I love you, Daniel? You’re a weak, pathetic parasite who rode Claire’s coattails for eight years. You couldn’t even kill her yourself—you needed me to step on her fingers because your stomach turned at the sight of her blood!”

Daniel raised his hand, shaking with fury, but Vanessa caught his wrist with surprising strength, her eyes wild with malice.

“Don't you dare touch me,” she snarled. “If I go down, you go down for first-degree murder. We walk into that gala tonight, we smile for the cameras, and we announce the trust transfer. Once the money clears on Monday, we split it fifty-fifty. If you cross me, Daniel, I will call the FBI myself and tell them you paid me to keep quiet while you shoved Claire into the Atlantic.”

Daniel stared at her, realizing with horrifying clarity that the woman he had chosen as his partner in crime was far more dangerous than the wife he had tried to drown. He slowly lowered his arm, his breathing shallow and ragged.

“Get dressed,” Daniel muttered bitterly, turning his back on her. “The car will be here in twenty minutes.”

Vanessa smoothed her dress, a vicious smirk playing across her lips. “Make sure you wear your black tie, darling. We have a grieving widowhood to celebrate.”

From the safehouse monitor, I watched them separate into their respective dressing rooms.

“They’re turning on each other,” Julian observed, closing the feed.