Chapter 1Trapped in the Mudslide with Him

The sudden mudslide left me and my department director stranded in the middle of nowhere on a business trip.

When the cell service finally flickered back to life, the texts from my boyfriend flooded in like a breached dam.

Why aren’t you answering?

What the hell are you doing?

You out of town or just in another guy’s bed? You enjoying it too much to text back?

Those ugly, vile words glaring at me from the illuminated screen were the final nail in the coffin.

Once upon a time, I had mistaken his suffocating possessiveness for a fierce, passionate love. Whether it was a completely normal conversation with a male friend, a necessary work interaction with a colleague, or even just my eyes accidentally lingering on a passing stranger on the sidewalk, it would trigger an episode of unhinged paranoia in him.

Only now, sitting in the freezing dark, did I finally understand. That wasn't love. That was control.

* * *

The regional site visit was a last-minute directive from corporate, and I was paired up with Bowen, the director of my department.

Before we hit the road, I specifically sent a text to Chad to let him know.

He replied instantly: Which coworker? A guy or a girl? Cara, I swear to God, don’t lie to me. I know people at your office. I’ll call your boss myself to check.

I stared at the screen, a familiar, sickening wave of exhaustion washing over me.

I had already rearranged my entire social life to avoid one-on-one contact with the opposite sex. But it was the twenty-first century—was I supposed to march into corporate and demand they excuse me from working with any male colleagues?

After agonizing over the keyboard, I simply typed back: I really am just going on a business trip.

Chad didn't reply.

The meetings went smoothly, and we decided to drive back that same night to beat the weekend traffic. But no one could have predicted the freak storm that descended on us as we wound our way through the mountain pass.

The sky bruised into a violent purple-black. Lightning fractured the clouds, followed by bone-rattling thunder.

Bowen drove through the torrential downpour with white-knuckled focus for what felt like hours, until he suddenly slammed on the brakes.

"Mudslide ahead," he said, his voice tight. "The hillside gave way. The road is completely blocked."

We were forced to detour into a remote highway rest stop. There wasn't even a convenience store—just an empty, rain-slicked parking lot rapidly filling with other stranded vehicles.

The rain showed zero signs of letting up, and within minutes, the power grid for the rest area blew out.

We were plunged into pitch blackness. The only illumination came from the erratic flashes of lightning, briefly revealing the sea of thick, churning mud completely cutting off the exit ramps.

But the truest despair hit me when I looked at my phone. No Service.

My stomach plummeted.

In the past, if I went dark for ten minutes, Chad would go absolutely nuclear. Now, completely cut off from the grid, I couldn't even fathom the scale of the meltdown he was having.

I turned my head toward Bowen, trying to keep the rising panic out of my voice.

"Bowen, do you have any bars? I've got absolutely nothing. I need to text my boyfriend to let him know I'm safe, or he's going to lose his mind."

Bowen pulled his phone from the center console and tapped the screen to show me. SOS Only.

"The whole grid is down. The mudslide probably took out the nearest cell tower," he said quietly. "It’s not going to be fixed anytime soon."

"What am I supposed to do..."

My chest felt suffocatingly tight. "If my boyfriend can't reach me, he's going to imagine the worst."

Bowen was silent for a few seconds. "Worrying about that right now won't change the outcome. Let's just focus on staying safe."

The wind howled, battering the car. Every so often, the terrifying rumble of earth and rock sliding down the distant mountain echoed through the dark, making the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

The temperature in the cabin was plummeting. I was only wearing a thin silk blouse, and goosebumps rapidly populated my arms.

Bowen didn't say a word. He simply unzipped his heavy wool jacket, shrugged it off, and draped it across my lap.

"Thank you," I murmured, feeling entirely out of my depth.

He gave a low "Mm" in acknowledgment.

Silence swallowed the car again. It was an eerie, heavy quiet, punctuated only by the aggressive drumming of rain against the windshield and the distant cracks of thunder.

I sat there, clutching my cold, useless phone, my heart hammering a frantic rhythm against my ribs.

Half of me was terrified of the mountain collapsing on us.

The other half was terrified of Chad's wrath.