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CHAPTER ONE

S he was finally going to get the perfect shot.

In the gray light of pre-dawn, Brooklynn Wright shifted on the jagged rocks, scraping her belly through her thin shirt. At least it was low tide. Otherwise, she’d not just be cold, but wet.

She snapped a few photos with her Nikon, adjusted the small tripod, and snapped a few more.

Excitement bubbled inside her. Just four minutes until sunrise.

She could see it in her mind’s eye. The rising sun shining through a wave as it crested and rolled. Behind it, the gleaming rocky headland north of the small bay that gave Shadow Cove its name.

Catching the wave and the sunlight at the perfect moment. That was the challenge. So much depended on her success. Her gallery, her very livelihood.

One more minute till sunrise.

She snapped photos as the eastern sky turned from midnight blue to indigo. Clouds she hadn’t seen in the darkness added richness to the view as light shone around them in deep red and coral and orange.

Finally, finally, the sun clawed back darkness with its perfect radiance.

Birds quieted as if to mark the moment. Even the ever-present breeze seemed to still.

Beautiful.

Brooklynn snapped, snapped. Catching waves and sunlight. Sunlight and waves.

But sunlight through waves? She didn’t know, didn’t stop to absorb what she'd captured. Just kept snapping.

A low hum rumbled beneath the sound of the incoming tide. A boat engine. She prayed it wouldn’t ruin her shot. She had a minute, maybe less, to get this.

Her father thought she was flighty, and…whatever. It didn’t matter. But he didn’t know this part of her. None of her family understood the single-minded focus it took to catch nature’s fleeting moments of beauty.

If this photograph came out the way she thought it would, if it won the prestigious Arthur Whitmore award, her sisters would congratulate her, her mother would sing her praises. And her father would pat her on the head—metaphorically, if not physically—like a cute little puppy.

Or maybe, just this once, he'd be proud of her.

The engine was getting closer.

Ignore it. Focus.

Snap, snap, snap.

Too soon, the sun was above the horizon, bathing Brooklynn and the Maine coastline in its warm light. She removed her camera from the tripod and flipped through the photos.

Decent. Good. Maybe great, but…

She gasped. Enlarged the tiny image.

Sunlight streamed through a cresting wave. No ugly seaweed inside, just clear blue. Behind it, the indescribable beauty of a new day. To one side, a seagull diving for breakfast. To the other, the rocky shoreline.

She’d done it. She’d finally gotten a photograph that could final for the most prestigious photography award in northern New England.

Just that would put her little gallery on the map. And if she won the cash prize…

She could survive past the tourist season—and prove that she could make a living doing what she loved.

Prove to her father that she mattered.

A shout carried on the breeze, the words lost in the roar of the surf.

Who in the world…?

Brooklynn stood, brushed sand off her jeans, and shoved her camera and tripod into her small leather backpack.

The boat had come from the north, but it hadn’t moved into view. Where had it gone?

If Brooklynn were smart, she’d hightail it out of there before she got caught trespassing.

But curiosity had her climbing to the top of the rocky cliff. She slipped between the few trees separating this edge of the outcropping from the other and peered inland down the narrow waterway and through the trees to an old, dilapidated dock.

Sure enough, a fishing boat bumped against the rotting wood. Two men carried a box onto the dock. By the way they strained, the box was heavy. They set it on a dolly, and someone else pushed it toward an army-green Polaris just inside the tree line.

A fourth man was returning with an empty dolly.

Meanwhile, a fifth watched the operation from the edge of a small beach.

Maybe the new owners of the Victorian mansion built on the hill above the cove were having something delivered? Though…why on a boat? The house had a driveway. Also, the path where the Polaris was parked led not toward the house but away from it, through the thick woods to who-knew-where.

She took out her camera and zoomed in on the men, the boat, the vehicle, and the boxes. Snapping photographs for no good reason except… Well, she was a photographer. It was what she did.

A weird acidy feeling filled her stomach, but she ignored the distraction. Something was wrong, something…

“Hey!”

The man’s shout was too close.

The ones moving boxes turned toward her.

Shoving her camera into her bag, she scanned the beach below the headland where she stood.

A figure was climbing, barely more than a shadow.

A quick glance back at the dock…

The men were running toward the headland. Toward her .

She had no idea what was happening, but…

Run!

She scrambled across the top of the headland and started making her way down the other side, angling toward shore, toward the path to the road where she’d left her Bronco.

A man shouted behind her.

“Cut her off. Close her in.”

“Don’t let her get away.”

Where could she go? On one side, the cold sea.

On the other, men determined to…what? Capture her? Harm her?

Kill her?

She couldn’t risk the road.

If she could make it around the headland on the northern edge of Shadow Cove, maybe she could flag someone down. There’d be people in town. Maybe someone walking the shore.

But that would mean running across jagged rocks. She’d be exposed. They’d see her.

They’d catch her.

Their voices were growing louder. Behind her. In front of her. Above her.

She stopped halfway to the bottom and pressed against the rocky cliff wall. Could she hide here? For now, but the sunlight was creeping toward her. She’d be exposed any second.

She was trapped.

A hand gripped her arm and yanked her back into darkness.

She gasped, fear clogging her throat.

The man—it had to be a man—held her around her middle, her back to his front. He curled around her body, imprisoning her.

He covered her mouth, not that she could scream past the fear.

He was speaking, low, insistent. She couldn’t decipher his words over the chaos of her terror.

She fought to escape, but he was strong, so much stronger.

“Stop struggling.” His whisper was vehement.

Those words registered.

“They’ll hear you. Stop.”

They . Who were they ? Who was he ?

“Trust me, please.” His words were barely audible.

She stilled. Fighting was useless. Think .

“These rocks are like a megaphone.” The warning came out in a soothing cadence, no doubt intended to calm her. “If you make noise, they’ll hear you. If we’re quiet, they’ll go away.”

She had no idea where she was. Somehow, she’d been transported from the cliff to this…darkness.

She shouldn’t trust the stranger who’d grabbed her, but if not for him, she’d have been caught.

“I’m trying to help you.” His words were even, unhurried. “Trust me. Please.”

Trust him?

She couldn’t even see him.

But now that her eyes had adjusted to the darkness, she made out rugged stone walls, a low ceiling.

The man was backed against the wall, his body pressed against hers. In the smallness of the space, she understood why.

“You’re not going to yell?” he asked.

She shook her head.

His hand lifted from her mouth.

“Who are?—?”

“Sh. Sh. They’re close.”

How did he…?

“I swear, she was right here.”

Brooklynn startled at the voice, which sounded only inches away.

Her captor pressed his fingers to her lips again, the hold surprisingly gentle, a reminder more than a demand to keep quiet.

“She’s gotta be here,” another man said, then shouted, “Anything?”

From farther away, “She’s gone.”

A curse.

“Don’t just stand there. Find her.”

Rocks skittered nearby. Then silence.

It stretched for seconds, minutes.

Brooklynn should’ve been overwhelmed with terror. When she'd run for her life, she'd never been so terrified. But here, in the darkness with this stranger, she felt secure.

Protected.

Which made no sense at all.

“Are you okay?” The man’s whisper warmed her ear, his breath brushing the hair at her nape and sending goosebumps across her flesh.

Was she? Aside from the psychotic break evidenced in her strange attraction to a man whose face she hadn’t seen?

Maybe she’d gone crazy. Maybe she’d dreamed the whole thing.

Was she still in her warm bed, conjuring all of this in her imagination? She’d always been the most creative of the Wright sisters.

At this point, that option seemed entirely plausible.

But the arms around her weren’t blankets and sheets. The man’s warm breath wasn’t heat from a furnace.

If it was a dream, this was the most vivid she’d ever had.

“I’m gonna move my hand,” her dream-savior said. “Don’t scream. I can get us out of here, but if you make any noise, you’ll get us both killed.”

“Killed?” He’d spoken her fear as if he had no doubt. “Who were those?—?”

“Not now. Keep your head down. The ceiling is low.” He placed his hands on her hips and moved her gently away, then slipped in front of her. “Stay right behind me. Grab my shirt if you need to.”

Why could he talk but she couldn’t?

A question she wouldn’t ask right now, considering that he obviously knew what he was doing. Of course, he might be leading her to a different kind of captivity. Or death.

Lord, protect me.

Because she couldn’t fight more than one bad guy at a time.

She hoped and prayed this was a good guy as she gripped the back of the stranger’s T-shirt and followed him into the darkness.