Chapter 5 - The ReunionThe crunch of snow under my boots was the only warning they had.
Lucas whipped his head around, his eyes wide and bloodshot, expecting to see a rescue squad or a mountain lion.
Instead, he saw me.
For three full seconds, Lucas froze. His jaw dropped, his mouth opening and closing like a landed fish. He looked down at my snow boots, my heavy thermal parka, my untouched face, and then back up to my eyes, as if his brain was trying to process an impossible math equation.
“Cl-Claire?” he stammered, his voice cracking into a pathetic squeak. “How... how are you here? You were on the plane! I watched you give me the pack!”
Vanessa let out a strangled shriek from beneath her foil blanket, pointing a trembling finger at me. “She’s a ghost! It’s a ghost!”
I stopped ten feet away, crossing my arms over my chest, looking down at them with a cold, detached amusement.
“Not a ghost, Lucas,” I said, my voice cutting cleanly through the freezing wind. “Just a wife who finally learned how to look after herself.”
Lucas scrambled up from the snow, stumbling on his stiff legs as he rushed toward me. He reached out as if to grab my shoulders, his face a mask of hysterical disbelief and desperate relief.
“You survived! Oh, thank God, Claire, you survived!” he babbled, his acting skills kicking in on pure instinct. “I knew it! I knew you were smart enough to find a way out! We’re a family—we’re going to get through this together!”
He tried to pull me into a hug, but I stepped sharply to the side, letting him grab empty air. He stumbled forward, catching himself against a tree trunk.
He stared at me, blinking rapidly, finally noticing the cold, dead hostility in my eyes.
“Claire?” he whispered, his voice dropping its fake warmth. “What’s wrong with you? Your husband just survived a plane crash to find you alive, and you won't even let me touch you?”
“My husband?” I let out a short, sharp laugh that echoed coldly across the clearing. “Lucas, let’s be very clear about something. The moment you strapped that parachute on Vanessa and jumped out of a doomed aircraft while leaving your pregnant wife behind to burn, you ceased being my husband.”
Color drained completely from Lucas’s face.
“Pr-pregnant?” he choked out, his eyes darting down to my stomach, which was clearly visible beneath the unzipped front of my parka. “You... you’re pregnant?”
“Six months,” I replied smoothly. “A little girl. Not that it matters to you. After all, you’ve always had a wonderful track record when it comes to dealing with our daughters, haven't you, Lucas?”
The blood rushed out of his face so fast he looked like a corpse. He staggered backward, his lips parting in mute terror.
He remembered.
Or rather, deep down in the fractured, paranoid corners of his subconscious, the psychic shockwave of the previous timeline—the memories I carried, the aura of absolute judgment I exuded—hit him like a physical blow. He didn't know how I knew, but he knew I saw right through the mask.
“You... you know,” he whispered, his voice trembling so violently he could barely form the words. “You know what happened... in the nursery.”
“Every second of it,” I said softly, stepping closer until I was towering over him in the snow. “I remember the cold wool blanket. I remember your hands. I remember the exact look in your eyes when you decided that Vanessa’s death justified murdering our baby.”
Vanessa, sitting a few feet away with her broken leg, stared at us in absolute incomprehension, her eyes darting between us like a spectator at a tennis match. “What are they talking about? Lucas, what is she saying? Make her help us! My leg is broken!”
Lucas didn't look at her. He couldn't. He was staring at me as if Satan himself had risen out of the snowdrifts to claim his soul.
“Claire,” he whimpered, dropping heavily to his knees in the powder, staring up at me with pathetic, tear-filled eyes. “Please. I was insane. Grief made me do it—the crash, losing her... it warped my mind! Give me another chance. We can fix this!”
I looked down at the man who had once been a titan of corporate aviation—a man feared and respected by hundreds of subordinates—now groveling in the frozen dirt like a beaten dog.
“Fix this?” I asked quietly. “No, Lucas. We aren't going to fix anything. Because right now, the rescue choppers you’ve been praying for are finally on their way.”
I tapped the satellite communicator on my belt.
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“And when they land, they aren't going to find a grieving husband rescuing his family. They’re going to find a corrupt pilot investigated for involuntary manslaughter, corporate fraud, and the illegal transport of unregistered passengers.”
Right on cue, a distant, rhythmic thumping sound began to echo across the mountain valley—the heavy, unmistakable chop of twin-rotor turbine blades cutting through the upper air.
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