Our supposed romantic hiking trip, the isolated location, and the enormous life insurance policy were not unrelated details but pieces of a plan designed to turn my death into an accident and make Michael extraordinarily wealthy.

My pregnancy had only increased what he stood to gain.

“Come on.

I’m freezing.”

Michael and Ashley walked away together without checking whether I was still breathing.

Within moments, the storm swallowed them completely, leaving me alone beneath the accumulating snow as though I had already ceased to exist.

For almost two hours, consciousness came and went.

Whenever I felt myself slipping into darkness, I pressed my hands against my stomach and waited until I felt the smallest movement beneath them.