The hospital rang me and said a little boy had named me as the person to call in an emergency. I laughed because it sounded absurd and said, “That’s not possible. I’m 32, single, and I don’t have a child.” But when they told me he had been begging for me, I drove over… and the moment I entered his hospital room, my whole world went still...

Noah stared at the small fire, the orange light reflecting in his wide, quiet eyes. He looked so much like Megan it made my chest ache—the same stubborn line of the jaw, the same way he held his breath when he was concentrating.

"Mom knew they were coming for her," he said softly, his voice barely carrying over the crackle of the dry cedar. "For the past month, she didn't sleep. She stayed up late in the kitchen with a lot of papers and three different phones. She told me we were going to take a long vacation to Canada, but then the locks on our front door were broken one afternoon while we were out buying groceries."

"Did she tell you who broke them?"

"She said it was the company," Noah replied. "She said she found out they were using the cargo ships to bring things into the port that weren't on the papers. Big crates that didn't go through the regular checks. When she tried to report it to the big boss, he told her to forget what she saw or she would end up like the last accountant."

"Who was the last accountant?"

"Mr. Davis," Noah said, his voice dropping to a terrified whisper. "Mom said he had a heart attack at his desk, but she found a paper that said he didn't have any heart problems before that day. That's when she started copying the computer files onto a little silver drive."

I reached out, picking up the brass pocket watch from the crate. "And this watch is the key to that drive?"

"Yes," Noah nodded. "She said the numbers on the watch face are the password coordinates for her personal cloud storage. She hid the silver drive inside my stuffed bear, Barnaby, but the men took Barnaby when they tore the house apart. Mom said the drive doesn't matter without the watch code anyway. The files are encrypted with something called a 'one-time pad' based on the gear configuration inside."

I turned the watch over in my hand. It was a beautiful piece of engineering, heavy and cold. Twelve years ago, when Megan and I were roommates, she had been obsessed with vintage cryptography. She used to challenge me to solve simple substitution ciphers left on the kitchen whiteboards. It had been a game back then—a silly hobby for two college girls. Now, it was the only thing keeping this boy alive.

"Emily?" Noah looked at me, his lip trembling slightly. "Do you think Mom is... do you think they caught her?"

I looked at him, remembering my promise to always tell the truth. I couldn't lie to him, but I couldn't destroy his hope either.

"Your mom is the smartest person I've ever known, Noah," I said honestly, leaning forward to take his hand. "She knew exactly how dangerous these people were, and she still managed to get you out safely. She stayed behind to draw them away from you. Right now, she's hiding, doing exactly what she needs to do to survive. Our job is to make sure we keep the secret safe until she can find us."

He let out a ragged breath and nodded, leaning his head against my shoulder. Within minutes, the exhaustion of the crash and the flight took over, and his breathing lengthened into a deep, heavy sleep.

I sat there for a long time, holding him, staring at the watch face. 4:35.

If the hour hand was between four and five, and the minute hand was on seven, it wasn't just a time. In standard legal documentation for maritime transport, coordinates were often logged using degrees and minutes, or specific reference codes from the Lloyd's Register. Megan wasn't just giving me a password; she was giving me a location.

I drew my phone out, checking the battery. Twelve percent. I needed to find a way to access the internet without letting the signal trace back to my service provider.