Chapter 1 - The Woman in My Seat“Mom, don’t.”
Maya’s small fingers tightened around mine as the woman in Row 11 laughed at us.
I wanted to argue. I wanted the flight attendant to remove her immediately. But something in my daughter’s voice stopped me.
It wasn’t fear.
It was recognition.
Ten minutes after takeoff, Maya unbuckled her seat belt and stood in the aisle.
The woman glanced back, irritation already gathering on her face.
“Children should stay in their seats,” she snapped.
Maya ignored her.
She looked directly into the woman’s eyes.
“You’re the woman who said my baby brother was the package you came to collect.”
The woman’s face went completely white.
A passenger lowered his newspaper. A man across the aisle stopped typing on his laptop. Even the flight attendant froze.
“What did you just say?” the woman whispered.
Maya swallowed.
“I heard you at the airport. You were talking on the phone about Leo.”
The woman abruptly stood.
“That’s ridiculous! This child is making things up!”
Her voice was no longer confident.
It was desperate.
I pulled Maya close. “Sweetheart, what are you talking about?”
My daughter reached into her purple backpack and pulled out an old tablet.
“I recorded her.”
The woman lunged toward the device.
“Give me that!”
Before she could reach us, the flight attendant stepped between her and Maya.
“Ma’am, return to your seat immediately.”
The woman stopped.
Then she looked at me, and the expression in her eyes made my stomach turn.
She wasn't merely angry.
She was afraid of what my daughter might have recorded.
Six weeks earlier, I'd given birth to my son, Leo. Since then, I'd barely slept, barely eaten, and barely managed to keep our little family functioning while my husband worked hundreds of miles away.
I thought the worst thing that could happen on this flight was a screaming baby and an embarrassing argument.
I was wrong.
Maya pressed the tablet against my chest.
“Mom,” she whispered, “there was another man at the airport.”
My blood ran cold.
“What man?”
She glanced toward the rear of the cabin.
“The one who was watching Leo.”
And when I followed her gaze, I recognized him.
May you like
He was sitting just three rows behind us.
Smiling.
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