A Stranger Handed Me a Blue Box at Church and Said, “You’ll Need This Tonight”—I Wish I’d Opened It Sooner

I smiled then, really smiled.

“You won’t need to find her. Blair’s not hiding anymore. She’s already here.”

The lights cut.

Flashbangs detonated. Windows shattered. The world turned white with explosive light and deafening noise.

“Federal agents! On the ground!”

Gunfire erupted—Navaro’s men returning fire, FBI SWAT breaching both doors simultaneously. I hit the floor and crawled toward the kitchen through smoke and chaos.

One of Navaro’s men staggered toward me, weapon raised, and I was staring at death when a single shot dropped him. A figure stepped over his body, lowered their weapon, pulled off a tactical hood. Short dark hair.

A fresh scar on the left cheek. Thinner than I remembered, harder, changed by a year of living underground. But unmistakably, impossibly—Blair.

My Blair. My supposedly dead wife. “Get away from my husband,” she said, weapon trained on Sheriff Brennan as he turned toward us.

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