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Michael’s words hung in the sterile air of the hallway, heavy as wet lead. A sedative. In an estate guarded like a nuclear silo, someone had slipped a chemical compound into the bloodstream of a quiet, unassuming housemaid, and my security network had treated it like a ghost walking through walls. / Chapter 17 / 20

Chapter 17 - Race Against the ClockThe SUV’s supercharged engine roared to life, kicking up gravel as I tore through the iron gates of the estate, heading south toward the industrial shipping yards along the river. The digital clock on my dashboard felt like a ticking bomb counting down the final seconds of my life.

Three minutes.

The Chicago night blurred past my windows in a streak of neon lights, rain beginning to spit against the windshield as I slammed my foot down on the floorboards, pushing the heavy vehicle past one hundred miles per hour.

If Kane had taken Claire and Lily, it meant there was a secondary cell operating inside the city—people I hadn't accounted for, mercenaries who didn't care about Kane’s arrest because their orders came from higher up the food chain.

Two minutes.

I screeched to a halt outside the rusted chain-link gates of Pier 42, slamming the SUV straight through the metal barrier in a shower of sparks and shattered wire. The massive crane towering over the slipway loomed like a gallows against the dark, stormy sky.

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The ink on the emergency audit report was barely dry when the secure terminal on my desk flashed a violent crimson. I hadn't slept in thirty-six hours, my eyes burning from staring at columns of ghost figures, duplicate invoices, and shell corporations linked to Dominic Rossi. But the red alert wasn’t from Rossi’s faction. It was an internal security flag originating from the estate’s main vault deep beneath the west wing.

The ink on the emergency audit report was barely dry when the secure ter...

The glass shattered into a thousand tiny diamonds on the marble, scattering the light from the chandeliers. The muffled laughter died instantly, replaced by a suffocating, heavy silence that crept outward from the grand staircase.

The glass shattered into a thousand tiny diamonds on the marble, scatter...

The heavy oak doors of my private study clicked shut behind us, locking out the clinical, terrifying silence of the kitchen. Evelyn Crane stood stiffly in front of my mahogany desk, her hands folded over her apron with the rigid precision of someone who had spent decades micromanaging every square inch of my estate. Behind her, Norah hovered near the doorway, clutching her clipboard like a shield.

The heavy oak doors of my private study clicked shut behind us, locking...

Suspended thirty feet above the churning, black water of the river hung a massive steel shipping container, its locking mechanism glowing with the harsh, red pulse of a digital timer: 00:45... 00:44...

I threw the door open, grabbed my rifle from the passenger seat, and sprinted across the slick metal grating of the pier.

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