Chapter 2 - THE SURGEON'S TRAPThe courtyard lights flickered and died, plunging the snow-swept grounds into a pitch-black abyss swallowed by the raging blizzard. On the surveillance monitors, I watched Marcus Kane’s tactical team instantly react, their night-vision visors snapping down with mechanical clicks, bathing their world in an eerie, glowing green light.
"Sir, power to the outer perimeter has been cut," one of the mercenaries barked into his shoulder mic, his voice picked up by my hidden acoustic sensors. "The old man is playing games."
Marcus stood near the rear door of the SUV, adjusting his leather gloves with unhurried cruelty. "He’s a surgeon, not a soldier," Marcus replied, his voice smooth and freezing. "He cuts open tissue; he doesn’t know how to stop a breach. Blow the gates. I want every room in that house searched before the local sheriff's department realizes the weather is too bad to patrol."
Boom.
The deafening roar of industrial-grade C4 detonated against the iron hinges of my front gate. The blast wave rattled the reinforced glass of the grand foyer windows, showering the manicured front lawn with twisted metal and spraying fine shards of ice into the air.
Through the thermal feed, I watched the heavy iron barriers swing inward, groaning under the strain. Three black-clad figures swarmed through the breach, moving with calculated, military-grade precision. Their assault rifles swept left and right, lasers painting the falling snow with crimson dots as they advanced toward the grand double doors of the mansion.
I stood in the shadows of the second-floor mezzanine, the heavy tactical shotgun resting comfortably against my shoulder. My heart rate remained steady—sixty beats per minute. A surgeon's rhythm. In the operating room, panic meant death. Here, it meant the exact same thing.
"Come on inside, gentlemen," I whispered into the freezing air of the hallway. "Let's see how well your tactical gear handles a scalpel."
The mercenaries reached the oak front doors and didn't bother knocking this time. A breaching charge was slapped against the wood.
Clack.
I didn't flinch. As the charge blew, shattering the antique mahogany into a thousand jagged splinters, I tapped a single icon on my wrist-mounted control pad.
Ssssssssss.
High-pressure steam valves hidden within the portico ceiling instantly released. Blinding, superheated vapor—pressurized at nearly three hundred degrees—erupted downward in a blinding white wall right across the shattered threshold.
"Ahhhh! Fuck!"
The lead mercenary screamed, dropping his rifle as the searing steam cooked through his tactical gloves, stripping the skin from his hands. The second guard stumbled backward, slipping on the black ice of the porch, his night-vision goggles short-circuiting in a shower of blue sparks.
"What is this bullshit?" the third mercenary roared, dragging his wounded comrade back into the snow while sweeping blind fire into the dark foyer. Wood splinters exploded around my head, but I was already moving, sliding silently across the Persian rug toward the eastern staircase.
Down in the courtyard, Marcus Kane saw his vanguard stumble. His calm, collected facade finally cracked, replaced by a dark, feral rage.
"Useless idiots!" Marcus yelled into his radio, pulling a sleek suppressed pistol from his own holster. "Move in through the conservatory! Use thermal breaching charges on the glass roof! I want that coat and I want those kids before the local authorities get any bright ideas!"
I heard the crunch of heavy boots shifting toward the eastern glasshouse. A cold wave of calculation washed over me. The conservatory was my greenhouse—filled with rare orchids, humidifiers, and high-voltage atmospheric regulators.
It wasn't just a room. It was a pressure cooker waiting for a spark.
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I reached the second-floor balcony overlooking the glass conservatory and pulled a small remote detonator from my pocket. Through the frosted glass panels below, I could see the faint thermal silhouettes of two heavily armed men planting a shaped linear charge along the reinforced roof frames.
"Let's see how much you love cold weather," I murmured, my thumb hovering over the red toggle switch.
