Chapter 3 - The Siege Begins
Adrenaline flooded my veins with the cold, familiar clarity of a courtroom cross-examination under fire. I yanked the USB drive from the terminal, shoved it deep into my jeans pocket, and stood up so fast the leather chair rolled backward and slammed against the cedar wall.
Footsteps. Heavy, hurried, and entirely unconcerned with stealth, echoed across the wooden floorboards of the ground floor.
"Lily! Rose!" a harsh, manic voice shouted from the living room below.
It wasn't the voice of a panicked mother checking on abandoned children. It was the frantic shriek of a cornered animal realizing its trap was empty.
"Where are those little brats? Useless! Absolutely useless!"
Vanessa Mercer.
She had returned much sooner than the storm or common sense should have allowed. The blizzard outside was howling now, driving sheets of blinding snow against the cabin's reinforced glass, yet Vanessa had broken through.
I moved silently to the doorway of the cedar room, pulling the heavy door almost completely shut, leaving just a narrow sliver of shadow through which I could observe the hallway.
Downstairs, the sound of splintering wood and shattered glass echoed through the stairwell. Vanessa was tearing through the kitchen, throwing pantry shelves to the floor in a blind rage.
"Aunt Vanessa?"
Rose's small, trembling voice drifted up from the corner of the living room where I had left them.
"Shut up, you little parasite!" Vanessa snapped, her footsteps pivoting instantly toward the sound. I heard the sharp, menacing snap of a heavy coat whipping through the air. "Where is he? Where is Daniel?"
"He... he went upstairs," Lily whimpered, her voice brave despite the terror lacing every syllable. "He has the key."
A cold, humorless laugh echoed up the stairwell—a sound that sent a shrick of fury straight down my spine.
"The key," Vanessa muttered to herself, her boots beginning to ascend the wooden stairs with heavy, deliberate thuds. Creak. Creak. Creak.
Each step brought her closer to the second floor.
I needed to get to the girls. If Vanessa was desperate enough to abandon them in a freezing, power-cut cabin for three days to scour the woods, there was no telling what she would do now that she realized they had failed her mission and turned to me instead.
I reached down to my belt, instinctively looking for the service weapon I used to carry during my federal prosecutor days—a weapon I had surrendered the day I resigned to care for Mara during her final months. My holster was empty. I was unarmed, relying entirely on intellect, shadows, and whatever makeshift leverage I could find in this high-tech vault.
Creak.
The second-floor landingboards groaned. Vanessa had reached the top of the stairs.
I slipped back into the cedar room, my eyes darting frantically across the array of monitors, server racks, and equipment. My hand brushed against a heavy, solid-brass paperweight shaped like the scales of justice—a parting gift from my old office when I left the Department of Justice.
I gripped the heavy brass base, feeling its cold, reassuring heft.
The hallway light flickered as Vanessa’s silhouette appeared in the narrow gap of the cedar room door. The shadow stretched across the polished concrete floor, halting right outside the threshold.
May you like
"Mara," Vanessa whispered mockingly into the dark hallway, her voice dripping with venom. "I know you're not here to stop me anymore. And your pathetic excuse of a husband is about to learn why you should never cross a Mercer."
The door swung wide open with a violent shove.
