Total pages in book: 108
Estimated words: 102754 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 514(@200wpm)___ 411(@250wpm)___ 343(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 102754 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 514(@200wpm)___ 411(@250wpm)___ 343(@300wpm)
We hadn’t found the smoking gun yet, but we were damn close.
Then my phone had buzzed. I’d pulled it out of my pocket, still half-focused on the cabinet I’d been searching in Topper’s kitchen. The moment I opened the message, the world disappeared from under me.
I didn’t say a word, I didn’t need to. The air shifted around me, electricity crackling as my brain went from detective to something more primal. I turned and walked straight out the front door.
Keir didn’t ask a single question, and neither did Kapono. They caught the look on my face—something between fury and fear—and immediately followed. Footsteps thundered behind me as we moved, three men with decades of training and a shared understanding that whatever it was, it was bad.
We peeled out of Topper’s driveway like the house was on fire, gravel spitting in every direction as our tires screeched across the ground. I didn’t even look back, I didn’t have to, I knew they were behind me. And thank God, because I wasn’t thinking straight.
My chest was tight as I opened the camera feed on my phone, fumbling to switch to the outside cameras as I took the first hard turn. What I saw made my stomach twist into knots.
A dark, unmarked van was half inside, metal groaning, wood splintered everywhere—a gaping wound in the structure where my family was supposed to be safe.
I swallowed hard, trying to control my panic as my fingers flew over the screen, switching to the internal feeds. I watched as they entered room after room with chilling precision. They were clearing the house like professionals—tactical and methodical, too good to be amateurs and too prepared to improvise.
I reached across the seat for my Kevlar vest and yanked it over my head, the truck swaying hard as I adjusted it while still barreling down the road. My hands were slick with sweat, and my jaw was locked so tight that it felt like my molars would crack under the pressure.
“Easy,” I muttered, my voice low and ragged. “Stay alive, you’re no good to them dead.”
In the rearview mirror, I caught the familiar shape of Keir’s truck close behind. Kapono’s SUV was just a few car lengths back, with headlights off, but moving fast. Silent backup, riding the same current of fury and urgency that had taken hold of me. They didn’t ask for intel, they didn’t need a briefing, they just knew.
And they were coming with me into hell without hesitation.
They wouldn't let me face whatever was waiting for us at that house alone.
And the second I got through that door—if they’d harmed even a hair on the heads of the people I loved—there wouldn’t be a place left for those bastards to hide. No corner of the earth dark enough, far enough, or protected enough.
Because I was going to burn every last one of them to the fucking ground.
I came in hot, tires shrieking against the asphalt as I slammed the SUV to a stop in front of the house. The world was chaos—flashing lights, shouting, sirens echoing off the nearby houses—and the front lawn looked like a full-blown crime scene. Members of Piersville PD were already swarming the property, weapons lowered but eyes sharp, trying to piece together what had just happened.
Then paramedics pulled up, lights strobing red and white, and my heart nearly stopped.
No, no, no.
I jumped out of the vehicle before it had fully settled, my boots hitting the pavement hard, and I was halfway to the porch when DB came running toward me, hand raised.
“It’s not for Sayla or the kids,” he said quickly, reading the look on my face. “It’s for the driver of the van. His neck’s likely broken from the impact. He’s still pinned in there, so the fire department’s on the way to cut him out.”
I barely nodded. I didn’t care about the driver, he wasn’t my concern.
I pushed past the chaos, past the uniforms shouting over radios and EMTs unloading stretchers, and straight through the broken front door. What used to be my living room was now a wreck of drywall, insulation, and shattered furniture. The side of the house gaped open like a wound, and the front of the van still sat wedged halfway into the wall, smoke curling from the engine.
But I didn’t stop. I didn’t look. I didn’t need to.
I knew precisely where Sayla had taken the kids. We’d talked about it more than once, in the quiet hours between midnight and dawn, both of us hoping it was a plan we’d never have to use.
Kaida’s room.
The hallway stretched in front of me like a tunnel, too long and too narrow, and I took it two steps at a time, boots pounding the floor. Adrenaline spiked hard through my veins, every nerve drawn tight like a tripwire ready to snap. The noise of the house—the shouting, the crackle of radios, the distant roar of the engine still smoking in the wall—faded to nothing. All I could hear was the pounding in my chest.