Chapter 3 - The Race to the North WoodsPetra trembled violently, her hands shaking so hard she nearly dropped her phone as she opened a private tracking application and shoved the screen toward Kieran.
On the glowing map, a small blue blinking dot indicated a remote location deep inside the dense pine forests of Door County, Wisconsin.
Kieran grabbed her phone, snapped her wrist backward to force her onto her knees, and pulled a set of steel handcuffs from his coat—a tool he usually reserved for syndicate interrogations. He roughly chained Petra to the heavy cast-iron radiator beneath the window.
"Kieran! Please!" Petra sobbed, her arrogant facade completely shattered into pathetic desperation. "It was Vance's idea! He forced me! He promised me five million dollars to get him the access codes!"
Kieran looked down at his sister-in-law with pure, unadulterated disgust. "You sold your sister's freedom for five million dollars. You let her believe I was having an affair with you just to keep her distracted while you stole her life."
"Kieran—"
"If anything happens to Nadia or my child," Kieran whispered, leaning down until his eyes were inches from hers, "there isn't a corner of this earth where you can hide from me."
He turned his attention to Dominic Vance, who was clutching his shattered knee on the floor, groaning in blood-slicked pain. Kieran reached into Vance's coat, pulled out his personal satellite phone, and dialled his security chief, Gabriel Rourke.
"Gabriel," Kieran commanded into the receiver.
"Sir?" Gabriel answered instantly.
"I need a tactical squad at Petra Cross's apartment immediately," Kieran ordered, his tone leaving zero room for question. "Secure Dominic Vance and Petra Cross. Lock them in the basement holding cells at the Southside facility. Nobody speaks to them, nobody touches them until I return."
"Understood, Don Kieran," Gabriel replied smoothly. "And your wife?"
"Vance dispatched a strike team to Door County, Wisconsin, thirty minutes ago," Kieran revealed, his heart slamming wildly against his ribs as he ran toward the apartment exit. "Mobilize two choppers. We are flying north right now."
Forty minutes later, a heavy black twin-engine helicopter roared through the dark, turbulent skies over Lake Michigan, cutting through a blinding snowstorm heading toward the dense wilderness of Wisconsin.
Inside the cabin, Kieran sat in full tactical gear, checking the magazine of his high-powered rifle. Beside him sat Gabriel and four of the Voss syndicate's most lethal enforcers.
Kieran stared out the rain-slicked window at the dark expanse below. His mind was tormented by the image of Nadia—twenty-two weeks pregnant, exhausted, sitting alone in a secluded cabin, believing her husband was a monster who had discarded her for her sister.
He remembered the way she had looked at him eleven days ago in Petra's apartment. No shouting, no crying, no dramatic confrontation. Just a single, devastating word: Don't.
She hadn't just left him because of the betrayal; she had left to protect their unborn child from the toxic, bloody world he inhabited. She had carried the heavy burden of her grief silently while preparing a quiet exit, unaware that her own sister had placed a federal target on her back.
"Ten minutes to the drop zone, Don Kieran," the pilot announced over the headset. "Thermal imaging is picking up two unauthorized SUVs parked on the logging trail five hundred yards from the cabin. Multiple armed signatures are moving toward the perimeter."
Kieran's blood ran ice-cold. "Vance's strike team is already on the ground."
He turned to Gabriel, his dark eyes blazing with an unhinged, protective fury. "We drop directly over the roof. Nobody leaves those woods alive."
Deep inside the snow-covered pine forest of Door County, a small, rustic wooden cabin sat nestled beside a frozen lake.
Inside, the only light came from the warm, crackling embers of a stone fireplace.
Nadia sat in a plush armchair wrapped in her heavy gray sweater, her hands resting over the gentle curve of her stomach. On the small wooden table beside her sat a warm cup of herbal tea and her nursing journals.
She had spent the last three days in complete isolation, trying to process the agonizing grief that heavy silence brought. She had thought about Kieran every second of every day—remembering the man she had married four years ago, a man who had promised to protect her from the world, only to become the very thing she needed protection from.
Suddenly, a loud CRACK echoed through the quiet night outside.
Nadia's body instantly went rigid. She sat up, her heart hammering against her ribs.
It was the sound of a heavy pine branch snapping under boots in the snow.
She stood up slowly, clutching her stomach, stepping toward the window. Through the swirling white blizzard outside, she saw dark, shadowy figures moving through the trees, holding tactical rifles fitted with suppressors.
Nadia's breath caught in her throat. Her medical instincts kicked in instantly. She knew what armed men looked like—she had treated enough gunshot victims at St. Vincent's to recognize a lethal hit squad.
They weren't here for a routine robbery. They were moving in a tactical formation, surrounding the cabin from all sides.
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She reached for her coat on the chair, her mind racing in pure panic. "My baby..." she whispered, her hands shaking violently. "God, please... protect my baby..."
Before she could reach the back door, the front window shattered inward in a spray of deadly glass.
