Chapter 45
CHAPTER
FORTY-FIVE
“Natalie?” Her father answered on the first ring, his voice sharp with concern. “Is everything all right? I haven’t been able to get in touch my security team.”
Relief washed through her.
If he was asking about the security team, he didn’t know about the attack yet. Which meant he probably hadn’t ordered it.
“Dad, something happened.” Natalie let her voice shake—not hard to do, given how genuinely frightened she was. “Two men showed up claiming to be your security team. But they weren’t. They attacked Timothy.”
“Attacked?” Her father’s voice went cold and hard. “Are you hurt?”
“No, I’m fine. Timothy got the worst of it. But Dad, who were those men?”
“I don’t know, but I’m going to find out.
” Movement sounded on his end—drawers opening, keys jingling.
“I’m coming over there right now. Don’t leave the house.
Don’t let anyone in except my actual security team—Dimitri will be there in five minutes.
I want every detail about what these men looked like, what they said, everything. ”
“Dad, you don’t have to—”
“Someone is targeting my daughter.” His voice was ice. “I absolutely have to. I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”
The line went dead.
Natalie looked at Hudson, at Jake and Atlas, at the small group of people who’d just risked their lives to protect her.
“He’s coming here,” she said. “And he sounded . . . angry.”
Hudson’s mouth pressed into a thin line. “Then we better have our story straight before he arrives.”
Because in twenty minutes, Richard Ravenscroft—shipping magnate or terrorist leader or possibly both—would be standing in this living room, asking questions they couldn’t afford to answer honestly.
And Natalie still wasn’t sure which version of her father would walk through that door.
Hudson knew he only had a few minutes before Natalie’s father and his cohorts arrived—and he needed to talk to his teammates.
He called his team to gather around him.
“What’s wrong?” Jake asked immediately, reading Hudson’s expression. “Did something happen at the office?”
Hudson glanced back at the house, making sure Natalie wasn’t watching through the windows. “I saw someone today. At Ravenscroft’s building. Someone who shouldn’t exist.”
“Meaning?” Atlas prompted.
Hudson took a breath. “Brass. Derek Brassen. I thought I saw him walking through the executive floor.”
The silence that followed was deafening.
Then Maverick stepped forward, his face pale even in the dim light. “You’re sure?”
“As sure as I can be without getting close enough to verify.” Hudson’s jaw tightened. “Same height, same build, same scar above his left eyebrow. He came out of a corner office and headed toward the secure elevators like he belonged there.”
“That’s impossible,” Jake said, but his voice lacked conviction. “Brass died in that helicopter crash. We all saw the after-action reports. The funeral—”
“I know what we saw,” Hudson interrupted. “But I also know what I saw today.”
“Don’t forget—I thought I saw him too,” Maverick finished quietly.
Everyone turned to look at him.