Chapter 6 #3
My boots hit the ground hard, snow soaking into leather as I scanned the scene.
No bodies.
No girls.
Just drag marks in the snow leading to tire tracks.
They’d been taken.
My chest tightened in a way I hadn’t felt in years.
Not fear.
Rage.
Controlled. Focused. Deadly.
“Search the woods. Every inch,” I ordered. “Thermals. Drones. I want shell counts and tire impressions documented.”
My men scattered instantly.
I crouched near the blood in the snow.
Too much of it.
“Jace,” I said into my earpiece, voice low and steady despite the war inside me. “Find them. Now.”
“I’m on it, boss. Traffic cams are glitching from the storm. I’m rerouting through state feeds.”
Behind me, one of my men approached. “Looks like at least four hostiles, possibly more. Professional.”
I already knew.
Lionetti.
You son of a bitch.
“They cleaned fast,” the man added.
“No,” I corrected. “They extracted fast.”
I stood, scanning the horizon.
The storm had erased half the tracks already.
Smart.
Too smart.
“Clean it up,” I ordered coldly. “I don’t want local PD stumbling into this. No evidence this ever happened.”
My men nodded.
No reports.
No headlines.
No witnesses.
This war stays in the dark.
I climbed back into my vehicle, leaving half the crew behind to sanitize the scene.
The door slammed shut.
For a moment, I let the mask crack.
I ripped the earpiece from my ear and hurled it into the dashboard.
“Dammit!”
My fist slammed into the steering wheel once. Twice.
“I was minutes behind.”
Jace’s voice came faintly through the speaker before I tore the connection completely.
“We’re going to find them, boss. She’ll be fine.”
Lionetti.
Jenna.
Izzy.
I will rip them apart until they beg to tell me where she is.
I threw the car into gear.
I wasn’t chasing the storm anymore.
I was hunting.
I went straight to her house.
Alone.
Jace met me there with equipment cases and backup servers.
The house was quiet.
Warm.
It still smelled like her.
Vanilla. Smoke. Something soft underneath.
It made my chest ache.
Jace moved quickly, setting up equipment in the basement to reroute surveillance feeds we’d intercepted earlier.
I didn’t follow right away.
Instead, I walked through her house slowly.
Every detail felt personal now.
Her living room.
The fire still low in the pit.
Two wine glasses on the table.
She was here hours ago.
Laughing.
Safe.
I moved upstairs.
Her bedroom door was slightly open.
I stepped inside.
The bed was unmade from earlier — a soft indentation in the pillows.
I sat on the edge.
Elbows on my knees.
Hands gripping my hair.
“Fuck,” I breathed.
I was supposed to be there.
I was supposed to prevent this.
I protected presidents’ daughters.
I dismantled trafficking rings across continents.
And I couldn’t stop this.
I saw her in my mind.
That night.
When I carried her inside this very house.
Laid her down gently.
Brushed her hair back from her face while she slept.
I’d sworn in that moment no one would ever touch her again.
And I failed.
“Boss.”
Jace’s voice cut through the dark.
“I think you need to see this.”
I stood instantly.
“Tell me you found something.”
He didn’t answer.
Which meant he had.
The basement screens lit the room in cold blue light.
We replayed the bridge footage.
Frame by frame.
I leaned forward; elbows braced on the desk.
There she was.
Fighting the wheel.
Gun out the window.
Returning fire.
My jaw tightened — not in anger.
In pride.
“That’s my girl,” I muttered under my breath.
She didn’t fold.
She didn’t freeze.
She fought.
We advanced the footage.
The crash.
The rollover.
I forced myself to watch.
She crawled out bleeding.
Went back for her friend.
Picked up the weapon.
Then—
Hand-to-hand combat.
I watched her move.
Clean. Efficient. Controlled.
That wasn’t street fighting.
That was training.
“She’s precise,” Jace murmured.
“I know.”
She pivoted. Broke a wrist. Dropped a target with a knee strike.
Combat style.
Where the hell did, she learn that?
A question for later.
When I have her back in my arms.
The footage advanced.
More hostiles closing in.
Too many.
Then—
I saw it.
A figure stepping forward.
Blonde undercut.
Face tattoos near the temple.
Leather jacket.
My blood went ice cold.
Izzy.
“Zoom in,” I ordered.
Jace enhanced the frame.
Clear as day.
Izzy cocking a gun behind her head.
My entire body went still.
“That son of a bitch was in on it?” I said quietly.
How did we miss that?
How did I miss that?
The laptop flew across the room, smashing into the wall.
I didn’t care.
“Where was their last movement?” I demanded.
Jace’s fingers flew over keys.
“Storm knocked out power to that grid five minutes after extraction. Cameras died. We lost them heading toward the city.”
The city.
Which meant—
Lionetti territory.
My jaw clenched so hard it hurt.
“Get me every warehouse. Every property. Every shell company tied to Lionetti and his right hand.”
Jace nodded. “On it.”
I stood in the center of her basement.
Breathing slow.
Thinking.
They didn’t kill her.
That means leverage.
Which means time.
And time means I hunt.
I picked up my phone.
“Call the Philly unit,” I ordered into it. “Lock down every exit route heading south.”
I paused.
Then added quietly—
“You touched the wrong woman.”
And for the first time since arriving at the bridge—
I wasn’t angry.
I was calm.
Because now?
This wasn’t a rescue.
This was a war.