Chapter 30
30
MARCUS
I stood in the ops room, watching Claire work, and I couldn’t shake the amazement buzzing through me. Never in a million years would I have thought to use a podcast like this. Me? I’d been ready to break bones, burn bridges, tear the city apart brick by brick until Evelyn Hart coughed up what she knew. That was my playbook—direct, brutal, effective in its own way.
But Claire? She’d flipped the script, turned her voice into a weapon, and unleashed a goddamn army of listeners to hunt for us. It was genius, and I’d been too buried in my own rage to see it coming.
Sure, this took the operation public to a degree—flashed a spotlight we usually kept dim. Who cared? Maybe it’d piss off Department 77 enough to make them slink back into the shadows, give us some breathing room.
I didn’t think that’d hold for the long haul—ghosts like them didn’t stay spooked forever—but in the short term? It was a nudge forward, a shift from defense to offense. We weren’t just reacting anymore; we were hunting. And it was all because of her.
Claire sat at the steel table, her laptop open, her gray eyes locked on the screen as notifications poured in like a flood. I leaned closer, arms crossed, trying to play it cool, but my pulse was hammering. Her voice—steady, raw, cutting through the air—had just set the world on fire. She’d laid Diego’s death bare for millions, turned her grief into a rallying cry, and now her listeners were answering. It was like watching a general call her troops to war, and fuck if it didn’t make me want her more than I already did.
I pushed off the chair, moving to the bank of monitors behind her. “Let’s get some order to this chaos,” I said. I fired up Dominion’s AI—custom-built, bleeding-edge, the kind of tech that could sift through a haystack of bullshit and find the needle in seconds. “Feed it everything coming in. Emails, comments, whatever’s hitting your inbox.”
She nodded, quick and sharp, her fingers flying over the keys to forward the data stream. “There’s a lot of noise already. People are gonna jump at the chance to be part of this.”
“Yeah,” I muttered, watching the AI’s interface light up as it started chewing through the flood. “Most of it’ll be garbage—attention whores, wannabe sleuths, trolls looking for a shoutout.”
And it was. The first wave was a mess—bogus tips like “Saw Hart at a gas station in Ohio” or “She’s hiding in my grandma’s attic,” dumb shit from people who just wanted to be famous for fifteen seconds.
I rolled my eyes, scrolling through the junk as the AI flagged it red—useless, irrelevant, out-of-state nonsense. But then, buried in the noise, a pattern started to poke through. Little comments, anonymous but steady, from people in the Lowcountry. Stuff like, “I’ve got friends in low places. They’re on the lookout.” Or, “I’ll keep an eye out during my shift.” Nothing flashy, nothing specific—just quiet, earnest promises from folks who lived here, worked here, knew the streets.
I froze, staring at the screen, a slow grin tugging at my lips. “Holy shit.”
Claire glanced over, her brow furrowing. “What?”
“Look at this.” I tapped the monitor, highlighting a cluster of those messages. “They’re not screaming for attention. They’re just … doing it. Working the case like it’s theirs, too.”
She leaned closer, her shoulder brushing mine, and I caught the faint scent of her—something clean and smooth, cutting through the stale air of the ops room. Her eyes scanned the lines, and a small, surprised smile flickered across her face. “They’re with us.”
“Yeah,” I said. “They’re fucking with us.” I turned to her, meeting her gaze head-on. “You did this, Claire. You turned a million strangers into your eyes out there. I’m amazed—fucking floored, honestly.”
Her cheeks flushed, just a little, but her eyes didn’t waver. “You’re not so bad yourself, Dane. That AI’s a hell of a trick.”
I smirked, leaning in a fraction closer, letting my voice drop. “Not as good as you. Never would’ve thought of this. You’re a goddamn force.”
She held my stare, and fuck, the air between us crackled. I’d always been drawn to her—those curves, that New York bite, the way she didn’t flinch when I pushed—but this? Seeing her wield her power like a longsword, slicing through the dark with nothing but her voice and her will? It lit something in me, hot and fierce, and I had to clench my fists to keep from dragging her against me right then and there.
Almost forgot what I’d done to Sinclair. Almost.
The memory hit like a cold splash—Gibson’s blood on my knuckles, his whimpers echoing in that concrete box, the way I’d lost it, unraveling like some rabid animal. I was supposed to be the cool one, the guy with the surfer vibe who didn’t crack, who kept his shit locked down no matter what.
Well, I’d cracked wide open, and why? Hart’s taunts about my father, sure—those had cut deep, reopening wounds I’d thought were scarred over. But it wasn’t just that. It was Claire, too—her grief, her fight, the way she’d looked at me like I could fix this for her. I’d wanted to. Needed to. And when I couldn’t, I’d taken it out on that kid’s face.
I’d have to figure that out—why I’d let it get that far, why I’d let myself become something I didn’t recognize. But not now. Not with Claire beside me, her fire pulling me back from the edge.
We didn’t leave the ops room. Couldn’t. The messages kept rolling in, a relentless tide of highs and lows like a stakeout stretched across the whole damn city. One minute, we’d get a lead that sounded promising— “Saw a blonde in a black SUV near Mount Pleasant” —only for the AI to cross-check it and flag it as too vague, too far off Hart’s profile. The next, some asshole would send a dick pic with “Found her!” scrawled over it, and I’d groan, scrubbing a hand down my face while Claire muttered, “Fucking idiots.”
But we kept going, scanning every line, chasing the signal through the noise. The minutes blurred, the flickering monitors casting shadows across her face, and I caught myself watching her more than the screens. The way her lips pressed together when she focused, the way her fingers tapped a restless rhythm against the table, the way she didn’t quit, didn’t falter, even as the night dragged on. She was relentless, and it made me want her so bad it hurt.
Then, not long after daybreak, it happened. A ping cut through the hum—a message from some listener named chipshot59 . I leaned over Claire’s shoulder, reading it aloud as it popped up: “Just saw Hart check in for a massage at the Daniel Island Club. Blonde, fancy, with a couple suits trailing her.”
My pulse kicked up, sharp and fast. “Bingo.”
Claire’s head snapped to me, her eyes wide, blazing with that hunter’s glint I’d seen at the pier all those weeks ago. “Daniel Island Club. That’s what, twenty minutes from here?”
“Fifteen if I drive,” I said, already moving, adrenaline flooding my system like a shot of pure heat. I grabbed my phone, texting our tech wizard.
Tap the club’s surveillance feed. Now.
Claire was on her feet, shoving her laptop into her satchel, her movements quick and sure. “You think it’s her?”
“I think we’re about to find out.” My phone buzzed back— fast as always.
Feed’s live. Blonde woman, mid-40s, checked in 10 mins ago. Husband and three bodyguards with her. Matches Hart’s profile. Sending stills.
The images loaded—a grainy shot of Evelyn Hart, all polished poise, striding through the club’s lobby taking off oversized sunglasses, her husband at her side, three suits in dark jackets fanned out behind her. I turned the screen to Claire, and her lips moved into a grim, feral smile.
“Let’s go get the bitch,” she said, voice low, lethal, echoing my own thoughts so perfectly I almost laughed.
I didn’t have to say it—she’d beaten me to it. I grabbed my keys off the table, the Bugatti’s fob cold against my palm, and headed for the door, Claire right on my heels. The ops room’s hum faded behind us as we hit the hallway, the weight of what we were doing settling into something sharp and focused.
Outside, the air was thick and humid, as usual. The kind of Charleston weather that clung to your skin. I unlocked the car, sliding into the driver’s seat as Claire climbed in beside me, her satchel dumped on the floor, her posture coiled tight like a spring ready to snap. I gunned the engine, the low growl vibrating through us, and peeled out of Dominion’s gates, tires chewing gravel then asphalt as we hit the road.
“Fifteen minutes,” I said, eyes on the stretch ahead, the city blurring past. “We’ll be there before she’s done with her massage.”
Claire nodded, her hands flexing in her lap. “She’s got bodyguards. Three of them.”
“Yeah,” I said, voice steady. “I’ve got us.”
She shot me a look—half challenge, half trust—and I felt it hit me low, a jolt that had nothing to do with the speed I was pushing. I’d lost my shit with Sinclair, let the beast out, but with her beside me, I was locked in again. Cool. Controlled. The surfer vibe was back, but sharper now, edged with something deadly. Hart wasn’t slipping away this time.
++ +
The Daniel Island Club loomed ahead, a sprawl of manicured lawns and low-lit luxury, the kind of place where Charleston’s elite hid behind membership fees and velvet ropes. I swung into the lot, parking out of sight near a service entrance—old habits from darker days. Claire was out before I’d even killed the engine, her steps silent on the pavement, her gray eyes scanning the building like a predator locking onto prey.
I followed, my hand brushing the pistol holstered under my jacket, a reflex more than a plan. “Service door,” I said, nodding toward the side. “Less eyes.”
She didn’t argue, falling into step beside me as we moved, shadows swallowing us. My phone buzzed—my tech guy again.
Hart’s still in the spa. Husband’s at the bar. Guards split—two outside, one inside.
“Perfect,” I muttered, relaying it to Claire. “We’ve got a window.”
Her smile was tight, dangerous. “Then let’s not waste it.”
We slipped through the service door, the buzz of the club’s HVAC masking our steps. The hallway was narrow, lined with staff lockers and carts—backstage for the rich and pampered. I led the way, muscle memory kicking in from years of moving unseen, Claire a silent force at my back.
The spa was close—I could smell the lavender and eucalyptus bullshit wafting through the air. A staffer in a crisp white uniform passed us, barely glancing up from her clipboard, and I kept my pace steady, casual, like we belonged. Claire matched me, her presence electric, her focus razor-sharp .
We hit the spa’s entrance—a frosted glass door, soft music seeping through. I paused, glancing at her. “Ready?”
Her eyes met mine, fierce and unyielding. “Let’s end this.”
I pushed the door open, and we stepped inside, the game shifting from hunt to strike. Hart was in there, oblivious, thinking she’d outrun us. She hadn’t. Not this time.