Chapter 15
Silas – POV
The windshield wipers on the cruiser were slamming back and forth at maximum speed, but they were no match for the sheet of water cascading down the mountain ridge road.
The headlights cut through the gloom, illuminating nothing but ghost-white fog and the thrashing branches of hemlock trees leaning dangerously over the asphalt in the heavy gale.
Silas gripped the steering wheel with both hands, his knuckles white.
He had just cleared the iron gates of the Hollister estate.
The mansion had been a dark, hollow tomb—front doors unlocked, the safes in the study drilled out from the back, and the federal GPS monitor buzzing uselessly on a marble countertop in the foyer. Hollister was gone.
Silas reached down, hitting the toggle for his tactical radio.
“Miller, this is Unit One. I’m descending the upper ridge now. Report your status at the farmhouse lane.”
Static. A long, empty hiss that sounded like the storm itself eating the frequency.
“Miller, do you copy? This is Colter. Respond.”
Nothing. Silas's jaw tightened until his teeth ached.
Miller was a good kid, a local boy who knew these roads, and he wouldn't neglect a direct order to check in.
Silas checked the dashboard display. The repeater tower on the north peak was completely dark.
The power grid was failing across the entire county block under the weight of the electrical storm.
He floored the accelerator. The cruiser’s rear tires fishtailed violently on a patch of wet pine needles, the vehicle sliding toward the unprotected sheer drop of the gorge before the traction control kicked in with a mechanical growl, gripping the slick asphalt just in time.
Silas corrected the drift, his heart hammering a steady, heavy rhythm against his ribs.
He didn't care about the risk of the road. His mind was locked onto a single image: Blair sitting at Jonah’s kitchen table, completely unaware that the safety perimeter had just collapsed.
He knew how Victor Hollister operated. A corporate sociopath didn't just flee when his empire crumbled; he eliminated the liabilities.
And right now, the biggest liability to Hollister's freedom was an Assistant District Attorney holding a charred evidence bag and an unfiled deed rider that could dismantle a multi-million-dollar banking network.
Silas grabbed the mic again, switching to the emergency state police channel.
“Dispatch, this is Whispering Pines Unit One. I am changing course, heading to the farmhouse location on the lower lane. I have a suspected officer-down situation with Deputy Miller. Requesting immediate backup and an ambulance to that location.”
The response from the county dispatcher was buried under a wall of atmospheric interference, the woman’s voice cutting in and out. “Unit One... dispatch... trees down on Highway 12... response time is... twenty minutes...”
“Twenty minutes is too late,” Silas muttered to himself, dropping the mic onto the passenger seat. He was on his own.
He slammed the cruiser into a lower gear as he hit the hairpin turn at the base of the ridge. Up ahead, the gravel lane leading to Jonah’s property was swallowed by the shadows of the dense timber.
As the cruiser rounded the final bend, Silas’s high beams caught the stark white side panel of Miller's vehicle. It was shoved into the ditch, the driver-side door hanging open like a broken wing, the dark interior caked in mud and rainwater.
Silas killed his lights a hundred yards out and his sirens were off, letting the cruiser coast to a silent stop in the middle of the lane. He didn't turn on his spotlight; he didn't want to tip off anyone who might still be lurking in the trees.
He reached down, unsnapping the leather retention strap on his holster. He pulled his service weapon, checking the magazine weight in the dark cabin before chambering a round with a clean, metallic clack.
Through the rain-streaked side window, he looked up the long, dark driveway toward the farmhouse.
The building was completely blacked out, a silent silhouette against the storm.
The power was gone, the phones were dead, and the only path to the front door was through sixty yards of open, muddy gravel.
Silas opens his door, stepping out into the humid, torrential deluge.
The wind ripped at his uniform jacket as he stayed low against the chassis of his cruiser, his eyes scanning the tree line, his weapon raised.
He could feel the thick, warm mud soaking through his boots, but his focus was entirely on the faint, rhythmic crunching sound echoing from the porch up ahead.
Someone was already at the door.