21. Sophie
Sophie
It’s been two hours of lying in the dark, and my mind just won’t stop. It keeps cycling through camera feeds and blind spots, personnel files and the faces behind them. Having narrowed it down to three suspects makes it easier, although at this point it could still be anyone.
But... that’s not really what’s keeping me awake.
I keep seeing three alphas in a living room that could only be described as homey and a little shabby, even.
The question is, why? Why would they choose to live so simply when they could have so much more?
I was expecting the kind of house you photograph, not one you live in.
What I saw was more like the middle-class home of a family with three kids and a dog.
It made no sense. I’ve been to plenty of wealthy homes, and somehow Pack Cavill’s made three absurdly rich alphas seem almost ordinary.
It’s peaceful here, I’d said, standing on their porch like an idiot. And what on earth possessed me to say that?
I get up and press my feet flat against the floor, hoping the cold will settle me. It doesn’t.
Fine. A run, then.
I change into leggings, a sports bra, and a hoodie and slip out into the corridor.
The building is quiet at this time of the day. I take the stairs down and go out through the front entrance into the dark.
The air is cold against my face, the grounds silver under a half-moon. I start running the moment I’m outside. I follow the perimeter path, gravel giving way to pavement as it curves along the tree line at the edge of the property.
My lungs burn and the cold streams past my face, but my mind finally, blissfully, shuts up. All I focus on is the rhythmic pounding of my feet on the ground, counting each step until there’s room for nothing else.
I’m rounding the side of the main building when I see it.
A shadow, moving where no shadow should be.
I slow my pace, watching. My hand goes to my hood on instinct, pulling it up and tucking my hair inside. The figure is perhaps fifty yards ahead, pressed against the wall of the building, moving with deliberate caution.
I follow, hanging back in the shadows and placing each step with care, so my feet make no sound at all. Ahead of me, the figure moves the same way, silent.
The figure is good, I’ll give them that. They check corners before moving. They stay low, keeping close to the building. They move like someone who has done this before, probably many times, in places far more dangerous than a biotech company.
Whoever this is, they know exactly what they’re doing.
I lose sight of them as they round the curve of the building. I curse under my breath and push myself faster.
I cut across the grass in a diagonal line, abandoning stealth for speed. They’re heading toward—
My stomach clenches with recognition.
The blind spot. The vulnerability I flagged just days ago, while Max and Ethan watched over my shoulders.
I round the corner of the building and there they are, crouched beneath the exact window I flagged, already working on the latch with some kind of specialized tool that glints dully in the moonlight.
They hear me before I reach them. They spin around, abandoning their work on the window, their body dropping into a defensive stance that confirms everything I suspected about their training.
I can’t see their eyes through the ski mask—can’t see anything of their face, just the dark fabric pulled tight across their features and the rapid rise and fall of their chest.
They’re taller than me by half a foot at least, broader through the shoulders. They must be male, based on their height and build, but lean and wiry rather than heavily muscled.
For a long, frozen moment, we simply stare at each other across the grass.
Then their hand moves, reaches into their jacket, and emerges holding something that stops me cold.
A gun. Compact, the black metal gleaming in the moonlight. He points the barrel directly at my chest.
Shit.
“Stay the fuck back.” The voice is male, as I suspected, but it’s higher than I expected, and there’s a tremor in it, as if he’s nervous.
He sounds young, maybe mid-twenties. Experienced enough to know how to hold a gun, but not so experienced that he can quite hide the anxiety I can sense all the way from here.
I raise my hands slowly, palms facing him. But my mind is racing. How long would it take me to get to him?
He’s ten feet away, and the way he holds the gun isn’t quite right. His elbow is slightly off, and the gun almost looks awkward in his hand. His finger is near the trigger but not actually on it. Yep, he’s definitely nervous, which is good, because nervous people make mistakes.
“I said stay back!” His voice rises slightly, the gun wavering in his grip.
I take a step forward.
“I’m warning you—”
I move before he can finish. I’m on him in an instant.
My hand shoots out in a strike I’ve practiced hundreds of times, the heel of my palm connecting with his inner wrist at the exact angle to break his grip.
The gun flies from his hand, spinning through the darkness in a lazy arc before crashing against the side of the building and skittering off into the dark.
The alarm goes off.
Red lights flood the building’s exterior, strobing in a pulsing rhythm, loud sirens echoing into the quiet night.
The intruder lunges at me.
He’s much faster than I expected. His fist catches my shoulder and spins me sideways, pain flaring down my arm. I stumble but don’t fall. I twist to face him again, years of training in my feet.
I drive my elbow into his ribs, feeling the satisfying impact of bone against bone.
He grunts but doesn’t go down, doesn’t stagger as much as he should.
We grapple in the flashing red light, and he’s stronger than me but I’m quicker, and I know where to hit.
I duck under a wild swing and drive my knee into his outer thigh, targeting the nerve cluster that will deaden his leg if I hit it right.
He staggers, his leg buckling.
Then I see the knife.
It’s in his hand before I can react, a flash of silver in the chaotic light. I jerk back but not far enough, and the blade catches my forearm just below the elbow. The pain is immediate and sharp, hot blood welling up and spilling down my forearm.
But I don’t stop. I can’t stop.
I grab his knife hand with both of mine, ignoring the scream of protest from my injured arm, and twist with every ounce of strength I possess.
I feel the bones of his wrist grinding against each other, feel the moment they reach their limit, and then I feel the satisfying crack as something gives way.
He screams, and the knife drops to the ground.
Footsteps are pounding in the distance now, and voices are calling out.
He runs.
I start after him, but my arm protests hard enough that I slow to a stop. I press my hand against the wound. He’s already gone, disappearing into the treeline before I can close the distance.
“What the fuck happened?” Finn reaches me first, with Ethan right behind him. I push my hood back.
Finn’s eyes find my arm, the blood dripping from my fingers, the dark stain spreading down my sleeve. His whole face tightens. “Sophie, are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” I say, annoyed by how breathless I sound. “But he got away. Ran toward the back fence. We might still be able to—”
Finn isn’t listening. His hands are suddenly on me, one gripping my uninjured arm to steady me, the other reaching for the hem of his t-shirt. Before I can process it, he’s pulled it over his head and pressed it firmly against my wound.
“What are you doing?” I ask, too thrown to pull away. Nobody puts their hands on me that fast without getting hurt for it.
“You’re bleeding,” he says, his voice tight with worry. “Pretty badly, Sophie.”
I look down stupidly at the shirt pressed against my arm. The blood is soaking through, but the pressure is helping.
“It’s just a scratch,” I say weakly.
“That’s not a scratch.” Finn is breathing hard, his hand pressing harder against my arm, and I become suddenly aware of how close he is, the heat coming off his skin, the way his eyes are fixed on mine.
More footsteps and voices are closing in, flashlight beams cutting through the dark as the security team responds to the alarm.
Ethan’s head snaps toward the sound. “Finn, take her to the house. Now.”
“What about—”
“The security team is almost here. They’ll want to know what happened, who was involved.” His voice is calm but quick. “We can’t blow Sophie’s cover. As far as anyone knows, she was asleep in her room when the alarm went off.”
He’s right. If anyone sees me like this—bleeding, disheveled—there will be questions Sophie Dysart can’t answer.
“I’ll deal with the security team,” Ethan says. “Tell them I spotted the intruder myself. But I need to know what happened first. Quickly.”
I push through the fog of adrenaline and focus. “Male, around five-ten to five-eleven. Black clothes, ski mask, no identifying features. He moved like someone with training, but he was nervous—probably his first time at this location.”
Ethan nods. “Entry point?”
“The blind spot I flagged on Friday. The window above the loading dock. He was already working on the latch when I found him. Another minute and he’d have been inside.”
“And the alarm?”
“He had a gun. When I disarmed him it hit the side of the building. That’s what triggered it.
” I nod toward the base of the wall. “It’s in the grass over there.
Grab it before your security people do, and get it to Declan’s team.
And the exterior cameras. West side, three angles at least. Get them wiped before anyone reviews them. ”
“I’ll text Max,” Ethan says. “He’s in New York tonight, but he can wipe them remotely.”
“He had a gun.” Finn’s voice is tight. “He pointed a gun at you.”
“What about the knife?” Ethan asks, his eyes on my arm.
“Somewhere near the window. I broke his wrist getting it away from him, so wherever he’s going, he’ll need medical attention.”