Chapter 4 - The Thunder in the Sky
The snow-laden pines surrounding the estate suddenly whipped violently sideways as a massive rotor wash battered the roof of the house.
Through the shattered front door, the blinding searchlight of a heavy-duty twin-engine helicopter painted the driveway in brilliant, unforgiving daylight. Emblazoned on the side of the aircraft were the dark blue letters of the Department of Homeland Security and the state tactical response wing.
Marcus’s operatives spun around, raising their carbines toward the sky, but they were instantly blinded by the tactical strobes flooding the property.
"Federal agents! Drop your weapons! Down on the ground now!"
The amplified voice echoed from the helicopter's external speakers, bouncing off the mountain cliffs with deafening authority. Half a dozen heavily armed federal marshals fast-roped down from the hovering cabin into the snowbanks, their rifles trained squarely on Marcus and his security detail.
Marcus cursed under his breath, lunging forward to grab my jacket, but I swung the stock of the rifle in a sharp arc, cracking him across the jaw and sending him sprawling onto the hardwood floor.
"Get off me!" Marcus roared, spitting blood onto the rug as two marshals descended upon him, slamming him face-first into the floorboards and snapping heavy steel cuffs around his wrists.
"Dr. Vance!" shouted a woman in a tactical jacket, pushing her way past the ruined doorway. It was Agent Miller from the federal healthcare fraud division, her breath pluming in the freezing air. "We got the automated ping from your study! The data dump was pristine—we’ve already seized the main servers at Cain-Whitmore Pharmaceuticals and frozen every asset associated with the Kane Foundation."
"Thank God," I breathed, lowering the rifle and letting it clatter against the floor. "Get a medevac team inside immediately. I have a seven-year-old pediatric patient with severe hypothermia and two neonates requiring immediate respiratory support."
Agent Miller nodded sharply, turning to her team. "Paramedics in! Secure the children!"
As medical personnel rushed through the door with oxygen tanks and heated blankets, Marcus was hauled to his feet by two marshals. His expensive overcoat was ruined, stained with mud and blood, his hair matted with snow.
He stared at me with a look of pure, unadulterated venom as they dragged him toward the waiting extraction vehicle.
"You haven't won, Nathan," Marcus yelled over the roar of the helicopter rotors. "Sarah is still out there! You'll never find her!"
I watched him go, feeling neither triumph nor anger—only a cold, relentless determination.
Because as I turned back toward the living room, Mara was holding up a small, blood-stained locket she had found inside Lily's coat pocket—a locket I recognized instantly as the one our mother had given Sarah on her wedding day, inside of which was a micro-SD card and a handwritten address in the industrial sector of the city.
May you like
Sarah wasn't dead.
And I was coming for her.
