Chapter 2 - THE PERIMETER
The rumble of the heavy transport helicopters rattled the crystal chandelier in the dining room long before the aircraft actually cleared the treeline.
I kept my arms firmly wrapped around Claire, feeling the terrifying, icy fragility of her skin beneath my heavy wool coat. Her breathing was shallow, a fragile thread I was guarding with my life. Outside, the blizzard howled, but the mechanical thunder tearing through the night sky drowned out the wind.
Through the frosted glass of the parlor doors, my mother, Eleanor, and my sister, Natalie, scrambled to their feet. The arrogant smirks had vanished from their faces, replaced by the panicked confusion of women who believed the world existed solely to indulge them.
“Ethan!” Mother shrieked over the deafening roar as blinding searchlights cut through the sheer curtains, sweeping across the antique rugs. “What is that? Are those police? I can explain—”
“Quiet,” I said. The single word cracked through the room like a gunshot.
For thirty-four years, Eleanor Vance had known a son who bowed his head, managed portfolios, and smiled through her endless passive-aggressive remarks. The man looking at her now was a stranger.
Three armored SUVs smashed through the wrought-iron front gates of the estate, their reinforced bumpers tossing the centuries-old metal aside like scrap. Men clad in matte-black tactical gear poured out, weapons leveled, moving with silent, terrifying precision. They surrounded the perimeter in seconds.
The heavy oak front door was kicked open.
Viktor stepped into the foyer. Rain and snow whipped around his broad shoulders. He didn’t wear a police badge. He wore the unmarked tactical rig of a Tier One operator, a submachine gun slung tight across his chest. He took one look at the room, his cold eyes passing over my mother and sister as if they were furniture, before landing on me.
“Perimeter secured, Commander,” Viktor said, his voice a low, gravelly rumble. “Medical is right behind me.”
Mother’s jaw dropped. She clutched the lapels of my father’s silk robe, her eyes darting from Viktor’s weapon to my face.
“Commander?” she whispered, the color completely draining from her cheeks. “Ethan, who are these men? Tell them to leave immediately. I am the head of this estate!”
She lunged toward the foyer console and snatched up my father’s vintage gold pocket watch—a heavy, ornate piece he had carried every day of his life. She held it up like a talisman. “This house belongs to me! My husband’s security firm answers to this family, not you!”
She thought Viktor was private security. She thought this was a misunderstanding.
Viktor didn’t even blink. He looked at me for the order.
Two field medics rushed in with a thermal blanket and a trauma kit. I gently laid Claire onto the plush sofa, stepping back to let them work. My wife’s lips were still tinted a bruised blue, but as the medic applied a heated IV line to her arm, her eyelashes fluttered.
I knelt beside her, ignoring my mother’s hysterical demands. “I’m right here, Claire.”
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Her brown eyes opened, hazy and exhausted. She looked past me, her gaze fixing on the trembling hand of my mother. Claire reached out, her fingers weakly grasping my sleeve.
“Ethan,” Claire rasped, her voice barely a breath. “The watch. Don’t let her open the watch.”
