LOGINThe world was still tilting when Jaxon kicked the warped door open and pulled Raven from the twisted wreck. Gravel skidded under his boots, the night air cold against the heat radiating from the ruined vehicle. Raven’s breath came in short, sharp bursts against his collarbone, her hand curled against her abdomen, fingers trembling.“Stay with me,” Jaxon muttered, voice raw, almost hoarse. “Just breathe, baby, I’ve got you.”Raven tried to answer, but pain cut through her in a jagged, electric line. Not from the crash alone, something deeper, tighter, wrong. A cold fear bloomed under her ribs.The dock stretched ahead of them, lit by the harsh industrial lamps Evelyn favored, pale, sterile light that washed the sea into a sheet of silver. Jaxon moved fast despite the weight in his arms, every stride fueled by terror.Then the wind shifted. A black car rolled to a stop near the far end of the dock. Its back door opened and Evelyn Morreau stepped out, flawless, untouched by fire or ruin,
The villa’s flames clawed at the night, smoke spiraling into the sky like black banners of war. The structure, once a monument to Evelyn’s meticulous control, now crumbled into chaos. Jaxon and Raven remained at the edge of the gravel drive, silhouettes against the glow of fire and ash.“She’s alive,” Jaxon muttered, his jaw tight, eyes fixed on the collapsing villa. “She always survives.”Raven’s hand closed around the drive in her coat pocket. “Then we make sure this time she doesn’t.”A sharp vibration cut through the tense night air. Raven’s phone. An encrypted call flashed across the screen.“Evelyn,” she whispered.Jaxon’s eyes darkened, and he leaned closer. “Take it.”Raven swiped to answer. Evelyn’s voice slithered through the speaker, silken, smooth, yet laced with menace.“Well, well… my sons and the whore,” Evelyn purred. “Did you enjoy my little fireworks show?”Jaxon’s expression remained unreadable, his hands clenched at his sides.“I trust you realize the villa was a d
The city hadn’t slept, but it pretended to.Under its quiet skin, deals were being rewritten, loyalties rearranged, and bloodlines prepared for sacrifice.In the dim light of dawn, Jaxon stood in his penthouse office at the Morreau tower, phone pressed to his ear. The skyline glimmered beyond him, gold spilling through the fractured glass of a war that hadn’t yet ended.“Matteo, confirm the intel.”Static hissed briefly before the man’s voice came through. “Intercepted three coded transmissions. Evelyn initiated a meeting with Zane. Private estate in the Hamptons. Restricted clearance, full lockdown protocols. The kind she used for succession hearings.”Jaxon’s jaw flexed. “She’s moving early.”“Or scared,” Matteo replied. “You burned half her empire last night. She’s cutting her losses.”“Not losses,” Jaxon muttered. “Liabilities.”He ended the call and turned toward Raven. She sat on the edge of his desk, her hair unbound, eyes shadowed from a night without rest. The screens behind
The city breathed differently that night.A low hum of electricity vibrated through the underbelly of New York, signals, encrypted codes, and orders hidden beneath the noise of normal life. For weeks, quiet movements had replaced open warfare. Now, those movements converged.A small newsroom on the Upper East Side glowed with the dim light of a single monitor. The journalist typing inside believed she was communicating with a source named Raye Kincaid. She was absolutely clueless as to who Raye Kincaid really was. The data came in waves, offshore ledgers, shipment manifests, transaction histories spanning three continents. Evelyn Morreau’s name appeared like a curse in the fine print, buried behind shell companies and aliases, now dragged into the light.Each file uploaded triggered a ripple across the digital map: hidden accounts froze, holding companies halted, funds locked in international limbo. The leak spread through secure channels, reaching regulators, watchdogs, and eventual
The snow hadn’t stopped falling, though it carried ash now, fine gray dust from the burning docks that clung to the air like memory. The warehouse still hissed and cracked behind them, fire eating through metal, but Jaxon’s focus was locked on the faint noise ahead, a groan, ragged and human.He moved first, weapon raised, every line of his body sharp with readiness. Raven followed, the wind clawing at her coat, heartbeat hammering against her ribs. The sound came again, closer this time, from behind a half-collapsed freight container.“Matteo!” Jaxon’s voice cut through the static air.A muffled cough answered. Then a shape lurched into view, Matteo, blood streaking down the side of his face, one arm slung around Viktor’s shoulders. Both were limping, half-burned, half-frozen, but alive.“Don…” Matteo rasped, voice shaking. “We thought...”“Save it,” Jaxon said, lowering his gun, his tone edged with controlled relief. “You’re late.”Viktor managed a broken laugh. “We were… invited to
The world outside Geneva burned quietly, as if the city itself was trying to hide the war crawling under its skin. Snowflakes fell through the smoke, catching on broken glass and twisted steel. The explosion at the Morreau Foundation had made the headlines, all but the truth, the bodies, the betrayal, was already buried beneath money and silence.Inside the safehouse, Raven’s reflection trembled in the windowpane. Her hair was still streaked with ash, her hands faintly shaking. She could taste the acrid bite of cordite and lies on her tongue. Behind her, Jaxon moved through the dim light like a shadow still learning how to be human again.He’d stripped out of his blood-streaked suit, trading it for black cargo and the gun he never set down. The wound on his shoulder was reopened, a dark bloom under the bandage, but he didn’t slow. Men like him didn’t bleed, they calculated.Matteo and Viktor had left an hour ago to track their remaining contacts in Zurich. Now it was just the two of t






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