For a moment she didn't know where she was. She only knew motion-fast, whipping past her face, vibrating beneath her legs-and a strong hand gripping her waist.

Then everything snapped into focus.

The motorcycle.

The parking garage.

The gunshots.

Donovan Hale.

Her arms tightened instinctively around him as he leaned the bike into a sharp turn, tires screeching on asphalt. Wind punched against her ears, but it couldn't drown the pounding of her fear.

"Hold on," Donovan shouted over his shoulder, voice low and urgent.

As if she could do anything else.

They burst out of the garage and into a side street, weaving between cars. Kira kept her head down, her fingers trembling against his jacket. Her office building disappeared behind them, swallowed by glass towers and morning traffic.

Nothing made sense.

Her so-called ordinary job.

Her ordinary morning.

Her ordinary life-

None of it had been real. Or safe. Or hers.

Not anymore.

By the time Donovan slowed the bike and turned onto a quiet industrial road, Kira's mind had spiraled into a thousand questions and none of them had answers.

He finally pulled behind an abandoned warehouse and cut the engine. Silence fell so suddenly that she felt dizzy.

Donovan pulled off his helmet first. When he turned to her, the intensity in his eyes was enough to steal her breath.

"You good?" he asked.

She didn't answer. She couldn't.

Her hands were still trembling.

He reached out gently. "Kira-talk to me."

His voice wasn't mocking or amused like the rumors claimed he always was. It wasn't arrogant or careless. It was strangely... steady. Blunt, but steady.

Her throat tightened. "Who were those men?"

"Killers," Donovan said plainly. "My father's."

She swallowed, but the fear only thickened.

"And why," he continued, "is his cleanup team after a quiet little accountant who's never broken a rule in her life?"

Kira pulled the padded envelope from her bag with shaking fingers. "Because of this."

Donovan's brows lifted, but something sharper flickered behind his expression-as though he had expected this moment but dreaded it anyway.

Before she could second-guess herself, before she could breathe herself out of it, she opened the envelope and held out the flash drive.

Donovan stared at it quietly.

"A flash drive," he said flatly. "That's what made a kill team chase you across a parking garage?"

"You don't understand," she whispered. "I opened it. I saw things. Numbers... files... things that shouldn't exist."

Donovan's jaw tensed. "So you looked."

"I didn't mean to," she said quickly. "It showed up at my desk. It wasn't labeled. I thought it was a mistake-"

"It wasn't a mistake."

His tone was low. Hard.

Too certain.

Kira's pulse stuttered. "You know something."

"Yeah," Donovan said, running a hand through his hair. "Unfortunately."

He motioned toward an old metal stairway leading up the side of the warehouse. "Come on. We can't stay outside."

Inside, the warehouse was dim but not abandoned-not completely. There were two camping chairs, a stack of bottled water, and a laptop on a crate. Not a living space... but a hideout.

"Sit," Donovan said softly.

She did.

He dragged a crate in front of her and sat across from her, elbows on his knees, the flash drive between them like something radioactive.

"Tell me exactly what you saw."

The memory hit her all at once-files and spreadsheets and horrifying labels that had lodged themselves like splinters in her mind.

"Ledger transfers," she whispered. "Millions sent to places that don't exist on the books. Payments labeled with operation names. There were photos. Audio recordings." She hesitated. "Your father was on them."

Donovan let out a low curse.

"He said something about... clearing loose ends. He said 'no survivors.'"

His face went still.

Something dark passed behind his eyes that made her chest constrict-not fear, but a strange, quiet empathy.

"I've been trying to expose him for years," Donovan said. "But I never had proof. He hides everything behind layers of shell accounts and private consultants. No paper trail. No digital trail." His gaze sharpened on the flash drive. "Until now."

Kira's breath caught.

"You think this could bring him down?"

"If it's real?" Donovan said. "It could burn his entire empire to the ground."

She looked down at her shaking hands. "I didn't ask for any of this."

"No," he agreed softly. "You didn't."

Kira's throat tightened again. "I just wanted-"

She couldn't even say it.

I just wanted a normal morning.

Donovan leaned forward slightly. "Look at me."

She did. Slowly.

"You're in danger," he said. "Real danger. They won't stop until they get that drive or silence you. So you have two choices."

"Two?" she echoed, voice thin.

"One: You walk away and go into hiding. Alone. But they'll still come."

She shivered.

"Or two," Donovan said, "you stay with me-because I'm the only one who knows how my father thinks, and I'm the only one who wants him exposed as badly as you do."

Her heart thudded.

"You want me to stay with you?"

"I want you alive," he said.

Kira's breath caught somewhere between fear and something she couldn't name.

The flash drive sat between them, small, silent, and devastating.

She lifted it slowly.

"If we open it again," she whispered, "I'll show you everything."

Donovan nodded, reaching for the laptop. "Then let's see what kind of monster my father really is."

But before he could plug it in-

before their fingers even brushed against the device-

Glass shattered above them.

Kira screamed as a black-clad figure dropped through the window, landing behind Donovan with predatory precision.

A gun cocked.

"I found them," the intruder said into a radio.

Donovan grabbed Kira and pulled her down as the first bullet tore through the air.

The flash drive flew from Kira's hand-

sliding across the floor-

straight toward the intruder's boot.

And he bent down to pick it up.

Time fractured.

Kira didn't breathe. Didn't blink. Didn't think.

All she saw was the gloved hand reaching for the flash drive-the one thing that could expose everything, protect her, and damn Richard Hale's empire.

"NO!" she cried before she even realized the voice was hers.

The intruder's head snapped up.

Donovan moved first.

With a speed that didn't match his relaxed, troublemaker façade, he lunged forward and slammed his shoulder into the man. The impact knocked both of them sideways, sending the gun skidding across the concrete floor.

"Kira-RUN!" he shouted.

Her pulse exploded. Her legs moved before her mind caught up. She grabbed the nearest metal pipe from the floor-rusty, heavy-and sprinted toward the flash drive.

The intruder recovered faster than she expected. He shoved Donovan back, spun, and reached for the flash drive again.

So did she.

Their fingers brushed the floor at the same time.

The man glared at her. "You shouldn't have looked at it."

Kira didn't know she could move that fast or that decisively. She swung the pipe with all the fear, panic, and adrenaline roaring through her.

The metal cracked against his forearm.

He hissed in pain, jerking away-and the flash drive shot out from under his boots, skittering across the floor and disappearing under a stack of old pallets.

"Kira, GO!" Donovan shouted again, grappling the man from behind.

But Kira wasn't running. Not without the drive.

Not after everything.

Not after almost dying for it.

Not when it held the truth.

She scrambled toward the pallets, heart hammering. She reached under, fingers brushing dust, splintered wood, a crushed bottle-

There.

A small, cold, rectangular shape.

The flash drive.

She grabbed it-

A gunshot exploded.

Kira screamed and ducked, clutching the drive to her chest. The bullet struck the pallet behind her, sending splinters into her arm.

"DROP IT!" the intruder roared.

She crawled backward, breath coming in broken gasps.

Donovan grabbed the man's wrist, slamming it against a metal beam. The gun clattered to the floor and slid into the shadows.

"You picked the wrong woman to hunt," Donovan snarled.

The man punched him across the jaw-hard enough that Donovan staggered. But he didn't fall.

He looked furious now. Focused. Deadly in a way Kira had never imagined from the man her company whispered about as a scandal magnet.

"Get her," the intruder spat.

Before Donovan could react, the man charged Kira.

She scrambled up, clutching the flash drive. Her legs screamed with pain, but she kept moving, dodging behind a row of steel beams.

He followed.

"Give me the drive," he said, voice low. "Do that, and maybe we don't have to kill you."

Maybe.

Not promising.

Not reassuring.

Not believable.

Kira pressed herself against the metal structure.

Every instinct told her she shouldn't be here.

She wasn't trained for this.

She wasn't brave enough for this.

She wasn't-

But she was still alive.

And she intended to stay that way.

She held the pipe tightly. "Come and take it."

The man smiled coldly.

Before he could step forward, Donovan appeared behind him-silently, swiftly-and slammed a metal beam into the back of his head.

The man collapsed instantly.

Kira dropped the pipe, shaking violently. Her entire body felt like it might give out.

Donovan rushed to her, catching her before she fell.

"Are you hurt?" he asked breathlessly, hands gripping her arms, eyes scanning her for wounds.

"I-I'm fine," she whispered. "I got the drive."

He let out a sharp, disbelieving laugh. "Of course you did."

Her limbs were trembling. His hands were still on her shoulders. Their faces were inches apart. Too close. Close enough for her to see the flecks of gold in his brown eyes, the worry etched across his expression.

"You're braver than you think, Kira."

She opened her mouth but nothing came out except a shaky breath.

Their moment shattered when the intruder groaned on the floor.

"He's waking up," Kira whispered.

Donovan grabbed her hand. "We need to go. There'll be more coming."

Together, they sprinted out the back exit of the warehouse, their footsteps echoing against the cracked pavement.

They climbed onto the motorcycle. Kira held onto him, her fingers digging into his jacket.

As Donovan started the engine, Kira looked over her shoulder.

The warehouse door burst open. Two more black-clad figures stepped out.

One lifted a radio to his ear.

"Kira Hale has the drive. Repeat-Kira Hale has the drive."

Her blood turned to ice.

"Donovan-"

"I know," he said, voice grim. "Hold on, because from this point forward-there's no turning back."

The motorcycle shot forward into the rising sun.

As they sped away, Kira's phone buzzed in her pocket.

One message.

Unknown number.

"They're not the only ones coming for you."

Chapter 3 NUMBERS THAT LIED

You might like