Chapter 8

Arla pulled the thick duvet up to Caden's chin, making sure he was completely tucked in.

Just as she pulled her hand back, the cell phone resting on her nightstand vibrated with a harsh buzz. The screen lit up the dark room.

Arla picked it up. It was a text message from an unknown number. She stared at the glowing screen, her heart hammering against her ribs. She had used cash for the cab, but she had hailed it through the city's digital transit app on her phone. Someone with terrifyingly high-level clearance must have hacked the dispatch grid the second the cab dropped her off.

The message was short. Arla Noel. You can't run.

Arla's heart skipped a beat. The image of the man in the hotel room-the steel handcuffs, the bloodshot, predatory eyes-flashed violently in her mind.

She walked quickly to the window, pulling back a tiny corner of the heavy curtain. She stared out into the pitch-black, rain-soaked grounds of the estate.

There was nothing out there but the wind thrashing the trees. But the heavy, suffocating sensation of being hunted by an apex predator crawled up her spine.

Arla didn't hesitate. She blocked the number immediately. She opened her banking app and wiped the digital receipt for the yellow cab, doing everything she could to erase her digital footprint.

Fifty miles away, deep beneath the bustling streets of Manhattan.

The elevator doors slid open, revealing a massive, hyper-modern underground command center. The air was cold, smelling of ozone and server racks. This was the nerve center of Task Force Chimera.

Ewald stepped out. He had changed into a tight, black tactical shirt. The deep gashes on his wrists were carelessly wrapped in black medical tape.

He walked toward the massive holographic display dominating the center of the room. His assistant, Jalen, was typing furiously at a terminal, his face pale in the blue light.

"Boss. We have it," Jalen said, spinning his chair around. He held out a physical file folder stamped with a bright red 'TOP SECRET' seal.

Ewald snatched the file. He flipped it open.

A high-resolution surveillance photo of Arla Noel stared back at him. Her face was slightly pale, her expression guarded.

Ewald's thumb brushed over the glossy paper, tracing the line of her jaw. His jaw muscles clenched tight, his eyes dark and unreadable.

"Arla Noel," Jalen read from his screen. "Officially the adopted daughter of the Sargent family. Currently engaged to Clinton Freeman, heir to the Freeman estate."

The word 'engaged' hit the room like a drop in atmospheric pressure. The air turned freezing. Ewald's eyes snapped up, flashing with a lethal, territorial aggression.

"Keep talking," Ewald ordered, his voice a low, dangerous rumble.

"Traffic cameras tracked her cab. She went straight back to the Sargent Manor in Long Island," Jalen swallowed hard, pointing to a blinking red dot on the map. "Also... the file shows she has a son. Five years old. Name is Caden."

"Five?"

Jalen hesitated. Then, carefully, he added: "Sir... I pulled the child's photo from the Sargent family's private social accounts. I don't mean to overstep, but..." He turned his screen toward Ewald. "Look at the boy's eyes. The bone structure. And the timing-"

"The timing," Ewald repeated, his voice flat.

"If you count back nine months from his birth," Jalen said quietly, "you land in the middle of that storm. Six years ago. The night the hotel's surveillance blacked out. The night you missed your scheduled check-in with Command. The night I found you barely conscious and the room looked like a war zone."

Ewald's eyes snapped to the photograph on Jalen's screen. A small boy with dark hair and a stubborn chin. He wasn't looking at the camera-he was looking at something off-frame, his expression serious and watchful.

Like a soldier scanning for threats.

Ewald's heart, usually a slow, steady metronome, slammed hard against his ribs.

The scent. That vanilla scent in the suite tonight. The same scent from six years ago. The same scent that had pulled him back from the edge of a flashback that nearly destroyed him. He'd thought it was a hallucination-a trick of his fractured mind conjuring comfort where there was none.

But what if it had been real?

Ewald let out a slow, controlled breath-the kind he took before pulling a trigger.

"Who is the father?" Ewald demanded, his voice dropping an octave.

"The file says... father unknown," Jalen replied, pulling up another document. "Publicly, he's considered an illegitimate child. A scandal for the family."

Ewald's jaw locked. Unknown. Of course it was unknown. She had never reported it. Never come forward. Never tried to find him.

"Jalen," Ewald said, his voice cold and absolute. "Initiate level-one surveillance on the Sargent Manor immediately. I want eyes on the boy at all times."

He paused, his gaze burning into the photograph on the screen.

"Find a window of opportunity for a clean, non-contact sample acquisition. A hair follicle. Saliva. I want his DNA. Make it completely untraceable."

Jalen's eyes widened at the unprecedented allocation of military-grade resources for a civilian target. "Sir?"

"And lock this down," Ewald commanded, his tone leaving zero room for debate. "Highest clearance. No one sees the results but me."