Chapter 6 - The Home Invasion That Changed Everything.
I drove like a bat out of hell. Ninety miles an hour down Palm Avenue, running red lights, tires squealing around corners. The safe house was only five minutes from my parents’ house—five minutes that felt like five hours. Thorne stayed on the line the whole time, feeding me updates. The SUV had pulled into the driveway. Two men had gotten out. Body armor. Silenced pistols. They’d cut the power to the house. The line went dead.
“Chloe! Dad!” I screamed into the phone, but it was too late.
I skidded to a halt at the end of the driveway three minutes later. Tires smoking. The house was dark. Pitch black. No lights anywhere. The black SUV was parked crookedly by the front porch, engine still running. The front door hung wide open.
I grabbed my USP from the holster under my jacket. Racked the slide. Click-clack. Familiar. Reassuring. I moved up the driveway low and fast, staying in the shadows, using the SUV for cover. The front walk was littered with broken glass—they’d smashed the sidelight window to get in.
I could hear voices from inside. Low. Male. Speaking French with a heavy Middle Eastern accent. Fournier’s men.
“…find the girl,” one of them said. “Karim wants her alive. The father and the sister… kill them. Make it look like a robbery. Leave the ace of spades.”
I didn’t wait to hear more.
I moved through the front door like a shadow. The foyer was dark. Moonlight slanted through the broken window, throwing long shadows across the floor. I could see them in the living room. Two men. Both wearing black. Both carrying suppressed Glocks. Their backs were to me. They were ransacking the bookshelves, looking for something—probably looking for me.
And then I heard it. A tiny, muffled whimper. From the kitchen.
Chloe.
My vision went red.
I didn’t hesitate. Didn’t call out. Didn’t give them a chance to surrender. I raised my pistol, took aim at the first man’s head, and squeezed the trigger twice.
Pfft-pfft.
The suppressor made the shots sound like someone popping a balloon. The first man went down instantly, a neat red hole between his eyes. The second man spun around, eyes wide, raising his gun—but I was already moving. I closed the distance between us in two steps, kicked his gun out of his hand, and drove my elbow into his throat as hard as I could. He gagged, gasping for air, and I slammed his head into the marble fireplace mantel. Once. Twice. He crumpled to the floor, unconscious.
“Clear!” I yelled, but I was already moving toward the kitchen.
The door was locked. I kicked it open.
Dad and Chloe were tied to the kitchen chairs, their mouths taped shut, their eyes wild with terror. Three more men were in there. One holding a gun to Dad’s head. One holding a knife to Chloe’s throat. And the third…
Luc Fournier.
He was leaning against the fridge, that same cold smirk on his face, the ouroboros tattoo snaking up his forearm. He looked exactly the same as he had five years ago. Same scar across his left cheek. Same dead eyes.
“Well, well, well,” Fournier purred. “The ghost of Mogadishu. I was starting to think you’d never show up. Karim will be so pleased. He’s got a special place reserved for you, Lieutenant. Right next to the men you left to die in that warehouse.”
“Let them go, Fournier,” I said, keeping my pistol trained dead center of his forehead. My hand didn’t shake. Not even a little. “This is between you and me. They have nothing to do with this.”
“On the contrary,” Fournier said, nodding at the man holding Chloe. The knife pressed harder into her throat. A thin line of blood welled up. Chloe whimpered again, tears streaming down her face. “They have everything to do with this. You see, Karim knows all about your little mission. He knows Admiral Thorne pulled you out of your bartender hole. He knows you’re planning to stop the shipment. And he sent me here to deliver a message.”
He pushed off the fridge and took a step toward me. I didn’t flinch.
“Message received,” I said. “You want me. Fine. I’ll come with you. Just let them walk out of here. Right now.”
Fournier laughed. A harsh, barking sound.
“Oh, Harper. You always were too noble for your own good. That’s what’s gonna get you killed. No. I’m not gonna let them go. I’m gonna kill your father slowly right in front of you. Then I’m gonna let my boys have a little fun with your sister before I slit her pretty little throat. And then… then I’m gonna take you back to Karim. And he’s gonna spend weeks cutting those pretty scars off your back, one slice at a time, until you beg him to kill you.”
He nodded at the two men. “Do it.”
Time slowed down.
I saw the man with the gun tighten his finger on the trigger, pressed to Dad’s temple. I saw the man with the knife pull Chloe’s head back, exposing her neck. I saw Fournier reach into his jacket for his own gun.
And then I did the one thing nobody expected.
I dropped my pistol.
It clattered to the tile floor. All four men stared at it, confused. That split second was all I needed.
I moved faster than humanly possible. Dove forward, grabbed a steak knife off the counter on my way, and drove it straight through the wrist of the man holding the gun to Dad’s head. He screamed, the gun going off with a deafening BANG, the bullet burying itself in the ceiling. I spun, grabbed the gun from his useless hand, and shot the man holding Chloe in the forehead before he could even blink. He fell backward, taking the knife with him, leaving Chloe gasping and sobbing in her chair.
Fournier recovered first. He raised his gun and fired—once, twice—the rounds zinging past my ear, shattering the window behind me. I dove behind the kitchen island, bullets chewing up the granite above my head.
“YOU BITCH!” Fournier screamed. “I’M GONNA KILL YOU!”
“COME AND GET ME, FUCKER!” I yelled back.
I heard him moving. Circling the island. The other man—the one I’d elbowed in the throat in the living room—stumbled into the kitchen, holding his neck, a gun in his good hand. I popped up, took aim, and shot him in the chest. He went down.
Just Fournier left.
“Harper…” he sang, his voice getting closer. “Come out, come out, wherever you are. We can end this nice. Or we can end it messy. Your choice.”
I crawled on my belly to the other side of the island. He was three feet away. I could see his boots. I stood up fast, bringing the gun up—but he was ready. He swung his arm, knocking the gun out of my hand, and drove his fist into my face. Stars exploded behind my eyes. I stumbled back, hitting the fridge hard. He was on me in a second, his hand around my throat, squeezing, lifting me off the ground.
“Now,” he hissed, his face inches from mine. “Now I’m gonna finish what I started in Somalia.”
He pulled his knife. The same serrated blade he’d used on my back five years ago. I saw the flash of steel as he raised it over his head, aiming straight for my heart.
And then…
BANG.
Fournier’s eyes went wide. He froze. The knife slipped from his fingers. Blood bubbled up from his lips. He looked down at the neat, red hole blooming in the center of his chest… then slowly turned his head to look behind him.
Chloe was standing by the table. Still tied to her chair. But she’d somehow gotten her hands free enough to pick up my USP off the floor. Her hands were shaking so hard the gun rattled. Her face was streaked with tears and blood. But her eyes… her eyes were cold.
“Nobody,” she said, her voice trembling but fierce. “Nobody hurts my sister.”
She pulled the trigger again.
BANG.
Fournier collapsed on top of me, dead weight, his blood soaking through my shirt. I pushed him off, gasping for air, my throat raw. I scrambled over to Chloe, cutting her bonds with his knife, then did the same for Dad.
“Are you okay?” I asked, checking her neck. The cut was shallow. Just a scratch. “Chloe, look at me. Are you okay?”
She stared at Fournier’s body. Then at the gun in her hand. Then at me. And then she threw her arms around my neck and sobbed. Hard, heaving sobs that shook her entire body.
“I killed him,” she whispered. “Oh my God, Harper, I killed him.”
“You saved our lives,” I said, holding her tight. “You hear me? You were brave. You were so brave, Chloe.”
Dad crawled over to us, his face ashen, his hands shaking. He pulled both of us into his arms. For a minute, the three of us just sat there on the blood-soaked kitchen floor, holding each other, while the wail of sirens grew louder and louder in the distance.
The QRF was here.
Thorne was right behind them, bursting through the back door with a team of operators, guns raised, only to freeze when they saw the carnage. Five dead men. Fournier in the middle of the kitchen. The three of us covered in blood, alive.
Thorne looked at me. His eyes went from Fournier’s body, to the gun in Chloe’s hand, to the raw handprints on my throat.
“Jesus Christ, Harper,” he said softly. “What the hell happened here?”
I stood up. Wiped the blood off my face with the back of my hand.
“Phase One just got moved up,” I said, nodding at Fournier. “We’ve got our link. And he’s got a phone in his pocket. I guarantee you it’s got everything we need. VIPER’s name. The port date. Everything.”
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I looked at Chloe. She was still crying, but she wiped her face and stood up straight. Tried to look like the Sterling she’d always pretended to be.
“And my sister?” I said, putting my hand on her shoulder. “She just earned herself a spot on the team.”
