At 2:17 in the morning, forty-three dollars sat in my checking account when a bleeding woman in a cream coat stumbled into the café and whispered, “Please don’t let them find me.”

The concussive shockwave of the flashbang sent Cynthia and her four guards staggering back, clutching their blinded eyes and ringing ears.

I had closed my eyes the exact second I heard the skylight crack.

Before the guards could recover their senses, I drew the ceramic push-dagger from the slit of my evening gown. I stepped forward into the blinded lead guard, drove the ceramic blade through the meat of his gun hand, ripped his concealed Glock 19 from his holster, and brought the butt of the heavy slide down across the bridge of his nose.

He collapsed onto the marble floor with a bloody groan.

Above us, descending on high-speed black tactical rappelling ropes from the shattered skylight, were two operators in sterile gray body armor, their suppressed weapons barking in precise, controlled bursts. The remaining three guards around the dais were dropped with non-lethal leg and shoulder shots before they could clear their holsters.

The crowd of Chicago’s elite was in full stampede, screaming, trampling velvet ropes and shattering champagne flutes as they surged toward the Michigan Avenue exits.

Cynthia was crawling across the dais, her green gown torn, her hair wild, frantically trying to reach the service door behind the stage.

I caught her by the back of her collar, slamming her against the mahogany podium with enough force to knock the breath from her lungs. I pressed the cold muzzle of the captured Glock against the base of her skull.

“Don't move,” I breathed into her ear, my voice flat, cold, and utterly devoid of mercy.

“*Maya!*” Dante’s voice roared through my earpiece, cutting through the blaring fire sirens of the hotel. “*Penthouse is secure! I have the boy! Toby is safe! Repeat, Toby is in my arms, and we are moving to the transport!*”

The weight of the world lifted from my chest in a single, shattering sob.

Toby was alive.

“He’s safe, Cassandra,” I whispered, pressing the barrel harder against her temple. “Your leverage is gone.”

Cynthia let out a choked, bloody laugh, turning her head slightly so she could look at me with one wild, mascara-smeared eye.

“You think Toby was the prize?” Cynthia spat, blood bubbling on her lip. “You arrogant little fool. Toby was the distraction! Look at your phone, Maya! Look at the news!”

My blood ran cold.

Keeping the gun pinned to her head, I reached into my clutch with one hand, pulled out my smartphone, and tapped the screen.

The screen was flooded with breaking news alerts from every financial outlet in the western hemisphere:

*BREAKING: THORNE GLOBAL REFINERY EXPLOSION AT LAKE CALUMET.*

*CATASTROPHIC FIRE AT SAINT JUDE HARBOR LOGISTICS HUB.*

*TRADING HALTED: ENTIRE THORNE MARITIME FLEET HIT BY SIMULTANEOUS CYBERATTACK.*

“What did you do?” I whispered, horror rising like bile in my throat.

“I didn't do it,” Cynthia sneered, her eyes gleaming with manic, triumphant madness. “Alexander Cross did. He knew you’d take the bait at the Drake. He knew you’d commit all your private security to the hotel and the boy.”

She turned her body, pointing a trembling, manicured finger toward the south windows of the ballroom.

Through the shattered glass of the skylight, far to the south toward the industrial edge of the city, a massive, hellish orange glow was rising into the night sky. Thick, oily smoke billowed thousands of feet into the air, turning the low storm clouds the color of bruised flesh.

The Port of Chicago—the industrial heart of the Thorne empire, where my mother’s private laboratories and deep-water terminals were located—was burning to the waterline.

“Saint Jude is the terminal where your mother hidden the master gene-sequencing lab,” Cynthia whispered, her teeth stained with blood. “Cross isn't hunting you anymore, Maya. He’s taking the cure by force. If you stay here, you can watch your grandfather’s entire legacy burn to ash before midnight.”

“Dante,” I barked into the radio, my voice shaking with rage. “Take Toby to the safehouse in Indiana. Put Carmela with him. Seal the perimeter and shoot anyone who approaches.”

“*Maya, negative!*” Dante shouted over the roar of the helicopter blades in the background. “*Saint Jude is a war zone! Local police are retreating! The private military contractors on-site have heavy artillery—*”

“Get my brother out of this city, Dante!” I screamed. “That is an order!”

I lowered the phone and looked down at Cynthia.

“You’re going to jail, Aunt Cassandra,” I said. “And this time, the feds won't lose the paperwork.”

With a swift, clean strike, I brought the butt of the Glock down against her temple, knocking her unconscious onto the ruined dais.

I turned and ran through the shattered ballroom, sprinting past the abandoned tables, the spilled champagne, and the hysterical sirens of the arriving police cruisers, heading straight for the subterranean garage where my car was waiting.

The wolves had burned the forest down.