Part 3
The black SUV tore across the pristine grass of the parade deck, its tires tearing deep gouges into the earth. The rear windows rolled down, revealing the dull, terrifying gleam of rifle barrels.
"Down!" I screamed, tackling my mother to the asphalt just as a spray of bullets shredded the white canopy above us. Lemonade pitchers shattered, raining sticky...
Part 2
When my father’s hand tightened on my torn shoulder, training overrode instinct. I ignored the blinding agony, drove the heel of my right palm upward into his wrist, and twisted hard. Richard let out a sharp yelp of pain, stumbling backward and crashing into Brianna’s entryway console table.
"Don't you ever lay a hand on me again," I growled,...
PART 2
Aunt Rebecca answered on the second ring.
“I need you in Arlington on Friday,” I said.
“Is this an order, Major?”
“It’s a request from your favorite niece.”
“Then I’ll wear the blue dress.”
She did.
Rebecca sat in the front row while my parents and Madison occupied a private dining room forty miles away, celebrating a handbag sponsorship that had not yet been...
Part 1
"Sign the paper, Nora, or my security detail will drag you out into the rain."
My husband Julian’s voice was ice, cutting through the soft jazz filling our Greenwich penthouse. Surrounding us were fifty of Wall Street’s most elite executives, holding champagne flutes and watching the execution with sick fascination.
I’m Nora Sterling—or Nora Vance, as the public knew me...
Part 1
"Get your freezing hands off my front door, Sarah. You’re officially evicted."
The icy December air whipped across my face, stinging like broken glass. I stood on the porch of our Greenwich mansion, eight months pregnant, wearing thin cotton slippers while my husband, Derek O’Connell, shoved a stack of signed divorce papers against my chest.
My name is Sarah Sinclair....
Part 1
My name is Meredith, and for eleven agonizing years, I believed I was a broken woman. Right now, in the high-risk delivery wing of St. Jude Medical Center, my hand is locked in the steady, warm grip of Julian Ashworth—the tech billionaire who put my shattered life back together. Contractions are tearing through me in brutal waves. I’m...
Part 1
Code Blue echoed through the maternity wing of St. Catherine’s Hospital at 11:47 PM. I’m Meredith Hayes, thirty-two, seven centimeters dilated, gripping my husband Julian’s hand as an agonizing contraction tore through my abdomen. My twins were coming three weeks early.
Through the open mahogany doors of our VIP suite, heavy leather shoes squeaked frantically against the polished floor....
Part 2
The shredded halves of my shirt hung from my shoulders, exposing the entire expanse of my back to the scorching Virginia sun. Etched into my skin in vivid black and crimson ink was a massive, intricate emblem: a skeletal rattlesnake coiled tightly around a cracked human skull, with a shattered dagger driven vertically through the center.
It wasn't a...
"Hands on the hood! Move and I swear to God I’ll drop you right here!"
The ice-cold steel barrel of a Glock 17 pressed violently against the back of my neck before I could even finish hanging up the fuel nozzle.
I am Malcolm Vance. To the four million citizens of this state, I am their elected governor. But tonight, standing...
My name is Mason Reed, and I was sixteen when I realized my mother was the most dangerous person in any room. Lieutenant Carter had just publicly humiliated me for saying she was a Navy SEAL. But now, fifty elite military working dogs had flooded the Harborview High gym, waiting for her command.
"Since you asked for a demonstration," my...
