MY HUSBAND CHOSE HIS FAMILY AFTER THEY NEARLY KILLED OUR SON—THEN HE LEARNED HIS WIFE WAS A SECRET COLONEL

The moment my boots hit the hangar floor, the world shifted into pure tactical instinct.

Victoria's private mercenaries instantly turned, shouting commands in German and French, their weapons rising. Nathan and I cut our descent lines simultaneously.

I sprinted toward the flank of the ambulance, laying down a controlled burst of automatic fire that shattered the engine block of the nearest SUV, sending shrapnel tearing through the mercenaries' cover. Nathan moved with shocking agility, diving behind a row of metal freight crates and firing his Glock with textbook discipline, pinning down two gunmen attempting to flank me.

"Take the woman!" Victoria shrieked, backing toward the mobile airstairs of the Gulfstream. "Kill them! Kill them both!"

I didn't give them the chance.

I closed the distance in a low, vicious sprint. When an operative stepped out with an MP5, I slapped the barrel aside, smashed an elbow across his jaw, and slammed his head into the steel fender of the ambulance. Spinning around, I drew my sidearm and placed two lethal shots into the chest of the sniper positioned on the aircraft stairs.

Victoria panicked. She scrambled up the steps of the Gulfstream, screaming at the pilots to engage the jet turbines. The high-pitched whine of the jet engines began to scream through the hangar, filling the space with deafening roar and burning jet fuel exhaust.

Brooke Whitaker was still in her wheelchair, screaming hysterically as crossfire pinged off the concrete walls around her. She looked up and caught sight of Nathan, who was advancing through the smoke, his face smudged with soot, holding his weapon with terrifying resolve.

"Nathan!" Brooke shrieked, reaching out her trembling, manicured hands. "Nathan, my boy! Save me! Your sister was going to shoot me! Save your mother!"

Nathan stopped three feet in front of her wheelchair.

He looked down at the woman who had terrorized his youth, who had fed his son deadly allergens and smiled while the child gasped for breath, who had used every drop of her wealth to escape justice.

"You aren't my mother," Nathan said, his voice cutting through the deafening roar of the jet engines like a guillotine. "You're just a monster who ran out of victims."

Before Brooke could scream again, Nathan kicked the brake lock off her wheelchair and shoved her hard across the concrete floor, sending her spinning directly into the arriving phalanx of federal agents and military police who had just breached the perimeter gates behind us.