Chapter 4
The text message disappeared from my lock screen as another notification popped up: an alert from my home security system.
*Front Door Camera - Motion Detected at 2:14 PM.*
I tapped the screen with a thumb that felt completely numb. The live feed loaded, buffering for two agonizing seconds before displaying the porch of our two-story craftsman house in Colorado Springs.
Standing on the front steps was a man in a navy windbreaker and baseball cap. He didn't knock. He produced a brass key, inserted it smoothly into the deadbolt, and opened my front door. Behind him, another man carrying heavy black duffel bags stepped inside.
They were in my house.
"Patricia," I said, my voice dropping an octave, completely devoid of emotion. "Keep Hannah here. Lock the truck doors."
"Chris, what's wrong?" Patricia leaned forward between the front bucket seats, her face tight with alarm. "What did the phone say?"
"Someone just entered the house," I told her, throwing the truck into drive and swinging back onto the highway, tires kicking up gravel. "Brenda wired Hannah’s trust fund out of the bank two days ago. And her people are currently ransacking our home."
Patricia gasped, clapping a hand over her mouth to keep from crying out and waking Hannah. "My God, Chris. How could she do this? She’s an elementary school guidance counselor!"
"No," I said, cold realization setting in like frost on a cockpit canopy. "She played one. We don't know who the hell she is."
I dialed the phone through the steering wheel interface. The line rang twice before a familiar, gravelly voice picked up.
"Miller," Captain Vance answered. "Where are you? Are you and Hannah safe?"
"David, I have a code red at my residence," I said, dropping the casual formalities. "Two unidentified men just made unauthorized entry into my home using a key. Brenda cleaned out Hannah’s inheritance two days ago—nearly three hundred grand transferred to a shell company run by her brother. I need the Springs Police Department rolling to my address immediately, and I need CID or base legal involved."
There was a half-second pause on the other end, the sharp intake of an officer processing a combat update.
"I'm on it," Vance said without hesitation. "I’m ten minutes behind you on 115 with Lieutenant Harris and Chief Martinez. I'll dispatch civilian dispatch and request high-priority response. Miller—do not clear that house alone. Wait for backup."
"Understood, sir," I lied.
I hung up, pressing the pedal until the V8 engine roared, pushing eighty-five miles per hour up the incline toward the Broadmoor foothills.
Fifteen minutes later, I pulled onto our quiet, tree-lined street. It was an upscale neighborhood, peaceful and suburban, the kind of place where kids rode bicycles and neighbors left their garage doors open. But parked at the curb directly in front of my driveway was an unmarked gray Ford Explorer with dark tinted windows.
The front door of my house stood wide open.
I pulled into the neighbor’s driveway two houses down, killed the engine, and turned back to Patricia.
"Take the keys. If I’m not back at this truck in five minutes, or if you hear gunshots, you put this vehicle in reverse and you drive straight through the gate at Fort Carson. You don't stop for red lights. You go straight to the military police checkpoint. Do you hear me?"
Patricia’s eyes filled with tears, but she nodded fiercely. "Be careful, Chris. Please."
I reached under the driver's seat, pressing the biometric thumbprint reader on the locked steel lockbox bolted to the chassis. The lid popped open. Inside lay my service sidearm, a Sig Sauer P320, along with two full magazines of 9mm hollow points. I checked the chamber, seated the magazine with a solid click, and tucked the weapon into the waistband of my trousers, concealed beneath the tailored jacket of my dress whites.
I stepped out into the crisp mountain air, shutting the truck door silently.
Approaching the house from the blind side of the garage, I kept low, utilizing the manicured juniper bushes for cover. Through the bay window of my home office on the ground floor, I could see drawers being yanked open and papers fluttering to the hardwood floor.
They weren't looking for jewelry or electronics.
They were searching for documents.
I moved silently up the front steps, stepping through the entryway onto the oak flooring. The living room was trashed. Photo frames had been knocked from the mantle—the glass on a portrait of Rebecca holding Hannah as a newborn was shattered, the picture tossed face down on the rug.
From the hallway leading to the basement, I heard voices.
"Did you find the ledger?" a deep voice asked.
"Not yet," a second voice replied from the study. "Lawson said it was kept in the false bottom of the antique secretary desk. The one that belonged to the dead wife."
"Hurry the hell up. The sister said the commander left the venue twenty minutes ago. We don't want a firefight with active-duty Navy."
I stepped into the doorway of the study.
The man in the navy windbreaker was bent over Rebecca’s mahogany roll-top desk, a crowbar wedged into the delicate woodwork of the lower cabinet. The second man, younger and stockier, was pulling hard drives out of my desktop tower.
"Looking for something?" I asked.
Both men whipped around instantly. The man with the crowbar reached toward his jacket pocket, but the click of my Sig Sauer locking back halted him mid-motion.
"Hands where I can see them," I said, voice cold, dead, and lethal. "Both of you. Interlock your fingers behind your heads and drop to your knees."
The man with the crowbar glared at me. "You don't want to do this, Commander. You're out of your depth."
"Knees. Now," I repeated, closing the distance by two paces, the barrel leveled squarely between his eyes.
He hesitated, saw the complete lack of fear in my eyes, and slowly sank to the hardwood. The younger man followed suit immediately, hands trembling over his ball cap.
"Who sent you?" I asked. "Bradley? Or Brenda?"
Before the man could answer, the screen of the smashed laptop on the desk flickered to life. A VoIP call had been initiated remotely. The speakers crackled, and Brenda’s voice filled the room, chillingly calm, completely devoid of the hysterical tears she had wept at the resort.
"Hello, Christopher," she purred through the speaker. "I see you made it home faster than expected."
I kept my weapon trained on the two intruders. "Where is the money, Brenda?"
"The money is safe in an offshore account you’ll never touch," she answered, a cruel, mocking laugh humming through the speakers. "And don't bother interrogating those two. They're just subcontractors. You see, Chris, you were never the target. Your stupid little Navy salary certainly wasn't. We wanted what Rebecca left behind."
"Rebecca had nothing to do with you," I growled.
May you like
"That's where you're wrong, darling," Brenda whispered. "Rebecca’s father didn't just appraise antique art. He stole something thirty years ago that belonged to the Lawson family. And Rebecca hid the provenance inside that desk. Now... you have twenty-four hours to hand over the key to the Denver safe deposit box. If you don't, I won't just keep Hannah's trust fund. I'll make sure the Navy learns all about the classified files currently sitting on your hard drive."
***
