Julian’s heart slammed into his ribs like a sledgehammer. «Leo, stop!» he roared, turning his back on the barrel of Marcus’s gun and lunging toward the boarding ramp.

A deafening crack split the air as Marcus fired, the bullet tearing through the fleshy meat of Julian’s shoulder. The kinetic impact threw Julian forward, sending him crashing onto the salt-slicked timber of the dock. Crimson spread rapidly across his white linen shirt, but the burning agony in his arm was instantly eclipsed by the sharp, metallic click of the boat’s secondary ignition turning over.

«Leo!» Julian screamed, scrambling to his feet, his sight swimming in a haze of sudden shock.

Inside the yacht’s helm, the engine coughed, a deep mechanical rumble vibrating through the hull. Below the waterline, the black chemical slick caught the stray spark of an exposed marine battery. A subterranean thump echoed beneath the dock, and a sudden wave of heat washed over Julian’s face as a tongue of blue flame erupted from the stern, licking rapidly toward the main fuel reservoir.

Marcus stepped over Julian, his face twisted into a grotesque mask of victory, pointing the pistol directly between Julian’s eyes. «It’s too late,» Marcus sneered, his finger taking up the slack on the trigger. «We all burn together.»

Before Marcus could squeeze, a violent spray of wooden splinters exploded from the dock beneath his feet. Three rapid, muffled gunshots echoed from the tree line surrounding the marina. Marcus gasped, his eyes widening in shock as three bloody blossoms burst across the chest of his tailored suit. He stumbled backward, his gun clattering onto the dock, before overbalancing and plunging headfirst into the burning, fuel-slicked water.

Julian didn’t look back to see him sink. He forced his bleeding body up the ramp, bursting through the glass companionway doors into the air-conditioned cabin.

«Julian!» Leo cried out from the controls, his small hands still clutching the brass key in the ignition. «The alarms are going off! What’s happening?»

«Out! Now!» Julian barked, dragging the boy by his arm and hauling him toward the side deck.

They hit the fiberglass deck just as the yacht’s main engine bay detonated. A concussive blast of fire and shattered carbon fiber blew them off the starboard side, throwing both of them headlong into the deep water of the bay.

The shock of the freezing ocean water hit Julian like a physical blow, threatening to drag him down into the dark abyss. His shoulder throbbed with a white-hot intensity, but he kicked furiously, breaking the surface just in time to see his million-dollar vessel transform into a roaring funeral pyre of black smoke and twisted metal.

«Julian!» Leo’s head bobbed above the small swells ten yards away, his chest heaving as he treaded water.

«I’ve got you,» Julian gasped, fighting the tide to reach his nephew. He hooked his good arm under Leo’s chest, pulling the shivering boy toward the wooden pilings of the adjacent, unlit pier.

As they dragged themselves onto the slippery lower beam of the old fishing pier, out of sight from the burning wreck, a heavy black rib-boat cut quietly through the smoke. Its twin engines were silent, gliding on electrical power alone.

Julian pulled Leo flat against the wet wood, his breath hitched in his throat. Standing at the bow of the black vessel was a tall figure clad in a dark tactical jacket, holding a long-barreled sniper rifle with a glowing thermal scope—the same weapon that had just executed Marcus.

The figure lowered the rifle, stepping onto the edge of the vessel, and pulled back the hood of their jacket.

Julian’s blood ran colder than the ocean water.

Under the amber glow of the burning yacht stood Clara.

She was alive. The woman whose funeral Julian had attended six months ago, the woman whose death had ignited this entire war, stood twenty feet away, looking down at them with cold, calculated detachment.

«Clara…» Julian choked out, his voice barely a rasp over the crackle of the flames.

«You shouldn’t have dug so deep, Julian,» Clara said, her voice completely stripped of the warmth he had known for a decade. She didn’t offer a hand. She didn’t smile. «Marcus was an idiot, but he was right about one thing. The family estate was never meant to survive the audit.»

Leo stared at his mother, his lower lip trembling in pure, unadulterated terror. «Mommy?»

Clara’s eyes flicked to her son for a mere fraction of a second, completely void of maternal warmth. «Secure the boy,» she ordered calmly to the two armed men stepping up behind her on the deck. «Kill Julian.»

Before the mercenaries could raise their weapons, a bright searchlight snapped on from the high bluffs overlooking the marina, blinding everyone on the water. A sharp, mechanical voice boomed over a loudspeaker, piercing the night air:

«Interpol Tactical Task Force! Put down your weapons immediately! The perimeter is locked!»

Clara’s face hardened. She didn’t hesitate. She drew a small sidearm from her hip, aimed it directly at Julian’s chest, and pulled the trigger.