Page 58 of The Maverick

She slammed her elbow into his gut, then jabbed the keypad: 1-4-2-7. The code for her manuscript folder. If he’d really read everything, it would be poetic.

The lock released. Vanessa yanked the door open and hurled herself through, slamming it behind her and twisting the bolt shut.

Miles roared on the other side, pounding his fist against the metal.

Vanessa collapsed to her knees, gasping. The hallway beyond the dungeon was narrow and choked with shadows, the dim green glow of an exit sign pulsing faintly down the corridor. Vanessa staggered upright, wiping blood from her lip with the back of her hand. Her breath came ragged and loud in the silence, but she moved. Barefoot, legs shaking, throat dry—she moved.

Each step was blind momentum. A surge of instinct. A promise to herself she wasn’t going to die down there, bound in someone else’s delusion.

She rounded the corner… and froze. Miles was waiting.

He didn’t speak. His eyes were calm. Focused. Like he’d planned for this. The taser in his hand lit with a quiet crackle—almost soft.

“No…” she whispered, turning and trying to retreat, but he was already moving.

The jolt hit her center-mass. Her scream caught mid-breath as electricity ripped through her limbs. Her knees buckled, body collapsing before her mind could register the pain. The floor slammed into her side, cold concrete stealing the last of her breath. She twitched once. Tried to crawl. Tried to fight.

Miles crouched beside her, voice low and almost gentle. “You almost ruined it.”

Her mouth worked, but no sound came.

He brushed a hand through her hair, like a lover instead of a monster. “But I’ll forgive you. You’ll understand when you wake up. You’ll see this was always how it had to end.”

Darkness closed in fast. The hallway blurred, his face the last thing she saw before the black took her.

But even as her vision faded, even as her body shut down, one thought burned steadily behind her eyes—bright and defiant:Hawke will find me. And when he does… Miles is dead.

14

HAWKE

The tracking device concealed in Vanessa’s clothes pinged just south of San Antonio.

Hawke stood in front of the portable ops table they’d set up in the Silver Spur’s tactical van, staring at the screen like it owed him blood. A red dot pulsed on the map overlay—too slow for a moving vehicle, too sporadic for a decoy.

Stationary. Which meant someone had gotten comfortable.

Reed leaned over his shoulder, fingers dancing across the keyboard as he pulled up matching traffic feeds from surrounding intersections. “Three compounds within a quarter mile. Only one with active storage units and a private loading dock. Corner of Ryland and 83rd.”

“Cameras?” Hawke asked.

“Two on the front gate, but they’re analog. No cloud sync. Means someone wanted to keep this place off-grid.”

“Too bad for him,” Hawke muttered.

Reed tapped one last key. “Got a shadow on satellite three hours ago—six foot, light jacket, matches Miles’s build. Walked in with a heavy duffel and didn’t walk out.”

Hawke straightened. “He’s still inside.”

“Far as we can tell,” Gavin confirmed from across the van. “We’re prepping for a silent breach. No sirens, no lights.”

Jesse tossed a vest to the bench. “We run this clean, Hawke. In, out, quiet.”

“No,” Hawke said, voice cutting through the room like steel. “You stay back. I’m going in alone.”

Gavin’s brows rose. “This guy nearly beat four members of our team unconscious.”

“And he won’t walk out of that unit if he lays one more hand on her,” Hawke said flatly. “I go in quiet. If I don’t come out in fifteen minutes, you breach.”

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