Page 14 of Bride of Vengeance

Too bad for them. Ghost doesn't get caught.

He gets results.

Movement in my peripheral vision catches my attention - a figure emerging from the darkness near Pier 19. Female, average height, dark hair visible under a baseball cap pulled low. She moves with the cautious confidence of someone trained in tactical situations but smart enough to be afraid.

There's my little wolf.

Mariana approaches the designated meeting point with her weapon drawn but not visible, scanning for threats while trying to appear casual. Even from a distance, I can see the tension in her shoulders, the way she favors her right side where her backup gun is holstered.

She's prepared for violence but hoping for answers.

You'll get both tonight.

I step out of the shadows when she's twenty feet away, hands visible but ready to move. The look of relief and terror that crosses her face when she sees me is worth every risk I'm taking.

"So it’s really you. You came," she says, and her voice carries surprise and gratitude in equal measure.

"I keep my promises, little wolf."

"Even when keeping them might get you killed?"

"Even so."

We stand facing each other in the yellow glow of streetlights, two people who should be enemies but find themselves on the same side of a war neither of us chose.

"The surveillance," she says. "My apartment was completely compromised."

"Harrison's work. He's been watching you for months, using your investigation to build credibility for fake Ghost kills while positioning you to take the fall when he needed a scapegoat."

"And Orlov?"

"Killed by Pavel Volkov's people. The shot placement is wrong, the staging is amateur, and they left shell casings behind. Whoever did it was trying to imitate me but they did it miserably wrong."

She processes this information with the quick analytical mind that made her such an effective hunter. "So you didn't kill him."

"I don't kill federal witnesses. Why would a ghost want to attract that kind of attention?"

"Then why are you here? Why risk exposure to help me?"

The question hangs between us like a challenge. I could give her the practical answer—that she's useful, that clearing my name serves my interests, that family loyalty requires protecting Mila's federal contact.

Instead, I give her the truth.

"Because you're just another pawn on a board you don't belong on. Because you chose to trust me, or at least you're starting to realize that I'm telling the truth, and you want that truth. Andbecause we have a common enemy. And someone needs to stop Pavel before he destroys everything good people have built."

"Pavel?"

"Pavel Volkov. The man who survived the explosion that was supposed to kill him three years ago. The man who's spent years rebuilding himself and planning revenge against everyone who destroyed his family's empire."

Her eyes widen as pieces fall into place. "The explosion... that was real?"

"Very real. But Pavel is harder to kill than we thought. He's been operating from the shadows, using Harrison's corruption network to access federal resources while building toward tonight."

"What happens tonight?"

"Pavel eliminates Ghost and the FBI agent hunting him. Public execution, maximum visibility, perfect closure to cases that have been embarrassing federal law enforcement for years, but that are also their cover, and the bridge to the next phase of their operation."

"A trap."