Page 42 of Deadly Hope (Hope Landing: New Recruits #2)

From their position in the darkened office across the hall, Olivia shuddered, her throat tight. James’s murderer was less than twenty feet away.

Deke pulled up the surveillance feed on his tablet and passed it to Olivia.

The changes in Driscoll’s appearance were striking. The Armani suit—likely tailored three months ago based on their intel—hung loose across his shoulders. His collar gaped where his neck had thinned.

Olivia’s hands wanted to shake. This man, this monster who’d ordered her brother’s death, looked so ... ordinary. Almost fragile.

Her brother’s voice echoed in her memory. “Sometimes the most dangerous people look the most normal, Liv.” She’d give anything to tell James he was right.

“He’s lost at least twenty pounds since those personnel photos.” She gripped the tablet harder, channeling everything into analysis. “Classic stress response, but this severe?”

“That’s not good?” Axel’s voice was low beside her. She caught his subtle shift closer—support without coddling .

“It’s telling.” From the feed, she watched Driscoll pause and look around his office, his fingers compulsively adjusting his tie.

One-two-three tugs, pause, repeat. “That’s new.

A control ritual—he’s trying to self-regulate.

” Just like James used to tap his fingers when stressed.

The parallel made bile rise in her throat.

Through their carefully placed cameras, she studied his eyes as he started to panic.

There was something frantic in their movement, something raw that made her pulse quicken.

Not from fear—from anticipation. After tonight, he’d answer for everything.

Every life he’d destroyed. Every family he’d torn apart.

They watched in tense silence as he froze, staring at his desk.

Olivia held her breath as she catalogued every movement he made, every micro-expression, with the precision James had taught her. The same attention to detail that had made him such a good investigator. That had ultimately gotten him killed.

But instead of the careful, paranoid search they’d anticipated, Driscoll exploded into motion.

He rifled through papers. Yanked drawers open.

Found the USB, and hurled it across the room with a wordless snarl.

The violence of it made her flinch—not from fear, but recognition.

She’d seen this kind of rage before, in suspects about to break.

“That’s not right,” she said sharply, shoving down memories of other interrogations, other cases. “His profile suggested secretive paranoia, not?—”

Driscoll was already pulling out his phone, punching numbers with shaking fingers. The same fingers that had likely signed James’s death warrant.

“Head’s up,” Kenji reported through their comms. His tone changed. “He’s not calling building security. This is a private number, routing through ... multiple shells? ”

“Let me hear it,” Axel ordered, and Olivia caught his quick glance in her direction. Checking on her. She gave him a slight nod. She was fine. She had to be fine.

A voice crackled through their earpieces. “Team activated. Ten minutes to your location, sir.”

“I want full tactical response,” Driscoll snapped. The tremor in his voice couldn’t disguise the steel beneath it. “They’re here. They’re already here.”

Private security. A trap. Ice slid down her spine as Kenji’s data populated Deke’s tablet. “Those aren’t regular security guards he’s calling,” Kenji said. “They are ex-military contractors. Heavy hitters.”

“Bringing in mercenaries wasn’t in his psychological profile,” Axel said quietly.

“No,” Olivia agreed, watching Driscoll tear through his office with frightening purpose.

Her brother’s voice echoed in her head. “When cornered, a desperate man becomes unpredictable.” She turned to Axel, letting him see past her professional mask to the concern beneath.

“I badly underestimated his mental state. And I have a feeling we’re about to find out exactly what that means. ”

Driscoll snatched his laptop, pounding furiously at the keyboard. Through their feed, Olivia tracked each movement, her training warring with the urge to burst in there, to confront him, to make him say James’s name.

“He’s deleting files,” Voss reported, her Midwest accent uncharacteristically clipped. “Accessing encrypted accounts. Exactly to plan, so far.”

“Not just deleting.” Olivia leaned closer to the tablet, recognizing the methodical precision beneath his frantic energy. The same precision that had covered James’s murder so thoroughly it had been ruled a suicide.

“Kenji?” Axel’s voice was taut .

“He’s transferring everything to a remote server. Give me two minutes to?—”

“We don’t have two minutes.” Her pulse spiked as Driscoll pulled something from his desk—a small device she didn’t recognize.

But his body language was clear: the slight squared shoulders of someone about to take irreversible action.

The same tell she’d seen in cornered suspects moments before they reached for a weapon. “He’s going to trigger something. Now.”

“I’m moving in,” Axel announced.

As Axel jumped up, heading for the hallway, Voss’s hand slipped into her jacket pocket. The motion was so smooth, so casual, Olivia almost missed it. Almost.

They burst into Driscoll’s office, Voss, Deke, and Axel ahead of her, weapons drawn.

Driscoll looked up. Olivia’s blood ran cold.

His face had transformed. No surprise. No fear. Just the ghost of a smile playing at his lips. The same smile she’d seen in photos of him at charity events, at board meetings. At a gala he attended the very night her brother died.

“Welcome,” Driscoll said softly.

The device in his hand blinked green. Behind them, the door clicked shut.

Deke crumpled suddenly, his handgun clattering to the floor, as Voss shoved her hand back in her pocket. The hypodermic dart was so small it was barely visible against the big man’s neck.

“You’re making a mistake,” Axel started to say, but Voss was already moving, her weapon trained on him with the practiced ease of someone who’d been waiting for precisely this moment.

“Drop it,” she ordered. “Unless you want to join your friend on the floor.”

Driscoll’s eyes flickered to Olivia. “Dr. Kane. Your psychological assessment was ... almost accurate. Though I suppose even the best profile is only as good as the information feeding it.” He said her name like he knew her, like he’d been expecting her.

Like James’s sister was exactly who he’d been waiting for.

Something in his tone made her skin crawl. She rapidly reassessed his markers. The weight loss was real, the anxiety genuine. But underneath ... “You wanted us to think you were breaking down.”

His smile widened. “Oh, I am breaking down. That’s what makes this so perfect. When the bodies are found, who wouldn’t believe the unstable operative finally snapped?”

“You know so much about us,” she said carefully, watching Voss’s precise movements, remembering James’s last warning about trust. “More than you should.”

“Indeed.” Driscoll set the device down with deliberate care. “Information is king.”

“And he pays well for it,” Voss said, her eyes cold.