Page 29 of Stealthy Seduction (SEAL Team Blackout Charlie #5)

S teele swiped the keys to the fastest vehicle Blackout had, and he never looked back.

The car cut through New York traffic like a blade, and Steele’s knuckles whitened on the steering wheel as Dante’s voice crackled through his earpiece giving real-time intelligence updates.

“Drone’s in position over the pier.”

Steele could almost see Dante hunched over his laptop, brows lowered in concentration.

“I’ve got eyes on the target location. Northwest corner of Pier 47.”

“Is she in a warehouse?” His throat clamped on the words. Too many things went sideways in warehouses. Shots went wild; people took hits from ricochets.

“No,” Dante said so slowly that he might think his teammate was mocking his Southern drawl. “Jesus, Steele—I can see her. She’s in a shipping container.”

Steele’s heart hammered against his ribs. For a moment, he couldn’t catch his breath to speak. Finally, he grated out, “Status?”

“She’s alive. Sitting in what looks like a modified shipping container. Hands are bound.”

“Look at her thumb. Is it tucked inside her fist?”

“Yeah, it’s tucked. But Steele…” Dante’s voice carried a note of grim recognition. “The guy with her—it’s not one of Cipher’s lackeys. It’s fucking Cipher himself. Holy shit, man. We’re looking at Daniel Sheen in the flesh.”

The confirmation slammed into Steele like a physical blow. His blood chilled, as if evil had stroked a finger through his veins. Then it heated in a flashing scald that left his face burning.

Bad enough that Izzy had been lured in, but knowing she was face-to-face with the architect of so much death and destruction made his vision blur with rage.

He swallowed against the painful brick in his throat, and his voice sounded as a rough rasp. “How’s she look?”

“Can’t see her face well. She’s turned away. But I can see her profile. Looks like she’s talking.” Several beats of silence passed. At last, Dante said, “I can’t believe this. She’s actually talking to him. Oh…fuck.”

“What happened!” He stomped the gas pedal to the floor.

“She turned her head. That look on her face. I’ve seen it before—Steele, she’s interviewing him.”

Despite everything, Steele felt a surge of fierce pride. Even in captivity, even facing a monster who’d orchestrated the deaths of countless innocent people, Izzy was being Izzy—asking questions, seeking truth.

Refusing to be cowed.

“The bastard’s enjoying it,” Dante continued. “Cold as ice, completely relaxed. This guy’s a stone-cold psychopath, Steele.”

Which meant Cipher wouldn’t hesitate to kill her the second he thought they were closing in.

Steele took a hard right onto the highway, the city lights blurring past as he pushed the vehicle to its limits. “I need details. What’s my best approach?”

Dante didn’t waste a second. “There’s a warehouse complex about two hundred meters east of the container yard. Five-story brick building, flat roof with clear sight lines to the target. If you’re going to take a shot, that’s your best bet.”

“Range?”

“Uh… Four hundred thirty meters, give or take. Moderate crosswind from the northwest. You’ll have to account for the harbor breeze, but it’s doable.”

Steele’s mind shifted into the cold, analytical state that had kept him alive through hundreds of operations. Four hundred thirty meters was well within his capabilities with his sniper rifle.

One shot, clean and precise, and this nightmare would be over.

As he pulled into the industrial complex surrounding the warehouse, his commanding officer’s voice exploded through his earpiece.

“Steele, where the hell are you? GPS shows you’re nowhere near base.”

Fuck. The last thing he needed.

“I’m handling it, Con.”

“You’re ordered to stand down and return to base immediately. That’s a direct order.”

“Negative.” The word came out flat, final. “I’m going to get her back.”

“Goddamn it, Steele! You’re compromising the entire operation. This is what Cipher wants—he’s using her as bait to draw us into a trap.”

“Maybe. But I’m not walking away.”

There was a pause, then Con’s voice came back harder than Steele had ever heard it. “You do this, you’re on your own. No backup, no extraction, no support. You understand that?”

“Copy that.”

“And if you get killed out there, I’m going to personally explain to Izzy why her boyfriend decided to throw away his life on a suicide mission instead of trusting his team.”

The line went dead.

Steele sat in the vehicle for precisely three seconds, letting the importance of his decision settle on his shoulders.

He was abandoning everything he’d sworn to uphold as a Navy SEAL.

His career was over. His relationship with his team might be irreparable.

And Con was right—this could very well be a suicide mission.

But the alternative—leaving Izzy in the hands of a man who’d already killed dozens of people—wasn’t an option he could live with.

“Dante,” he said quietly into his comm. “You still with me?”

“Where else would I be?” came the immediate reply.

He blew out a heavy breath of dread about what would come after…and what would come now.

The car engine screamed as he pushed it harder, weaving in and out of traffic, passing cars at a speed that, growing up in the South, he’d call Mach Jesus. When you grabbed your balls and said a prayer that you’d live to see another sunrise.

“Approaching the pier. I’ve got eyes on the warehouse. What’s the best route to the roof?”

Dante was his lifeline. He gave him the coordinates and Steele slowed the vehicle on the approach, coming in as quiet as possible.

With fluid movements, he slipped out of the car. The click of the door shutting was drowned by the slosh of water against the pier supports.

The sun had been swallowed by thick clouds. A few noises came from far down the pier as a few laborers started their shifts.

He grabbed the rifle, moving with the fluid efficiency of his years as a SEAL. The warehouse’s fire escape was rusted but solid, and he scaled it quickly, his boots silent on the metal rungs despite his haste.

The roof offered what Dante had promised—clear sight lines across the industrial waterfront to the shipping container yard. Through his scope, he could see the partially open container in the northwest corner. Thankfully, not all of the interior was cast in shadow.

“I’m in position,” he reported, settling into a prone shooting position.

“Copy that. Adjusting drone position for better angles. Steele, they’re still talking. She’s tense…but so is he. I can’t tell who’s asking the questions.”

Steele adjusted his scope’s magnification, and suddenly Izzy’s face filled his field of vision.

Christ. His heart exploded with emotion, pangs of love bursting in sync with the terror of her being in there with a cold-hearted killer.

Barely breathing, he stared at her. She was pale but alert, her posture straight despite having her hands bound, a pose he knew firsthand made your muscles scream in pain, but she didn’t show it.

Even from this distance, he could see the intelligence in her eyes, the way she was studying Cipher like he was a puzzle to be solved.

“She’s trying to understand him,” Steele murmured.

“What?”

“She’s doing what she does best—getting inside the story, figuring out what makes him tick. Even now, even like this, she’s still a journalist.”

The crosshairs centered on Daniel Sheen’s head.

From this angle, Steele had a clean shot.

One squeeze of the trigger, and the man responsible for Echo team’s deaths, for at least three major terrorist attacks and maybe a few they hadn’t yet uncovered the truth of, for the terror he rained down on Times Square…

for everything that had torn Izzy’s life apart… would be gone.

But Cipher was sitting close to Izzy—close enough that any movement, even a flinch, could put her in danger.

“Wind’s picking up,” Dante reported. “Gusting to about eight knots from the northwest. You’ll need to compensate.”

Steele made the adjustment, his heart rate slow and controlled. This was what he’d trained for, what he’d done in hostile territory from Afghanistan to Syria. One shot, one kill, mission accomplished.

“Wait!” Dante’s voice carried sudden urgency. “Movement in the container. Cipher’s standing up, he’s—shit, Steele, he’s got a weapon.”

Through the scope, Steele watched Daniel Sheen rise from his chair, something metallic glinting in his hand. A pistol, held casually at his side as he paced around Izzy’s chair like a predator circling prey.

Steele’s finger found the trigger, muscle memory taking over as his breathing slowed to the deliberate rhythm he’d perfected over years of precision shooting. The crosshairs tracked Cipher’s movement, waiting for the perfect moment when Izzy would be completely clear of the line of fire.

“Steele,” Dante’s voice was tight with tension. “Whatever you’re going to do, you need to do it now. This bastard’s working himself up to something, and I don’t think it’s going to end well for Izzy.”

Time seemed to slow as Steele watched Cipher raise the pistol, pointing it directly at the woman he loved. Through his scope, he saw Izzy’s face clearly—frightened but defiant, meeting her captor’s gaze without flinching.

She was magnificent.

Even facing death, she refused to give this monster the satisfaction of seeing her break.

“I love you too,” Steele whispered, knowing she couldn’t hear him but needing to say the words anyway.

* * * * *

“You could have built something beautiful.” Izzy’s voice carried the weight of genuine conviction despite facing a man holding a gun he fully intended to use on her.

“With your intelligence, your resources? Your obvious ability to coordinate complex operations? You could have created a foundation in your mother’s name, funded medical clinics all over the world. Saved thousands of lives. Instead, you chose destruction.”