Cora Whitaker had stitched up gunshot wounds before, but never on a man who had just put a bullet in someone else.

The next morning, the adrenaline was gone, leaving only the cold reality of her situation.

Cora knew she couldn't keep running blind. If she was a pawn in a game between Julian Voss and his enemies, she needed to know who had placed her on the board in the first place.

She skipped her morning shift at the hospital and took the bus to a run-down residential motel near the industrial docks of Bay Ridge.

Room 114 smelled of stale tobacco and damp carpet.

When Cora knocked, the door opened an inch, held by a rusty chain guard. A bloodshot eye peered out.

"Cora?" Walter Whitaker’s voice was raspy, laced with terror. "What are you doing here? I told you not to come!"

"Open the door, Dad," Cora said coldly. "Or I call the police and tell them where to find you."

The chain rattled, and the door swung open.

Walter Whitaker looked ten years older than his fifty-two years. His clothes were stained, his hands trembled violently, and he reeked of cheap gin. He looked like a man waiting for his own execution.

Cora stepped into the room, shutting the door behind her. "Who is Felix working for?"

Walter flinched, stepping back toward the sagging mattress. "I don't know what you're talking about, sweetheart—"

"Don't lie to me!" Cora screamed, her voice cracking. "I almost got dragged into a van outside my hospital last night! A man named Julian Voss broke into my apartment! People are trying to kill me, Dad! Tell me the truth!"

Walter collapsed onto the bed, burying his face in his stained hands. He began to weep—pathetic, quiet sobs of a man who had ruined everything he ever touched.

"I didn't have a choice, Cora," Walter sobbed. "I owed eighty grand. I was in deep. They were going to break my legs, then they said they'd come after you."

"Who?" Cora demanded, grabbing his shoulders and shaking him. "Who holds the debt?"

"The Drescos," Walter whispered, his voice shaking with absolute terror. "Marco Dresco. Felix doesn't work for a loan shark, Cora. He works for Marco."

Cora felt the room spin. The Dresco family was the chief rival to Julian Voss’s empire—a syndicate known for extreme violence and ruthless expansion.

"Why did Felix want me at that auction?" Cora asked, connecting the horrific dots in her mind. "Why me?"

"It wasn't an accident," Walter confessed, looking up with red, tear-streaked eyes. "Felix told me if I got you into that room, wearing a specific dress, carrying drinks near Voss's private table... my debt would be erased. They knew Voss was paranoid. They knew he was attending the auction without his usual security detail. They were planning an ambush, Cora!"

"They used me as bait," Cora whispered, the horrific truth settling into her bones. "They placed me next to Julian so his attention would be divided. They wanted him distracted so their shooter could take a clean shot."

"They didn't think you'd survive the crossfire," Walter wept. "I'm sorry, Cora. I'm so sorry. I thought you'd just drop the tray and run when the shooting started!"

Cora pulled her hands away from her father as if he were made of poison. The man who was supposed to protect her had sold her to a cartel of murderers as a disposable human decoy for eighty thousand dollars.

"Stay away from me, Walter," Cora said, her voice dropping to an icy whisper that cut deeper than any scream. "If I survive this... I never want to see your face again."

She turned and walked out of the motel room, ignoring her father’s desperate cries behind her.

She walked out into the freezing autumn drizzle, her head spinning. She wasn't just an innocent bystander who had gotten caught in the crossfire. She was the epicenter of a mob war.

She pulled her thin coat tighter around her shivering frame and began walking back toward the subway station.

As she crossed the intersection, a dark silver SUV pulled up smoothly beside the curb. The tinted rear window rolled down half an inch.

"Get in, Miss Whitaker," Tomas’s voice called from the front seat. "Before Marco Dresco’s scouts spot you on the street camera."

Cora hesitated for only a second. She had nowhere else to go. She opened the door and climbed into the leather interior of the armored vehicle.

Sitting in the back seat, staring out the window at the rain, was Julian Voss.

He didn't look at her as the car pulled away from the curb. He was dressed in a dark charcoal suit, holding an encrypted tablet in his lap.

"You visited your father," Julian stated flatly, his dark eyes remaining fixed on the screen. "Foolish. We had three teams watching that motel. If Marco’s men had moved on him while you were inside, you would be in a basement in Queens right now."

"He sold me," Cora said quietly, staring straight ahead. "My own father sold me to Marco Dresco as bait."

Julian paused, his long fingers hovering over the tablet screen. He slowly turned his head to look at her.

For the first time, the cold, impenetrable mask he wore slid away, revealing a flash of profound, dark understanding. He knew what it felt like to be betrayed by the people who were supposed to love you. He had watched his sister die because the world deemed her disposable.

"In our world," Julian said, his voice dropping to a low, quiet hum, "family is usually the first knife in your back."

"I don't belong in your world," Cora said, a tear finally slipping down her cheek. "I just want my life back."

"Your old life is dead, Cora," Julian said gently—a tone so unexpectedly soft it made her heart ache. "Marco knows who you are now. He thinks you're my weakness. As long as he breathes, you will never be safe."

"Then what am I supposed to do?" she choked out.