“Sign over your stock assignment and step aside so Julian’s real family can take your place,” my mother-in-law, Eleanor, said, sliding a thick black folder across the table toward me in the middle of dinner.

It was a rainy Tuesday afternoon. The sky over Brooklyn was the color of wet slate, and a cold autumn drizzle beat against the tall windows of the brownstone.

I was in the upstairs home office reviewing some trust documents with Marcus over a secure video call when the doorbell rang.

Ding-dong.

I glanced at the wall-mounted security monitor by my desk. The camera facing the front porch showed a delivery driver in a yellow rain poncho holding a large cardboard box.

“Hold that thought, Marcus,” I said into my headset. “I’ll be right back.”

“Take your time, Evelyn,” Marcus replied from his Manhattan office.

I walked down the grand wooden staircase, hurried across the foyer, and unlocked the heavy front door, pulling it open to greet the delivery driver.

Except it wasn't a delivery driver.

The yellow rain poncho was thrown back, revealing Renata’s grinning, manic face. And standing right beside her on the porch, gripping Nora’s small upper arm with terrifying, vice-like cruelty, was Eleanor.

My blood ran instantly ice cold.

“Nora!” I screamed, lunging forward out the doorway.

Before I could cross the threshold, Renata slammed her foot against the heavy oak door, blocking my path, while Eleanor dragged a sobbing, terrified Nora down the porch steps toward a waiting black sedan idling at the curb.

“Get away from my daughter!” I shrieked, throwing my entire weight against the door to push past Renata.

Renata grabbed me by the lapels of my sweater, shoving me backward into the foyer. For a thirty-something socialite, she possessed a desperate, ugly strength fueled by sheer malice.

“You stay right there, Evelyn!” Renata hissed, spitting the words into my face. “You want to play hardball? You want to ruin our lives? Let’s see how you like it when your precious little girl learns what happens when you cross a Vance!”

I managed to wrench myself free, swinging my arm hard and catching Renata square across the jaw with the back of my hand. She staggered backward, stumbling off the porch and hitting the wet pavement with a sharp cry.

I sprinted down the steps into the pouring rain, ignoring the cold water soaking through my clothes, screaming my daughter’s name.

“Nora! Nora!”

The black sedan’s tires squealed against the asphalt as it peeled away from the curb, kicking up a dirty wave of rainwater across the street.

I stood in the middle of the Brooklyn avenue, chest heaving, rain plastering my hair to my face, staring after the retreating taillights of the car carrying my five-year-old child.

My phone was still in my pocket. My hands were shaking so violently I dropped it twice before managing to unlock the screen.

I didn't call the police. Police paperwork took hours, and every second those monsters had my daughter was a lifetime.

Instead, I dialed a private, unlisted number that connected directly to the head of New York’s elite tactical surveillance and private security firm—a man named Viktor Vance (no relation to Julian, thank God), who owed my grandfather a debt he had spent twenty years waiting to repay.

“Viktor,” I said, my voice shaking with a terrifying, incandescent rage that burned hotter than any fire.

“Mrs. Vance?” Viktor answered immediately, his voice deep and razor-sharp. “What’s wrong?”

“Eleanor and Renata just abducted my daughter from my front porch,” I said, every word dripping with lethal precision. “I want every tracking satellite, every traffic camera, and every operative you have in the tri-state area activated right now.”

“Consider it done,” Viktor replied without a second hesitation. “Where are they heading?”