You have exactly thirty minutes,” I said, keeping my voice utterly level. “To pack up your blue painter's tape

For three days, the perimeter remained undisturbed.

My father secured a temporary financial freeze through the county family court, effectively locking my mother out of any further attempts to liquidate their joint assets. Chase’s parents, horrified by the scale of the financial fraud their son had orchestrated, formally removed their name from his legal defense and refused to post a single dime for his civil debts.

Harper, faced with the cold reality of Chase’s bankruptcy, had retreated into self-preservation mode, staying in the Sterlings’ pool house while her attorneys began drafting emergency paperwork to protect whatever remaining assets she held in her personal name.

Chase was completely alone. He was broke, facing imminent indictment, and locked out of every door in the county.

That made him exceptionally dangerous.

It was 2:40 on a Thursday morning when the perimeter security alert chimed softly on my bedside nightstand.

I didn't wake up startled; six years of shipboard alerts had trained me to snap into full operational awareness in an instant. I rolled out of bed, slipped into dark tactical pants and boots, and pulled up the encrypted security feed on my phone.

Camera Three—covering the rear tree line where my property met the saltwater marsh—showed a dark figure cutting through the high reeds.

He wore a dark hooded sweatshirt, work boots, and heavy work gloves. In his right hand, he carried a heavy, five-gallon red plastic container.

A gas can.

My heart rate jumped, not with panic, but with the cold, precise adrenaline of combat readiness.

Chase hadn’t come to argue. He hadn't come to apologize. In his warped, narcissistic logic, if my house didn't exist, the verified address on the federal loan wouldn't be an issue—or worse, an insurance payout on an arson might create the chaos he needed to flee the state.

I didn't run out the front door.

I unlocked the gun safe in my closet, retrieved my service-issue Remington 870 shotgun, racked a round of non-lethal heavy beanbag rounds into the chamber, and moved down the rear utility stairs without making a single sound.

Outside, the heavy night air smelled of salt and decaying marsh grass.

Chase reached the wooden perimeter of my detached garage, unscrewing the yellow plastic nozzle of the fuel container. His breathing was loud, ragged, and smelling heavily of cheap whiskey. He sloshed the first wave of gasoline against the untreated cedar siding of the storage shed.

“Drop the container, Chase,” I spoke from the shadows of the covered breezeway, eight yards away.

Chase jumped violently, dropping the gas can with a heavy splash against the turf. He spun around, pulling a long steel prybar from the pocket of his hoodie, holding it up like a club.

“You ruined my life!” he hissed, his eyes bloodshot, his face gaunt and twitching in the moonlight. “I had everything lined up! Three hundred and fifty thousand! We were going to buy the waterfront spec house in Fairhope! I was going to pay everything back!”

“You were going to prison, Chase,” I said, keeping the shotgun leveled squarely at his center mass. “And now you’re going there tonight.”

“You think you can shoot me? You military freak!” he roared, taking an aggressive step forward, raising the crowbar above his shoulder. “Let’s see how tough you are when this whole place burns to the—”

*BOOM.*

The heavy beanbag round caught him squarely in the sternum.

The kinetic impact hit Chase like an eighty-mile-per-hour fastball. The breath exploded out of his lungs in a sharp wheeze, the prybar flew from his grip into the weeds, and he crashed flat onto his back in the wet grass, clutching his chest and gasping like a landed catfish.

Before he could roll over, I closed the distance, planted my heavy combat boot firmly on his shoulder blade, and pressed the cold steel barrel against the back of his neck.

“Don't move,” I commanded.

From the front driveway, blue and red emergency lights suddenly lit up the oak canopies.

Three patrol units from the county sheriff’s office rolled up the drive, sirens screaming, doors slamming, gravel flying.

I had dialed 911 the second the perimeter motion tripped.

Deputies swarmed the backyard with high-intensity flashlights, weapons drawn.

“Drop the weapon! Step back!” the lead deputy shouted.

I immediately set the shotgun down on the grass, raised my hands, and took three paces back. “Homeowner. Coast Guard officer. Intruder is armed with an accelerant and attempted arson. The perimeter cameras recorded the entire sequence.”

Two deputies pinned Chase to the turf, ratcheting his arms behind his back with steel cuffs. Chase sobbed into the grass, choking on dirt and gasoline fumes, blabbering about how he was just trying to visit his family.

The lead deputy walked over to the cedar siding, inspected the pool of fuel, looked at the prybar, and then looked at Chase.

“Attempted aggravated arson, felony trespass, criminal mischief, and violating a civil protection notice,” the deputy muttered, shaking his head. “You picked the wrong house to mess with, son.”

As they dragged Chase toward the back of the cruiser, his boots dragging through the dirt, I stood on my porch under the cold glare of the floodlights.