I laughed when I saw my ex-wife walking alone along an empty road with two babies strapped to her chest.

The Gulfstream cut through the storm clouds over Middle Tennessee like a silver blade. Rain lashed the oval cabin windows, illuminated by violent purple sheets of cloud-to-ground lightning.

"Tower cleared us for an emergency priority landing at BNA," the co-pilot called back from the cockpit. "Runway 20-Left. But Davidson County is under a severe thunderstorm warning. Wind shear is gusting at forty-five knots."

"Put her down anyway," I commanded, staring at the digital tracker on my phone.

The red dot representing Walter Briggs’s company Lincoln wasn't at the airport.

It had turned off Interstate 40 West. It was heading toward the Cheatham County quarry line.

Walter wasn't waiting for the night. He had realized the net was closing. With the Vanguard cards frozen and the corporate accounts locked down, he had decided to destroy the evidence before he ran for the border. He was going to burn the Pegram trailer to the ground right now, believing Megan and the boys were inside.

"Cal," I shouted over the roar of the jet engines as the landing gear groaned into position. "Where are the boys?"

"Safe," Cal answered, checking his tactical tablet. "Megan, Mason, and Bryce are in the high-security executive suite at the Hermitage Hotel under four armed details from our terminal security team. Nobody gets within fifty yards of that floor without showing a biometric Sullivan pass."

"Good. What about the quarry?"

"We’ve got Miller and two men in the cedar line with suppressed carbines and video cameras. If Walter steps foot on that pallet with an accelerant, he’s on federal film for attempted murder."

The Gulfstream slammed onto the wet tarmac of Nashville International with a violent jolt, the reverse thrusters screaming as water sprayed forty feet into the air.

Before the jet had even come to a complete stop outside the private hangar, the cabin door dropped.

I vaulted down the aluminum stairs into the pouring rain, sprinting across the tarmac to my armored Denali idling by the fuel depot. Cal threw himself into the passenger seat, racking the slide on a twelve-gauge tactical shotgun and setting it between his knees.

"The bank just called," Cal said as I slammed the truck into drive, the tires screaming against the wet concrete. "Tiffany managed to draw an eight-hundred-thousand-dollar emergency cashier’s check from the family auxiliary vault before the branch manager could freeze the ledger. She’s heading toward the Belle Meade estate to clean out the master safe."

"Let her," I said, weaving through the airport freight gates at seventy miles per hour, hitting the siren override. "Walter is the head of the snake. We cut him off first."

The rain on Interstate 40 was blinding, turning the highway into a river of gray spray. Wind buffeted the heavy Sierra, but I kept the throttle pinned to the floorboards.

Thirteen months of calculated deceit.

Thirteen months of watching Megan’s dignity shredded by socialite whispers in country club lounges, while Walter Briggs smiled and poured my scotch, and Tiffany slept in the bed my father had given my mother.

As we crossed the bridge over the swollen Harpeth River into Cheatham County, Cal’s phone chirped with a priority encrypted feed.

"Miller’s live," Cal said, holding the screen toward me.

Through the rain-streaked thermal lens of the surveillance camera, the rusted camper in the Pegram clearing appeared as a dull gray rectangle against the cold limestone rock.

A black Lincoln Town Car rolled silently into the gravel clearing, its headlights extinguished.

The driver’s door opened. Walter Briggs stepped out into the deluge. He was wearing a heavy black oilskin duster and tactical gloves. In his right hand, he carried a five-gallon red plastic container of industrial kerosene.

He didn't hesitate. He didn't look around.

He walked up the three pine pallets, kicked the screen door open with his steel-toed boot, and sloshed the fuel directly across the threshold and into the sleeping cabin.

"That bastard," Cal growled, his knuckles white on the shotgun stock. "He really thought they were in those bunks."

Through the camera feed, Walter pulled an emergency road flare from his coat pocket, struck the striker cap, and let the white-hot phosphorus ignite with a violent burst of crimson light.

He tossed the flare through the open door.

*BOOM.*

The camper exploded into an inferno. The shockwave rattled the thermal camera in the trees, a roaring fireball tearing through the blue plastic tarps and blowing the aluminum roof twenty feet into the air.

Walter stood on the gravel for three cold seconds, watching the flames consume the tin shell, the reflection of the fire dancing across his emotionless, silver-haired face.

Then he turned, walked back to the Lincoln, and reached for the door handle.

That was when the headlights of my Denali burst through the tree line at eighty miles per hour.

Walter’s head snapped toward the road.

I didn't tap the brakes. I didn't honk.

I aimed the heavy steel brush guard of the six-ton truck directly at the driver’s side of the Lincoln.

Walter realized what was coming half a second too late. He scrambled to draw a sidearm from his coat, but the wet gravel betrayed his footing.

*CRASH!*

The Sierra slammed into the Lincoln with the sound of a locomotive hitting a dumpster. The Lincoln’s frame buckled like an accordion, spinning two hundred and seventy degrees and smashing into the rock bluff in a shower of sparks, shattered safety glass, and screaming metal.

My airbags didn't deploy—I had disabled the front sensors before leaving the depot. The impact threw me forward against the locked seatbelt, the smell of burning radiator fluid and ozone instantly filling the cab.

I unclicked the belt, kicked my door open, and drew the .45 Colt Commander.

The rain hit my face like needles. Behind the crumpled Lincoln, the camper was burning furiously, thick black smoke billowing into the stormy sky, smelling of scorched polyester and burning tires.

Walter was crawling out of the shattered passenger window of his car, his face covered in blood from a deep scalp laceration, his right arm dangling uselessly at an unnatural angle.

I walked across the crunching gravel, stepped on his good wrist, and ground his palm into the limestone dirt until his fingers opened, dropping a suppressed Walther PPK into the mud.

I kicked the pistol twenty feet into the brush.

Then I grabbed Walter by the collar of his oilskin coat and hoisted him up against the crushed door of his Lincoln.

He coughed, spitting red foam onto my shirt. Despite the broken shoulder and the blood streaming into his eyes, a thin, sickening smirk stretched across his pale lips.

"Garrett," he wheezed, his breath rattling in his crushed chest. "You always were... too reckless with your machinery."

"Where is the offshore ledger, Walter?" I asked, pressing the cold muzzle of the .45 directly beneath his chin, lifting his head until his heels barely brushed the ground. "Where did you put the money you siphoned from my mother’s estate?"

Walter chuckled, a wet, choking sound. "Check the wedding registry, boy. Tiffany’s been moving it through the Caymans for two years. You were just the bank account."

"And Megan?" I pressed the barrel harder, bruising his jawline. "Why destroy her? Why frame her with the necklace?"

Walter’s smile vanished. His gray eyes flared with twenty-six years of hidden, festering hatred.

"Because she saw through me," Walter hissed. "From the day you brought her home from that church in Franklin, she audited the kitchen books. She asked why the estate security payroll had eight phantom guards. She was going to tell your daddy before he died. I spent thirty years building this family’s empire from the mud, cleaning up your father’s messes, burying bodies in the river while you went to private academies! I wasn't going to let a schoolteacher from Williamson County cut me out of my retirement!"

"She wasn't a schoolteacher," I whispered, my voice shaking with an ancient, terrifying fury. "She was my wife. And those are my sons you just tried to incinerate."

Walter spat blood onto my cheek. "You're too late, Sullivan. The girl is dying in Memphis. And Tiffany’s at the house with the transfer keys. You lose."

"The girl is alive, Walter," I said softly into his ear. "I held her hand two hours ago."

The smirk on Walter Briggs’s face died.

The color drained from his lips faster than the blood dripping from his brow. His pupils dilated in sheer, unadulterated horror.

"No," he whispered. "The medical block... you couldn't bypass it..."

"I don't bypass blocks, Walter," I said, cold rain washing the blood from my face. "I tear down the building."

I struck him across the temple with the heavy steel frame of the Colt. Walter’s eyes rolled into his head, his knees folding as he collapsed unconscious into the mud.

Cal stepped up beside me, holding zip-ties. "What do we do with him?"

"Tie him to the bumper of the Lincoln," I said, wiping my brow. "Leave Miller here with the video evidence until the state troopers arrive. Cal, get the truck turned around."

"Where to?"