I lunged at the billionaire’s flawless bride right in the middle of the wedding reception, throwing the entire ballroom into chaos—but I had to do it to expose the sinister trap she had placed beneath his seat before it was too late.

CRACK!

The heavy aluminum briefcase struck Lenora full in the jaw. She let out a sharp cry, her head snapping back as she dropped to the concrete floor, the black carbon-fiber detonator slipping from her fingers and clattering across the floor.

It bounced directly toward Dr. Reev's feet.

Panicking, Dr. Reev dove for the device, slamming his palm down on the red button as he hit the floor!

WHIRRRRRR!

A deafening, shrill alarm began blaring throughout the sub-basement vault! Strobe lights began flashing bright amber, casting disorienting, rhythmic flashes across the high computer racks!

“WARNING,” a synthetic computer voice bellowed over the loudspeakers. “ATMOSPHERIC SUPPRESSION INITIATED. HALON DISCHARGE IN TEN SECONDS. EVACUATE IMMEDIATELY.”

Heavy, explosion-proof steel blast doors began slowly sliding down from the ceiling, threatening to seal the entire server complex into an airtight tomb!

"Out! Move!" I screamed, grabbing Sebastian by his jacket collar and shoving him toward the narrowing gap beneath the descending steel blast door!

Marcus Vance didn't fight us. He sprinted past Dr. Reev, diving headfirst under the descending steel door, escaping into the outer corridor!

Dr. Reev scrambled up, weeping hysterical tears as he tried to follow, but his foot caught on a heavy computer cable. He fell hard, his chin slamming against the concrete as the heavy steel door slammed shut with a deafening THUD, locking him inside the vault as white halon gas began pouring from the ceiling nozzles!

Lenora scrambled across the floor, her jaw swollen and bleeding, reaching for the silver briefcase that had fallen near the airlock exit.

Sebastian lunged forward, snatching the briefcase away from her hand just as the secondary emergency lock engaged, sealing the server room off entirely.

We were standing in the narrow, concrete access tunnel leading to the estate's subterranean parking garage. The air here was thick with exhaust fumes and the cold draft from the open garage ramp above.

Ahead of us, Marcus Vance was standing near a sleek, matte-black armored SUV, holding an assault rifle he had retrieved from a wall-mounted emergency locker.

"It's over, Vale!" Marcus shouted over the sound of the halon alarms ringing through the walls. "Give me the briefcase, or I put a bullet through the housekeeper's head!"

I raised my captured rifle, but before I could acquire my target, a deafening roar echoed from the top of the concrete garage ramp.

A massive, yellow commercial excavator—the one used for the estate's ongoing landscaping project—came crashing backward down the steep concrete ramp!

The heavy steel bucket of the excavator swerved wildly, smashing directly into Marcus's armored SUV with catastrophic force!

CRASH-BANG!

Metal crumpled like paper, glass shattered into millions of tiny cubes, and Marcus was thrown off his feet by the sheer force of the impact, dropping his rifle as he tumbled across the oil-slicked concrete.

Sitting in the high glass cab of the massive excavator, clutching the dual hydraulic control levers with a terrifyingly fierce expression, was Mrs. Whitfield—the sixty-two-year-old head housekeeper of the Vale estate.