Chapter3

The dull thud of a battering ram exploded in the hallway.

The wooden doorframe let out an overwhelmed crack, splinters flying inward like shrapnel. The badge-less field team outside had no intention of negotiating; they had opted for a heavy-duty breach.

Ignoring the crumbling security door, I spun around and slid to my knees into the kitchen.

The claw hammer in my hand smashed viciously against the main gas pipe under the sink. First strike: the copper valve deformed. Second strike: the pipe wall ruptured. High-pressure natural gas let out an ear-piercing hiss, spewing out madly. The pungent smell of mercaptan instantly filled the cramped space.

"Breach!" a tactical command rang out from beyond the door.

The sound of tactical boots kicking through the remaining door panels followed. A black cylinder rolled across the solid wood floor into the living room.

A flashbang.

I lunged out of the kitchen in one stride, grabbed my parents by their collars, and tackled them—along with Leo, whom they had just pulled from the closet—behind the hard load-bearing wall in the hallway.

"Eyes closed! Mouths open!" I pressed Leo's head fiercely against my chest.

The flashbang detonated. Blinding white light and a deafening roar instantly stripped away all senses.

But the high-heat sparks from the detonation precisely ignited the highly concentrated combustible gas permeating the air.

Boom!

Orange-red tongues of fire rolled back along the ceiling. The massive expanding airflow morphed into a raging beast, instantly tearing apart the living room's floor-to-ceiling windows. Two armed men who had just breached the room with submachine guns didn't even have time to scream before the blast wave hurled them out the window.

Shattered glass and burning furniture debris rained down like a torrential storm, smashing into the police cars below and triggering a cacophony of alarms.

A wave of heat scorched my back while the smoke detectors let out shrill screams.

"Go!" I scooped up Leo, shoved him into my father's arms, and used my shoulder to ram open the rusted iron door of the fire escape on the side of the kitchen.

The night wind poured in, briefly scattering the thick smoke. The rusted iron stairs shuddered violently under our footsteps.

The tactical squad below reacted swiftly. Several beams of intense flashlight swept mid-air. Bullets hammered against the brick wall and iron railings, erupting in dense sparks. Stray gravel grazed my cheek.

I leaned out halfway, raising the snatched Glock with one hand. Without aiming, relying entirely on muscle memory, I pulled the trigger three times toward the light sources.

The muffled thud of bullets biting into Kevlar drifted up, mixed with a stifled grunt. The net of fire below paused for a fraction of a second.

Seizing this gap, we slid all the way down the iron scaffolding, tumbling into the damp, dark alleyway behind the apartment.

A parked Ford Crown Victoria was hidden in the shadow of a dumpster, its taillights taped over with black duct tape.

The car door pushed open. The firelight illuminated Frank's stubble-covered face. This veteran detective, who had scrapped his way through twenty years in the LAPD Major Crimes Division, was currently chewing on an unlit half-cigarette. He was the only law enforcer in this city I trusted.

Frank didn't waste words, simply pulling open the rear door.

"The noise you made is loud enough for City Hall to hear." His gaze swept over my hands, which were covered in blood and motor oil.

"The Vance Consortium deployed private soldiers. The field team has been bought out by them." I pushed my terrified family into the vehicle and slammed the door shut. "Take them to the safe house in the San Fernando Valley. Cut off all electronic tracking and stay off the main roads."

My mother reached a trembling hand out of the rolled-down window, gripping the hem of my shirt tightly. Her eyes were filled with terror. "You're not coming with us?"

I reached out and gently pried her fingers open, one by one.

"As long as I'm with you, you're walking targets." I looked straight at my family in the car. "Tonight, I'm the bait."

Frank gave me a deep look and tossed a spare magazine out the window, landing perfectly at my feet.

Amid the screeching of tires against the pavement, the Ford sedan vanished like a stealthy nocturnal beast, quickly melting into Los Angeles's labyrinthine network of dark alleys.

Sirens were closing in from all directions. The entire block was already sealed off by flashing red and blue lights.

Leaning against the cold brick wall, I fished out the tactical terminal dropped by the cleaner team's leader. The heart rate monitors and live feed on the screen had turned into static snow.

The signal transmitted by this static was traveling along an invisible network of cell towers, straight to a center of power in Beverly Hills.

The scene seamlessly cut to that heavily guarded luxury estate halfway up the mountain.

Outside the panoramic floor-to-ceiling windows, the city lights of Los Angeles resembled a dazzling sea of stars. Victoria Vance was holding a glass of Burgundy wine, her slender fingers tracing absently across a tablet on the marble table.

On the screen, the originally live-streamed breach footage was swallowed by a violent flash of explosion, followed by a dead grayish-white. The vital signs representing three top-tier cleaners completely flatlined.

The killer squad, cultivated with immense wealth by the consortium, hadn't even survived a single encounter before turning into a pile of charred remains. The billowing smoke from that cheap burning apartment felt like a blatant trampling of her authority.

Victoria said nothing. The expression on her face froze at absolute zero.

Her fingers quietly tightened.

Crack.

The priceless crystal wine glass shattered violently in her palm. Scarlet wine mixed with blood from the glass cuts dripped down her pale wrist onto the expensive Persian rug, a shocking sight.

The suited assistant behind her handed over a white towel, holding his breath, not daring to make a sound.

Victoria shoved the towel aside. Using her bloodstained fingers, she tapped directly on the tablet screen, accessing a hidden portal to the dark web interface.

Undisguised murderous intent burned in her eyes as her fingers rapidly typed commands on the virtual keyboard.

A surveillance screenshot with my clear facial features was hoisted to the very top of the dark web's underground bounty board.

A glaring string of numbers pulsed in the center of the screen: 5,000,000 USD.

Five million dollars. This sum was enough to plunge the entire Los Angeles underworld into madness.

Below the bounty order, the additional condition was just a single, brief line of text, carrying an unquestionable death sentence:

"Before dawn, bring me his head."