Page 91 of Knuckles & Knives
His composure breaks. His shoulders slump, and for the first time since I’ve known him, Kieran Frost looks utterly defeated.
“Twenty-seven years,” he whispers. “Twenty-seven years of being groomed to take over the family legacy. Every decision I made, every relationship I formed, every goal I set… all of it in service to the Sterling Syndicate.”
“And now?”
“Now I’m nobody. No family, no inheritance, no protection, no identity beyond what I build for myself. Even the money I tried to move to secret accounts they found and drained. I have nothing to offer now.” He laughs bitterly. “Do you know what Uncle Charles said when I told him I choose you over blood loyalty?”
I shake my head.
“He said that Vincent Blackwood’s daughter has accomplished what no enemy ever could. She’s destroyed a Sterling heir from the inside out.”
Generational hatred and family disappointment… But beneath the pain, I hear a kind of liberation.
“Maybe he’s right,” I say carefully. “Maybe I did destroy Kieran Frost, the heir to a criminal dynasty.”
His ice-blue eyes flash with something that might be anger or hope.
“But maybe,” I continue, moving closer until I can feel the heat radiating from his tense frame, “that leaves room for someone better to emerge. Someone who chooses his own path instead of following family expectations.”
“You think there’s anything left worth salvaging?”
“I think,” I say, reaching up to touch the cut on his forehead with gentle fingers, “that the man who just sacrificed everything for love is worth a hundred Sterling heirs who follow orders without question.”
The tears he’s been holding back finally spill over, and Kieran Frost allows himself to grieve for the family he’s lost, the identity he’s abandoned, and the future he’s chosen to build from nothing.
I pull him into my arms, and he clings to me with desperate need.
It should feel like victory. Instead, it feels like responsibility—the weight of being chosen over everything else someone values, and the obligation to be worthy of such devastating sacrifice.
In the industrial quiet of our safe house, surrounded by the wreckage of old loyalties and the promise of new alliances, Kieran begins the long process of becoming someone entirely his own.
CHAPTER 28
The intelligence Marcus intercepts at 3:47 AM changes everything we thought we knew about our war with the Sterling Syndicate. I watch his face go pale as he processes the encrypted communications, his fingers flying over multiple keyboards as he traces the signal back to its source.
“This can’t be right,” he mutters, running the decryption algorithms three separate times. “The metadata suggests this communication originated from?—”
“Where, Marcus?” I interrupt, my patience fraying after watching Kieran systematically lose everything that defined him.
“Vincent Blackwood’s old office building. The one that’s been sealed since his death.”
I gasp. My father’s headquarters has been empty for five years, protected by legal injunctions and enough security to deter casual trespassers. If someone is operating from there now, it means they have resources and connections that dwarf anything we’ve encountered so far.
“Could be a relay,” Dom suggests, but his voice lacks conviction.
“No,” Marcus shakes his head grimly. “The signal strength and routing patterns indicate active operations. Someone is starting to use your father’s old command center as their base of operations.”
“Someone who wants us to know they’re there,” Kieran adds, his tactical instincts intact despite his emotional devastation. “This feels like bait.”
“Or,” Axel says from his position by the window, his wild energy suddenly focused with predatory intensity, “it’s exactly what we need to end this once and for all.”
Something in those amber-flecked eyes that makes my pulse quicken with warning. Axel has that expression he gets when he’s about to do something brilliant, dangerous, and completely unauthorized.
“Whatever you’re thinking, the answer is no,” I say immediately.
“You don’t even know what I’m thinking,” he replies, but his grin is sharp and reckless in a way that confirms my worst suspicions.
“If I have to guess, you’re thinking about infiltrating my father’s old building alone. About using your ghost abilities to slip past whatever security is protecting our mystery puppet master. About gathering intelligence without backup or support.”
