Page 9 of Silent Target

The truth doesn’t.

There have been people I couldn’t save.

Names I don’t say aloud.

Faces that return whenever I close my eyes.

Men who trusted me to see the danger before it reached them.

A team surrounded on a mountain while I watched through a scope, calculating distance, wind, and bullet drop as one brother after another went down.

Sometimes even the best sniper is too far away.

I step into the freezing night.

The truck’s engine growls to life, and the tires cut through the gravel as I leave the cabin behind.

Evelyn Hart is being hunted by some of the most powerful men in the country.

She heard too much.

Recorded too much.

And trusted Shadow Division enough to send one desperate message.

Walter Graves put a target on her back.

Now I’m coming for her.

This time, I won’t be too far away.

3

EVIE

Ichange cars twice.

Jackets once.

I leave my phone in the trunk of a taxi heading toward Baltimore.

And still, I know they’re following me.

Not because I can see them.

Because I can’t.

The men Graves sent are too disciplined to drive close, stare too long, or make obvious mistakes.

But I’ve spent years studying patterns.

A dark SUV appearing three times in forty minutes isn’t a coincidence.

Neither is the silver sedan that takes its place after I cross into Alexandria.

I pull the borrowed car into the underground garage beneath my old apartment building.

Borrowed is generous.