Everyone feared the mafia boss’s vicious dog, but the moment his three-year-old daughter touched him, the animal exposed the enemy hiding inside the estate.

The smoke burned Claire's throat immediately. Lily coughed against her shoulder. Atlas barked at the floor while Mara shouted for the ventilation controls.

"Find the shutoff!"

Grant dragged Victor away from the wall. The transmitter beneath Victor's shirt blinked red.

"Turn it off," Grant ordered.

Victor tried to reach it, but Mara struck his hand away.

"Do not touch anything."

Atlas ran to a wooden cabinet and clawed at it. Claire followed him. Behind the cabinet was a metal wheel connected to the ventilation system.

She turned it with both hands.

The smoke slowed.

Mara found an emergency door, but the electronic lock was dead. Grant fired at the hinges. The first shot did nothing. The second cracked the metal.

"Move back."

He fired again.

The door opened into the snow.

They escaped as flames rose behind them.

The old kennel burned quickly. Grant watched the roof collapse, his face expressionless.

Victor knelt in the snow, blood soaking his shoulder. Mara removed the transmitter and placed it in an evidence bag.

"You used him as a beacon," she said.

Victor looked at Grant. "I needed them to follow me instead of Lily."

"You failed."

"I was not expecting the child to notice the transmitter."

Lily stared at him. "You smell scared."

Victor looked away.

Grant wanted to question him, but a new message appeared on his phone.

A live video showed the main house. Grant's security team had been forced to kneel in the entrance hall. Miriam stood behind them, holding a knife to the throat of the head of staff.

Beside her stood a man wearing a dark wool coat.

He was older, thin, and leaned on a cane.

Grant dropped his phone.

"Father," he whispered.

Henry Whitmore had been dead for eight years.

Mara picked up the phone. "That is not possible."

The man in the video turned toward the camera. His face was scarred along the jaw, but the eyes were unmistakable.

"Grant," he said. "Come home."

Claire stepped back. "Is that your father?"

"It cannot be."

Victor spoke quietly. "Henry never died. Julian arranged the funeral. The body belonged to another man."

Grant grabbed him by the coat. "You knew?"

"I suspected."

"For eight years?"

"I did not know where he was."

Mara looked at the burning kennel. "Now you do."

The phone video shifted. Henry moved closer to Lily's image on the screen.

"The child carries what belongs to me," he said. "Bring her to the library, alone, within thirty minutes. If you do not, everyone inside the house dies."

The video ended.

Claire's hands shook. "He wants Lily."

"He wants what she carries," Victor said.

"She carries nothing."

Victor looked at the silver bracelet. "Not visibly."

Grant took the bracelet from Lily's wrist. He examined the star engraving. One point of the star was slightly raised.

Mara found a narrow seam around the metal.

"This opens," she said.

Claire felt panic rise. "Rose never told me."

"She may not have known," Victor said.

Mara used a small tool to pry the star open. Inside was a strip of material no wider than a thread, folded around a tiny black chip.

Grant stared.

"A data key," Mara said. "Encrypted."

The radio on Grant's belt crackled.

A guard's voice whispered, "Sir, we have a second problem."

"Report."

"The east wall is compromised. Someone has opened the old drainage tunnel."

Atlas began moving toward the trees.

Lily followed him.

"What is it?" Claire asked.

Lily pointed at the snow. "He hears the bad whistle."

Grant looked from the estate to the woods. The attackers expected him to enter the main house. They were trying to force him into a trap.

"We do not go to the library," he said.

Victor shook his head. "If Henry has the staff, he will kill them."

"Then we make him think we are going."

Mara understood. "A decoy."

Grant assigned two guards to take his coat and move toward the library. Another team circled toward the front entrance. Claire, Lily, Atlas, Mara, and Grant headed for the drainage tunnel.

Victor insisted on coming.

Grant pointed his weapon at him. "You stay here."

"The tunnel leads to Henry."

"That is why you are not coming."

Victor met his eyes. "Your father knows something about Julian. If you want to find your brother, you need me."

Grant hated that he was right.

They entered the drainage tunnel. It was cramped and wet, but the floor showed fresh marks. Someone had moved heavy crates through it recently.

Atlas stopped near a bend.

His ears lifted.

The whistle came again.

This time, a second sound followed.

A woman's voice singing a lullaby.

Lily whispered the final line before the singer finished.

"Sleep, little star, until the gates are open."

Claire knew that song.

Rose had sung it when Lily was a baby.

The tunnel opened into a hidden room beneath the north wall. Inside was a bed, a table, and a wall covered with newspapers. Most of the articles described Evelyn's death.

One photograph had been pinned in the center. It showed Evelyn alive three days after her supposed funeral.

She was standing beside a man whose face had been torn away.

On the floor lay a note.

The man you call dead is not the man you should fear.

Atlas growled at the opposite wall.

Mara searched it and found a hidden speaker. Henry's voice filled the room.

"Very clever, Grant. But you still brought the child to the place I wanted."

The door behind them slammed shut.

Water began rushing through the tunnel.

Claire lifted Lily onto a table.

Grant fired at the lock. The bullet ricocheted.

Victor shouted from the tunnel entrance. "The flood gate! It is controlled from the main room!"