SHE TRIED TO DESTROY HIS BABY IN THE SHADOWS, BUT THE RED LIGHT IN THE CEILING RECORDED HER SINS—AND HER BILLIONAIRE HUSBAND’S VENGEANCE WAS UNFORGIVING!

*KABOOOOM!*

The thermite charge ignited with blinding fury, burning through the fiberglass hull and detonating the boat’s auxiliary fuel reserves in an instantaneous fireball that lit up the night sky over the Hudson.

The shockwave tore through the water, hammering against Julian’s Kevlar vest as he plunged deep into the icy black depths. The cold was shocking, knocking the breath from his lungs, but the sheer adrenaline coursing through his veins drove him back toward the surface.

Julian broke the water, gasping for air.

Twenty yards away, the stealth boat was a burning wreck, listing heavily to port as water poured into its torn hull. Flames hissed against the rain-slicked river.

Alistair Sterling had been thrown onto the smoldering front deck, his clothes on fire, screaming hysterically as he crawled toward the bow. Before he could reach the life raft, the front fuel tank exploded in a second violent detonation, tearing the bow in half and dragging the mad neurosurgeon down into the dark, churning currents of the river.

Dr. Alistair Sterling was gone, swallowed by the cold water he had sought to conquer.

Julian swam through the flaming debris with powerful strokes, reaching the floating wreckage of the stern. Through the smoke, he saw Sarah.

She was coughing violently, clinging to a buoyant section of the carbon-fiber deck, her designer coat soaked in black river water and diesel oil. Her face was blackened with soot, her perfect hair matted to her skull, her left arm dangling uselessly at her side, dislocated from the explosion.

Julian hauled himself onto the floating debris, dripping wet, rising above her like an avenging titan.

Sarah looked up at him, her eyes wide with terror. The mask of the supreme mastermind had completely shattered. For the first time in her life, Sarah Vance was staring into the face of a man who held the absolute power of life and death over her—and she saw no mercy in his eyes.

"Julian... please," she wheezed, blood bubbling at the corner of her mouth. "You loved me... you remember how we loved each other in Paris... in Switzerland... you can't kill the mother of your child..."

"You gave up the right to call her your child the day you turned her into a science experiment," Julian said, his voice flat, freezing, harder than diamond.

He reached down, grabbed her by the collar of her soaked coat, and dragged her toward the edge of the floating raft.

"Where is she, Sarah?" Julian’s voice was a low growl that vibrated through her bones. "Give me the coordinates at Newark, or I will push you under this engine block and watch you drown."

"You... you won't do it," Sarah gasped, trying to summon a shred of her old defiance. "You're Julian Vance. You operate in courtrooms. You operate with lawyers and money. You don't have the stomach for cold blood."

Julian leaned down until his eyes were inches from hers. "Victoria thought that too. She’s in an eight-by-ten concrete box for the rest of her miserable life. But you, Sarah? You died two years ago. The world already buried you. Nobody is looking for a dead woman."

He pushed her head back over the freezing water. The black waves lapped against her ears.

Panic—raw, animalistic panic—finally broke her.

"CONTAINER 408!" Sarah screamed, clawing at his wrists with her single good hand. "Pier 14 at Newark! The cargo ship is the *Titan Valkyrie*! She’s inside a climate-controlled mobile lab in Container 408! The chopper already landed five minutes ago! They’re loading her onto the crane right now! PLEASE, JULIAN! PULL ME UP!"

Julian stared at her for two long, agonizing seconds.

Then, with an expression of cold disgust, he let go.

"Julian!" she shrieked as her body slid into the freezing water.

Julian did not push her down, but he did not pull her up. He reached down, unclipped the emergency locator beacon from his own tactical vest, and threw it onto the floating wreckage beside her.

"The Coast Guard will be here in eight minutes," Julian said, his voice carrying over the crackle of the dying flames. "If your cardiovascular resilience is as superior as you claimed, you might survive the hypothermia. If not... then your second death is official."

A thundering beat of rotor blades echoed through the rain above.

Marcus’s black tactical helicopter dropped out of the low-hanging clouds, hovering thirty feet above the burning wreck. A searchlight pinned Julian against the steel, and a heavy extraction cable dropped down from the open cabin door.

Julian grabbed the harness, strapped himself in, and signaled the crew.

The winch engaged, lifting Julian into the sky. He did not look back at the drowning specter of his former wife in the burning water. His eyes were turned entirely toward the south.