He came down over Milton, pinning the man's wrists beneath his knees before Milton had processed that he was moving. Milton thrashed and tried to pull his arms free and found them completely immovable, which produced a different kind of panic than the pain had, the panic of realizing that strength was not going to be a factor in this situation regardless of how much he applied.Logan looked down at him from above with that same light, cold expression and said nothing at all.Then he started.The first blow landed on Milton's left cheek and snapped his head sideways. The second came from the other direction. Logan worked with the methodical rhythm of someone who had done this before and understood exactly how to calibrate force for maximum effect, where to land each one, how to pace the intervals so the pain had time to register fully before the next arrived.Milton stopped trying to articulate words after the first thirty seconds. What came out of him instead were sounds, broken and

There was a moment of absolute stillness in the room as the four bodyguards stood with useless weapons in their hands and the full understanding of the situation arrived.Then one of them threw his gun at the floor with a sound of raw frustration. The others followed, the weapons clattering across the tile, and all four of them charged simultaneously.Logan came off Milton in a single movement and turned to face them.Logan moved between them with the fluid, economical precision of someone who had trained long enough that the decisions happened below the level of conscious thought. The first man came in high and Logan redirected the momentum, used the body's own energy against the direction it wanted to go, and put him into the wall with enough force to end his contribution to the evening immediately.The second came from the side. Logan's elbow met his jaw on the way in and the man's legs left the conversation.The third and fourth came together, which was tactically reasonable and p

The door to the room was half open. Logan pushed it the rest of the way and stepped inside.Ava was sitting in a chair beside the bed, her posture tense, her eyes on Denise's face. She looked up the moment the door moved and was on her feet and crossing the room before Logan had fully stepped through it.She wrapped her arms around him, holding on tightly, and he felt her exhale against his chest, long and shaky, the breath of someone who had been holding herself together through sheer will for the past hour."You're okay," she said, more to herself than to him. She pulled back enough to look at him properly, her eyes moving over his face, his jacket, his hands. "Are you hurt? Did they.""I'm fine," Logan said."You should let a doctor look at you. Just to be sure. They have people here, it would only take a few minutes, and after everything that."Logan cupped her face with both hands, stopping the flow of words gently, and leaned in to press a kiss to her forehead. He held it there

The morning of the antique event started the way most mornings did.Logan dropped Mia at school first, walking her to the entrance and waiting until she disappeared through the doors with her bag bouncing against her back. Then he drove Ava to Synergy Corp, and she leaned over to kiss him before getting out, telling him to have a good day in the easy, familiar way that had become part of their mornings without either of them noticing exactly when it had started.He was pulling away from the building when his phone rang.He glanced at the screen and answered through the car's speaker. "Kyle.""Logan." Kyle Cooper's voice came through warm and slightly hesitant, the voice of a man who had been preparing himself to make a call he wasn't entirely sure would be received well. "I hope I'm not catching you at a bad time.""Not at all. What's going on?""There's an antique exhibition today. Private event, by invitation. A few collectors and dealers I know put it together." Kyle paused. "I was

Logan let out a small, quiet chuckle, the sound of someone who recognized exactly what was happening and found it mildly amusing rather than intimidating.He took the fan from Holt's hands and turned it slightly, angling it toward the light. He examined the brushwork for a moment, ran his thumb lightly along the edge of the frame, checked the join at the base, and then handed it back.The whole inspection took less than ten seconds."Lower mid tier," Logan said. "I'd put it around six hundred thousand."The room around them had gone quiet, or it felt that way, the conversation at the nearby displays fading into background noise as Kyle and Stacy both turned their attention to Holt.Holt stood completely still, the fan in his hands, his expression frozen in something between surprise and disbelief."Six hundred," he repeated."Give or take," Logan said. "The brushwork is consistent with the period, the carving on the frame matches, and the join at the base shows the kind of wear you'd