The silence in the Grand Ballroom was profound. It was the kind of absolute, breathless quiet that only occurs when a room full of powerful people realizes they are trapped in the center of a blast radius.

Seraphina Vance descended the carpeted stairs with a slow, measured grace. The clicking of h

The grand, brass-handled doors of the Pierre Hotel ballroom violently swung open, and the world outside poured in.

A dozen federal agents in tactical windbreakers flooded the room, their badges gleaming under the dim ambient lighting. The wail of sirens that had been a distant threat only moments

Six weeks later.

The morning sun poured through the floor-to-ceiling windows of the CEO’s office at Aegis Global, casting long, golden geometric shapes across the expansive hardwood floor.

Seraphina Vance sat behind the massive, monolithic obsidian desk that commanded the center of the room. For