When my ex-husband sent lawyers to seize my unborn triplets, he had no idea who was waiting for him at the hospital entrance.

The heavy iron wrench slipped from Nathan’s paralyzed fingers, clattering loudly against the marble floorboards.

A single high-velocity bullet had punched directly through the glass window panel beside the front door, striking the heavy concrete pillar three inches above Nathan’s head, showering his face with sharp limestone dust.

Nathan shrieked in terror, stumbling backward, dropping his hold on my arm.

Through the shattered front doors, three high-powered security vehicles slammed to a halt on the stone portico, their high-beam spotlights flooding the foyer with blinding white light.

Armed men in navy tactical gear bearing the bold, yellow letters BLACKWOOD SECURITY across their chests poured into the house, weapons drawn, pinning Nathan’s three masked accomplices to the floor within five seconds.

Down the center of the portico steps walked Lucian Blackwood.

He was not wearing his suit jacket. His white dress shirt was unbuttoned at the collar, his dark eyes burning with an unholy, terrifying, apocalyptic rage that caused even his own tactical team to step back in reverence.

In his right hand, he held a sleek black semi-automatic weapon.

"Lucian!" I sobbed, collapsing onto my knees on the carpet, clutching my stomach.

Lucian didn't look at Nathan. He sprinted past the fallen intruders, dropping to his knees beside me, his massive arms instantly encircling my trembling body, pulling me against his broad chest.

"Ava... Ava, look at me," Lucian rasped, his hands frantically checking my head, my shoulders, my back for any signs of injury. "Did he touch you? Did he hurt you?!"

"I’m... I’m okay," I wept, burying my face in his neck, smelling his familiar scent of rain and cedar. "You came back..."

"I will always come back," Lucian promised, his voice cracking with raw emotion.

He turned his head slowly toward Nathan, who was currently cowering against the marble fireplace, pinned under the boot of Vance, the chief of security.

Lucian stood up slowly.

The atmosphere in the grand foyer dropped into an absolute, lethal freezing temperature.

Lucian walked over to where Nathan lay on the floorboards. He didn't raise his gun. He simply stood over Nathan, looking down at him as if he were a poisonous insect that had dared to crawl into his home.

"Nathan Drake," Lucian said, his voice dropping into a register so quiet, so cold, so dark that it chilled the blood in everyone’s veins. "You broke into my home. You threatened my wife. And you put your hands on my children."

"Blackwood... please!" Nathan whimpered, blood and dust leaking from his nose as he pressed his hands together in pathetic supplication. "I was desperate! I have nothing left! Please don't kill me!"

"Kill you?" Lucian whispered, a terrifying, dark smile touching his lips. "Death is a mercy, Nathan. And you do not deserve mercy."

Lucian turned his head slightly toward Vance.

"Call Federal Director Hayes," Lucian commanded flatly. "Tell him that Nathan Drake has been apprehended while committing armed domestic terrorism, attempted kidnapping, and home invasion. Instruct him to transfer Mr. Drake to the maximum-security federal facility in Florence, Colorado, under zero-bail detention."

Vance pressed his heel harder into Nathan’s shoulder. "Understood, Mr. Blackwood."

As the tactical officers dragged the screaming, sobbing, broken man out into the rain toward the waiting police vans, Lucian turned back to me.