The storm hit at 9:02 AM Eastern Standard Time.
In the serene, soundproofed calm of his office, Ji Jingheng was reviewing the final terms for the Veridian Tech acquisition. The Adler Motors deal was solid, his teams in Brussels confidently navigating the regulatory snags. His counter-message to Lu Huai had been sent. The silent pressure was building. He was in control.
Lin's entrance was uncharacteristically abrupt. She didn't speak. She simply placed a tablet on his desk, the screen displaying a real-time financial data feed. One graph, representing the stock price of Kylene Therapeutics, was in violent, plunging freefall. A red arrow pointed down, next to a staggering percentage loss.
He stared at it for a full three seconds, his brain processing the data but rejecting its implication. Kylene was a sideline. A long-term, stable play. Its value was in its patents, not its daily volatility. This was not normal market fluctuation. This was an attack.
"What happened?" His voice was a low rasp.
"Massive, coordinated sell-off," Lin reported, her own composure fractured by a note of urgency. "Over eighteen percent of the total float was dumped onto the market in the first fifteen minutes of trading. It's triggered automated sell orders, panic selling from retail investors… it's a cascade."
"Eighteen percent," he repeated, the number clicking into place with a cold, sickening finality. L.H. Capital's stake. She hadn't just sold. She'd firebombed her own position to create maximum damage. He'd been watching Adler, expecting a feint there. She'd blindsided him on a flank he considered secure.
"The buyer?" he demanded, already knowing the answer.
"A consortium led by BioVantage AG. Our primary competitor for the patent portfolio." Lin swiped to another screen. "The sale was executed at a three percent loss to the seller, but the market perception is that a major insider has lost faith. BioVantage is now the largest single shareholder. They've issued a statement expressing 'confidence in Kylene's revolutionary pipeline,' which is only accelerating the sell-off of our remaining position."
Ji Jingheng's hand curled into a fist on the polished desk. The loss wasn't catastrophic in pure monetary terms. It was the strategic blow that was devastating. Kylene was meant to be his safety valve, the stable asset he could leverage if his bigger, riskier plays wobbled. Now it was wobbling. Badly. More importantly, the cash from that sale was now in BioVantage's hands—his rival's hands—giving them ammunition to potentially outbid him on the very patents he needed.
Worst of all, it was a message. A brutal, elegant, and deeply personal one. You see my money? I see your whole board. You think you're hunting me? I'm inside your house, moving the furniture.
The intercom on his desk buzzed. His head of risk management, voice strained. "Sir, we're seeing margin calls on the Adler position. The volatility from Kylene is spooking the banks. They're demanding additional collateral."
Another buzz. The lead on the Japanese hotel deal. "Ji, we have a problem. The sellers are getting nervous. They've heard about Kylene and are questioning our liquidity. They want to pause negotiations."
The carefully balanced house of cards was trembling. Not from a gale, but from a precise, surgical cut to one of its central pillars.
He looked back at the tablet, at the bleeding red line of Kylene's stock. The ghost had not just made noise. She had detonated a charge at the heart of his operations. And she had done it from a mountain cabin, with a satellite link and a ruthless, brilliant understanding of his weakest point.
The cold fury that had been simmering within him boiled over. It was no longer just about the child, or possession, or even defiance. This was an assault on his domain, on his very identity as the infallible architect of his empire. She had looked at his masterpiece and found a single, loose thread. And she had pulled.
"Lock it down," he said to Lin, his voice terrifyingly calm. "Sell non-core assets to cover the Adler margin. Use the Singapore reserves. Do whatever it takes to stabilize the Japanese deal. I want this contained in one hour." The orders were automatic, the crisis-response part of his brain engaging despite the inferno of his rage.
"And her?" Lin asked, the question hanging in the now-charged air.
Ji Jingheng stood up, turning to face the panoramic window. The city below, his kingdom of steel and glass, seemed suddenly less solid. "She has made this a financial war. Fine. We escalate. Freeze every asset, every account, every shell company you can trace back to L.H. Capital. Petition the SEC, Interpol, anyone who will listen, for fraud, for market manipulation. I want her financial wings clipped. I want her ghost to have no money to haunt with."
"That will take time. And evidence."
"Then find it! Fabricate it if you have to!" The shout erupted from him, raw and violent, shocking in the normally tomb-silent office. He never shouted. He controlled. He calculated. This loss of control was her victory, and it enraged him further. He took a sharp breath, forcing the steel back into his spine. "Do it. Now. And get Ross on the line."
While Lin hurried out, he placed his palms flat on the cool glass of the window, as if he could steady the tilting world. A minute later, his private line connected to the secure phone in the G-Wagon, now parked in a motel outside Willow Creek.
"Sir," Ross's voice came through, tense.
"The situation has changed," Ji Jingheng said, each word a chip of ice. "The subject is no longer just evading. She is attacking my business directly. This is no longer a discreet retrieval. It is an extraction. I want her found and brought to me. Today."
There was a pause on the line. "Sir, the local opposition is dug in. A direct extraction against armed, prepared resistance carries significant risk of exposure and collateral."
"I am aware of the risks," Ji Jingheng hissed. "I am also aware that she just cost me nine figures and endangered three major acquisitions. Your mandate is updated. You are authorized to increase pressure on the local asset, Mitchell Callahan. Leverage whatever you need to. Threaten his family, his business, his freedom. Break him. Use him to get to the doctor. Use the doctor to get to her. I don't care how. I want her in my custody by nightfall."
The line was silent for a beat. "Understood. We'll proceed."
"See that you do." Ji Jingheng ended the call. The calm he projected was a lie. Inside, a storm raged. She had wanted his attention? She had it now. In its most furious, unforgiving form. The hunt was over. Now came the capture.
In the mountain cabin, the mood was grimly triumphant. Lu Huai watched the financial news feeds on her laptop via a lagging, intermittent satellite connection. The ticker for KYLN was a satisfying streak of red. News anchors were speculating about "insider unrest" and "strategic repositioning." BioVantage's smug press release was everywhere.
She had done it. She had hurt him. Not just in his pride, but in the core of his operation. The short position on Adler was a mosquito bite. This was a gunshot wound.
But the victory tasted like ash. Mitch had just returned from a scouting trip down the mountain, his face like granite. "They're back," he said, shrugging off his pack. "Not at the main gate. They've got a spot on the ridge overlooking the retreat. High-powered binoculars, maybe a spotting scope. They're watching. And they brought friends. Two more vehicles, same make. Four men total now."
Eleanor's face paled. "They're tightening the noose."
"They're waiting for something," Mitch said, his eyes on Lu Huai. "Your move rattled his cage. He's not just watching anymore. He's deciding how hard to hit back."
Lu Huai closed the laptop. The adrenaline high of her financial strike was crashing, replaced by the cold, heavy reality of their physical situation. She was in a freezing cabin, pregnant, with a four-year-old and two other civilians, surrounded by professionals who had just been given a green light to "increase pressure."
"We can't stay here," Sarah said quietly, her arm around Chloe. "They'll find this place eventually. We're sitting ducks."
"Running is what he expects," Lu Huai said, thinking aloud. "He'll have the roads, the trails, the airports covered. His response to Kylene proves he's not a patient man. He'll throw more resources at the problem until it's buried."
"So what do we do?" Eleanor asked, her practical nature seeking a solution, any solution.
Lu Huai looked at each of them: the fierce, loyal doctor; the brave, struggling mother; the steadfast, capable guide; and the innocent child whose only crime was being in her orbit. She had brought this down on them. Her war. Her choices.
A plan began to form in her mind. Not a plan of escape, but of confrontation. A dangerous, desperate plan that turned her greatest vulnerability into a weapon.
"We don't run," she said, her voice gaining a hard edge. "We make him come to us. On our terms."
Mitch frowned. "That's a good way to get caught."
"Not if we control the when and the where." She met his gaze. "You said they're watching the retreat. They're waiting for a sign of life, for movement. So we give it to them. But not from here."
"What are you thinking, Lily?" Eleanor asked, using the false name out of habit.
"I'm thinking we split up. Mitch, you and Sarah take Chloe. You leave first, backtracking the way we came but then cutting west towards the logging roads. You have a vehicle stashed there, right?"
Mitch nodded slowly. "A jeep. Old, noisy, but it runs."
"You get to town. You go to the sheriff. You tell him everything. Not just about the men on the ridge. About me. Who I really am. Who's after me. You make it a public problem. You get it on the record."
Sarah's eyes went wide. "But your privacy… the baby…"
"Privacy is a luxury I lost the moment that drone flew over," Lu Huai said, her tone leaving no room for argument. "He's using shadows and threats. We fight back with sunlight and law. A pregnant woman being hunted by a billionaire will make headlines. It will create a shield he can't just bulldoze through, not without a hundred lawyers and a media storm watching."
"And what about you?" Eleanor's voice was thick with concern.
Lu Huai placed a hand on her belly. "You and I are going back to the retreat."
A stunned silence filled the cabin.
"It's the last place they'll expect us to go," she continued. "They're watching it, waiting for us to flee from it. They won't expect us to walk back into the lion's den. We wait until dark. We use the trails you know, Eleanor. We get back to your lodge. And then…" She took a deep breath. "Then I call him."
"You what?" Mitch exclaimed.
"I call Ji Jingheng. I tell him I'm done running. I tell him I'm at Serenity Pines. Alone and willing to talk. But only if he comes alone. No teams. No lawyers. Just him."
"He'll never agree to that," Eleanor said.
"He will," Lu Huai said, a strange certainty hardening her features. "Because after what I just did to Kylene, he won't want to talk. He'll want to look me in the eye. He'll want to be the one to… finish this. His ego will demand it. And coming alone, to a place he already has surrounded, will feel like a show of power to him, not a risk."
It was a gamble of terrifying proportions. She was betting her life, and the life of her child, on her read of a man she had spent one night with and was now trying to destroy. She was using herself as bait to draw the predator into a trap, but she was the one in the cage.
Eleanor stared at her, seeing not a scared pregnant woman, but the formidable strategist who had just shaken a billionaire's empire from a remote cabin. She saw the resolve, the terrifying clarity. Slowly, she nodded. "It might work. It's the only move he won't anticipate. The move that makes no sense."
"Exactly," Lu Huai whispered. She looked at Sarah and Chloe. "You'll be safe. Once you're with the sheriff, you're witnesses. He can't touch you without it blowing up in his face."
Sarah hugged Chloe tighter, tears in her eyes, but she nodded. "Okay. Okay, Lily."
Mitch let out a long breath, looking from Lu Huai to Eleanor. "You two in the lodge… it'll be like holding a lit match in a powder keg."
"I know," Lu Huai said. She felt the baby kick again, a strong, solid thump. A reminder, a protest, a tiny ally. "But it's the only match we've got. And I'm tired of hiding in the dark."
She was turning from the ghost into the flame. And she was going to see what, or who, burned first.