Chapter 4 - THE DAWN AT DUNE ROAD
The sun was just beginning to crest the horizon over the Atlantic, painting the ocean in jagged strokes of gold, bruised purple, and slate grey.
Rory walked out onto the second-floor balcony of the beach villa, the salty morning wind catching the edges of his unbuttoned shirt. Down below, the fleet of black SUVs was turning around in the wrecked driveway, their headlights cutting through the retreating fog.
He pulled out his phone and tapped a number.
It picked up on the first ring.
“Boss?” Veronica’s voice came through the speaker, calm, steady, unbothered by the chaos of the night.
“Are they awake?” Rory asked, his voice softening just a fraction, though the exhaustion in it was still raw.
“Not yet,” Veronica said. “They’re sleeping in the back seat. Real sleep this time. Not that rigid, trembling state they’ve had for months. Their breathing is slow. Deep.”
Rory closed his eyes, leaning his forehead against the cool steel railing of the balcony. For the first time in eighteen months, the tight, suffocating band around his chest felt like it had loosened.
“Did you find anything else in the house?” Veronica asked.
“It’s over, Veronica. The systems are down. She won't be bothering them—or anyone else—ever again.”
A short pause on the other end of the line.
“People like that don't just stop, Mr. Starks. They find another way in.”
“They won't,” Rory said, and there was a terrifying, absolute finality in his tone that brooked no argument. “Because from now on, nobody gets near my daughters. Nobody.”
“Understood,” Veronica said. “Should I make breakfast when we get back to the estate? Pancakes? The girls like them with blueberries.”
Rory opened his eyes and looked out at the vast, endless expanse of the ocean, bright and clear in the morning light.
May you like
“Yeah,” he said softly, a faint, ghost of a smile touching the corners of his mouth. “Make the pancakes, Veronica. Make as many as they want.”
He hung up the phone, pocketed it, and stood there on the balcony for a long time, listening to the sound of the waves crashing against the shore—the only sound in the world, at last, that was real.
