A Crown of Quiet Knives

by Vivian Cross

Heat 3 / 5Novella · 12 chapters30,425 words2h 12m read~3h 23m listen

The key is lying in a puddle between two jets, and both of them want it.

At 12:11 a.m. in a sleet-hammered Chicago hangar, Astrid Torres crosses the no-man’s-land between a Blackridge-chartered plane and a rival crew’s matte-black aircraft with one order from the Manhattan tower ringing in her ear: retrieve the cream-painted master key before dawn, or the board will send someone to clean up the entire airfield. What she does not expect is Malik Alden stepping out of the dark on the other side — the lieutenant she once loved, once left, and whose brother she may have helped disappear into a locked room that officially does not exist.

Malik wants answers. Astrid has too many of them, and every single one is damning. Eighteen months ago she signed off on a corridor reroute that turned an exit into a killing funnel. Now that same room in the Manhattan towers is about to hard-lock with someone inside, and the key between them is the only thing standing between a cover-up and the truth.

MafiaEnemies To LoversMorally Grey