I did not let them see the thing building behind my eyes.

I looked at each of them in turn — Vivienne, then Preston, then Damien — slowly, the way you memorize faces you intend to see again under very different circumstances.

And they mistook my silence for surrender.

I watched them do it.

I watched the smiles settle back onto their faces as they decided that the colonel understood the situation, that the threats had landed, that this uniformed woman knew better than to make war on a family with judges in its pocket.

That was the biggest mistake any of them would ever make.