He swore, low and vicious, and tightened his grip.
Her lungs burned. Her body strained. Her mind spun through every strategy she’d ever studied, searching desperately for something that could apply tothis. To being dragged forward by men twice her size, toward an exit that meant death, with no Marshall barreling in to catch her hand and pull her out.
Her heel slid on the carpet as the door loomed closer, its emergency light washing the hallway in a faint, red glow, like the whole world had tilted toward warning.
Her chin lifted. Her eyes burned with refusal.
If they were going to drag her into the dark, she would go down fighting—mind sharp, body resisting, and silently screaming for help through the wild, unbroken terror in her eyes.
And then the door was beside her, and they pulled her through.
CHAPTER 27
MARSHALL
Marshall pushedthrough the ballroom’s cheerful glamour with the precision of a man moving against a riptide. His jaw was set, eyes cutting across the room in sweeping arcs. He’d reentered with purpose, but it took precious seconds for him to realize why his instincts were screaming.
Morris’s inner circle had shifted. The casual drift of politicians and strategists had hardened into a subtle formation that boxed the senator in like a crown guard. Hale had vanished from the center of the crowd. Sidarov’s people were moving with new intention, weaving toward the service corridors at the back of the ballroom.
And Norah was nowhere.
His chest tightened. He scanned again, faster this time, tracking faces, dresses, posture, hair—anything that might be her. Nothing.
Until—
Two men in tailored black suits slipped along the ballroom’s right flank, keeping their shoulders angled to block a third figure between them.
And Marshall knew that dress.
The stiff control. The slight drag of her right heel. The way her chin lifted when she was afraid.
Norah.
His pulse slammed once, hard, like his heart was putting him on notice. Then he moved.
Not a sprint. Not yet. Just a clean, quiet break from the crowd—cutting across servers, ducking behind a column, sliding through a gap in donors. The music swallowed the sound of his steps. The chandeliers cast enough shadow to hide him when he needed to disappear.
He watched the men angle her toward and through a side door.
Heat surged up his spine, cold and electric. They’d already decided what to do with her. They were removing her from the board before she even realized the game had shifted.
He didn’t wait another heartbeat to follow them into the corridor.
The hallway outside the ballroom was a slim corridor lined with utility doors and staff signage. The two operatives kept Norah close, one in front, one behind, guiding her with practiced subtlety. Anyone glancing over would think they were escorting a tipsy guest to fresh air.
Marshall hit them like a shadow breaking form.
He grabbed the rear guard first—hand at the wrist, twist, elbow to the throat—silencing him before a warning sound could escape. The man’s gun clattered uselessly against the carpet as he crumpled.
The second guard spun, already reaching for the weapon under his jacket.
He didn’t get there.
Marshall slammed him into the wall with enough force to rattle the plaster. The man swung back, but Marshall caught his forearm and drove his own fist into the man’s solar plexus,once, twice, fast and punishing. The guard folded, gasping, and Marshall yanked him down by the collar, knocking him out cold with a sharp blow to the jaw.
Ten seconds. Maybe less.
Norah stood frozen, pressed against the far wall. Her eyes were wide, glassy with shock. Her dress was rumpled, curls slipping from their pins, her breath sharp and shallow.
