The Million-Dollar Heart by Rebecca Ryan

The “Destruction Plan” was the ill-fated op that Karen led with the Vanguard Agency’s elite squad, ending in a devastating failure.

After the mission’s collapse, Lark went AWOL, Micah vanished into obscurity, and Vance Edwards went deep undercover while the rest of the special squad was nearly wiped out.

Years later, Lark’s deputy team leader, Daphne, met a mysterious end.

Lark herself ended it all with a supposed suicide.

Due to the tragic consequences of the mission, the “Destruction Plan” was classified as top secret by the headquarters, never to be spoken of again.

For years, Percival had been itching to unravel the whole story, but his clearance level was far from sufficient.

Now, however, no longer being a part of the Vanguard Agency, he found himself with more freedom to act.

Vance rubbed his temples, his voice grave. “You should know that even with my clearance, I can’t access those files.”

“You just need to give me the “Destruction Plan” code. I know you remember it better than anyone.”

The past haunted every surviving member, and Vance had once climbed to the rank of second-in-command at the Sea City Vanguard Agency HQ.

He definitely had access to the detailed case files and that unforgettable sequence of numbers.

Vance hesitated. “You’re asking me to make a mistake.”

“You’ve done it before, Vance. It’s important to me.”

Silence stretched on the other end of the line before Vance finally spoke, “245214216589.”

After getting the information, Percival hung up and entered the code into his computer.

Seconds later, the connected printer whirred to life, detailing the “Destruction Plan” documents.

picked up the report, scrutinizing every word, imprinting

she had hacked into the Vanguard Agency’s secure servers seeking the “Destruction Plan” files but always

this

the correct file code, the documents remained

a wrong input would trigger a counter-hack sequence, pinpointing the intruder’s location within a

Vivienne had

handing Vivienne a glass of juice, and

She passed the papers to Percival

more. Standing up, he compared the new printouts with the old; his gaze turned

original operation trajectory of the

after Karen’s “suicide,”

matched

chasing GTO but rather GTO ambushing the

the intel on GTO’s location provided to the “Destruction Plan”

annihilation of the Vanguard Agency’s special

With such blatant evidence, no wonder Lark never returned to the

realized there was

her finger tracing a red line on the map. “This route? My mom led the first squad to safety

the document, his knuckles white. “It’s because of this decision that most of the first squad survived, though they eventually walked into an ambush. Still, it was a

pursuit,” Vivienne added, pointing at an image of the squad’s uniform. “Our pursuers wore this.

words tightened Percival’s

He remembered.

only him and Micah

being hunted from all sides, she never

shared the truth, it might have unleashed a storm of blood and betrayal within the Vanguard Agency,

not yet fully developed, and even Karen was in dire straits. The truth

Percival had never imagined that someone within the Agency had

silence, the weight of

Vanguard Agency that there was a mole in their midst, and the mole had indeed been identified, the raw truth still hit hard

a sense of dread. There,