He walked over to a large mahogany desk, picked up a document, and tossed it onto the floor in front of me. It was a deed of surrender, transferring all rights to the Vance family ranch and the crucial valley water rights to Thorne's development company.
"Sign it, Arthur," Thorne said flatly. "You sign the deed, and I let Sarah and the girl go. They can take your truck—or what's left of it—and leave the state. If you don't sign it, Grizz and his boys are going to take them out into the woods, and I'll make sure the police find your body in the wreckage of your truck, looking like a tragic, alcohol-fueled accident."
I stared at the document, my mind racing. I knew Thorne was lying. He couldn't let any of us live now that Logan had exposed his operations. He was going to kill us all the moment the ink was dry.
I looked at Logan. He gave me a barely perceptible nod, his right hand slipping out of the severed zip-ties behind his back. His hand drifted down to the pocket of his tactical cargo pants, where he had managed to conceal a small, ceramic folding knife.
I looked back at Thorne, forcing my expression to soften into one of complete, broken defeat. I reached out, my hand trembling as I touched the paper. "Alright," I whispered, my voice cracked and old. "Alright, Thorne. You win. Just... let me get my pen. It's in the tackle box. My father's pen. I want to sign it with that."
Thorne smirked, his arrogance blinding him to the desperate trap I was setting. He nodded to Grizz. "Give him the box."
Grizz sneered, tossing the heavy, rusted metal tackle box onto the floor in front of me. The metal clattered loudly against the wood, the latch popping open slightly.
I reached out, my hand slipping inside the box. My fingers bypassed the stacks of hundred-dollar bills, reaching deep into the bottom compartment beneath the tray. My hand closed around the cold, heavy steel of Danny's old military-issue SIG Sauer pistol—the one he had smuggled back from his first tour, which I had hidden in the secret compartment of the box years ago.
"I'm sorry, Danny," I whispered under my breath.
In one fluid, explosive motion, I pulled the pistol from the box, leveled it directly at Thorne's chest, and flipped the safety off.
"Step back!" I roared, my voice carrying a booming, military authority that shocked everyone in the room into absolute silence.
At the exact same instant, Logan exploded into action. He leaped to his feet, his ceramic knife flashing in the firelight as he slashed the throat of the guard standing next to him. The man gasped, clutching his neck as he collapsed. Logan caught the man's assault rifle before it hit the floor, spun around, and fired a short, controlled burst into the chest of the second guard.
Grizz roared, reaching for the pistol at his hip, but Logan fired a single, precise shot that tore through the biker's shoulder, spinning him around and sending him crashing into the stone fireplace.