7. Falcon
Falcon
By six the next morning I already know the SUV wasn't a one off.
Condor's got three sightings pulled up across two monitors in the common room, all inside a forty-eight-hour window, all spread far enough apart to look like coincidence if you only ever saw one of them.
Put together, they're a pattern. South road, east service lane, the county route near the old quarry, different times, same vehicle profile, and the same habit of vanishing before anyone gets close enough for a plate.
Zip's standing over Condor's shoulder with coffee in one hand, glaring at the screen like he can intimidate the pixels into cooperating. Ice Pick's against the back of the sofa, arms folded. Rook's at the table with the patrol logs from last week.
Vulture walks in, takes one look at the room, and raises an eyebrow. “Do you all sleep in here now?”
“Ask the nerd,” Zip replies without looking away from the screen.
Condor swivels his chair toward him. “You’re the one who came down at five thirty.”
“Because you texted me,” Zip points out.
“I sent you information,” Condor corrects him.
Zip finally looks away from the screen. “At five seventeen in the morning.”
“It was time-sensitive,” Condor says, entirely unapologetic.
Vulture sets his mug on the table with a heavy thud. “Can we skip to the part where somebody tells me why half my officers are awake before sunrise?”
I slide the printout toward him. “The same SUV has appeared three times in two days.”
Vulture picks it up and reads without speaking.
Rook turns a patrol sheet toward him. “We also found tyre marks near the south access fence this morning.”
That gets everyone’s full attention.
Vulture lowers the printout. “Were they inside the fence?”
“No,” Rook answers. “They were outside the line, about twenty yards back.”
“How fresh?” Vulture asks.
“Overnight,” Rook confirms.
I’m already heading for the door. “Show me.”
We take the tree line instead of the main path, moving quietly and leaving the bikes behind. The prospects near the garage don’t try to stop us.
At the south fence, Rook crouches and points to the ground. The marks aren’t deep, but once I know where to look, the tread is clear and unmistakably fresh.
“A vehicle sat here,” Zip says, studying the ground.
Ice Pick scans the surrounding trees. “They were either watching the fence or timing the patrols.”
Vulture looks toward Condor. “Do we have any cameras covering this section?”
Condor checks the security map on his phone. “The outer range misses it by about eight yards.”
“Fix it,” Vulture orders.
“I’ve already ordered two more units,” Condor replies.
“Of course you have,” Zip mutters.
The fence itself is untouched. There are no cut wires, no pressure marks, and nobody tried to get through it.
That should feel like good news but it doesn't, because testing us without breaching takes discipline, and discipline means somebody's been watching us long enough to know exactly how far to push.
"Pull every patrol time for the last week," I tell Zip. "I want to know if the sightings line up with gaps." To Ice Pick, "Check the fence at the same distance all the way round, see if they parked anywhere else."
"Got it." Ice Pick nods.
Vulture watches me a moment. "Church in thirty." Then, before he turns, "Everyone there."
By the time Church starts the room's full and the mood's different than it's been all week. Not panic. Focus. Ice Pick drops photos of the tire tracks on the table.
"They parked in three places," Rook says. "South, northeast, near the old service gate."
"This one's older," Ice Pick adds, tapping the third photo. "Maybe two days."
"So they've been closer than we thought," Harrier says, and the humor's gone out of his face entirely.
Zip's already got the laptop turned around. "I ran the sightings against patrol rotation. Two of the three passes happened inside ten minutes of a shift change."
"Could be coincidence," Sterling says.
"The stop near the south line wasn't. It sat there nineteen minutes, during the longest gap in visibility we've got." Zip points at the times on the screen.
Condor pulls up the camera map. "They know where the blind spots are."
Nobody speaks for a moment. There’s no panic, only a grim understanding settling over the group.
Ice Pick straightens and scans the fence line. “Either they’ve watched us long enough to map the compound, or somebody handed them the map.”
“We’re not starting a witch hunt without evidence,” Vulture warns before anyone can seize on the suggestion.
“Nobody said we were,” Ice Pick replies, his expression hardening.
“You were thinking it,” I point out.
Vulture looks between us. “Don’t.”
His voice is flat enough to end the argument before it can begin.
I step in before it turns into something we don't need right now.
"Either way, we fix the weakness first." I point at the map.
"No more predictable rotation gaps. Patrols overlap fifteen minutes until this is done.
Cameras cover the dead zones. Nobody leaves the compound alone, patched or prospect. "
"Supply runs?" Harrier asks.
"Two vehicles. Nobody does anything alone."
Rook taps the women's house on the map. "Do we move them?"
That one lands and sits there. Vulture looks at me, and I understand what he's doing, letting the VP answer it after everything I promised the house yesterday morning. Choice. Information. Not deciding for them.
"We don't move anyone without talking to them first," I say. "Unless we've got an active breach. We agreed that with them yesterday."
Sterling nods. "Agreed."
"Even if we think it's safer?" Harrier asks.
"Then we tell them why, and they decide," I say meaning every word.
Sterling sends the update to the women’s house through the new security channel instead of calling. Once it goes through, Condor reads the message aloud from his screen.
Security Phone:
SECURITY UPDATE Evidence of surveillance found outside the perimeter. No breach detected. Patrols doubled and overlapping. Nobody is to leave the compound alone. The women’s house remains secure. Further update will follow after the perimeter sweep.
Harrier looks over Condor’s shoulder. “That’s shockingly readable.”
“I contain multitudes,” Condor replies.
Zip snorts. “You stole that line from me.”
“I improved it,” Condor informs him.
Vulture rubs a hand over his face. “I swear to God.”
Before the tension can settle over the room again, Sterling opens the feeder-company folder. He has a hit on one of the drivers, who has an active contract at a warehouse fourteen miles east. Two layers up, the ownership overlaps with the shell company we already know about.
Ice Pick looks toward Vulture. “Are we checking it out?”
“Not today,” Vulture answers.
Ice Pick’s expression hardens. “Why not?”
“Because somebody is trying to pull our attention away from the compound,” I explain.
Ice Pick studies me for a moment, works through the implications, then gives a reluctant nod.
"Nothing moves until we know whether the surveillance escalates," Vulture says. "We work. We don't chase bait."
Church breaks twenty minutes later. I stay behind with Zip and Vulture going over the overlapping patrol schedule, and by the time we're done the common room's filled with the ordinary noise of the compound trying to feel normal on top of everything else.
Harrier's arguing with a prospect about eggs.
Rook's checking his sidearm at the back table.
Threat layered under regular life. Our specialty.
I’m checking the rear gate when the security channel sounds through my radio.
It’s the priority tone. Not routine.
Every muscle in my body locks before Sterling finishes his first sentence.
“Falcon,” Sterling says over the channel. “There’s a problem at the women’s house.”
“What happened?” I demand, already moving.
“Somebody tampered with the back window latch,” he reports.
“Did they get inside?” I ask.
“There’s no confirmed entry,” Sterling answers.
My pace quickens. “Is anyone hurt?”
“Unknown,” he replies.
That’s the wrong fucking answer. I break into a run and key the radio. “Lock down the compound.”
“On it,” Zip confirms over the channel.
I switch to the next line and issue the orders without slowing. “Rook, take the south line. Ice Pick, cover the north approach. Condor, get on the cameras now. Vulture, meet me at the women’s house.”
“I’m moving,” Vulture answers without hesitation.
I take the trees at a dead run and this time I'm not running away from anything.
I'm running toward it, and I'm not alone.
The women's house comes into view, the front door standing open.
Sterling's on the porch. Gull and Digger are near the path. The first thing I notice is there’s no screaming, no gunfire, and it's still too quiet.
I take the steps two at a time. "Where?"
"Back hall. Kitchen window." Sterling points. "The women are in the living room."
I look through the doorway and every one of them is there, Sarah, Emily, Maya, Lena, Rachel, Frankie, and Cara standing near the sofa with one arm around Emily. They are unhurt and breathing. I don't know how badly I needed to see that until I see it.
She looks up and finds me, and for one second everything else disappears. Then Vulture's behind me. "Falcon, show me."
Right. Job first. I turn away from her and follow Sterling through the kitchen. The back window looks normal until he points at the latch, fine fresh scratches around the metal.
Ice Pick comes in through the back door. "Fence clear."
"South line clear," Rook says over the radio.
"Camera at the rear corner dropped for ninety-two seconds around eleven forty-three," Condor reports. "Signal interference."
My stomach turns cold. "That’s not random."
Vulture crouches by the window. "Could they have opened it?"
"The latch held," Sterling says.
"They weren't trying to get in," I say, looking at the scratches. "They were testing whether they could, for when they're ready."
"Same as the fence," Ice Pick says. "Learning about us."