Then they turned the corner and disappeared.
Rachel walked to the couch and sat down in the spot where Bear had been. The cushion was still warm.
She picked up her phone. No new messages. No unknown numbers. Just the quiet and the waiting and the sick feeling in her stomach that came from knowing the man she—
She stopped that thought before it could complete itself.
Instead, she pulled up the security camera app Ghost had shown her yesterday. Six different views of the property. Front door. Driveway. Back yard. Side gates. All clear.
All she could do now was wait.
42
The morning air off the bay was damp, fog thick enough that Ghost could taste salt on his tongue when he breathed. It stuck to his skin. The truck's interior was clammy, condensation forming in the corners of the windshield. He'd parked three blocks from Hale's last known address two hours ago, engine off now, windows cracked just wide enough to hear footsteps on the sidewalk if anyone approached.
His coffee had gone cold an hour ago. He drank it anyway, the bitter sludge coating his mouth, gritty with undissolved grounds. His eyes burned from lack of sleep and too much screen time, but he kept them on the building across the street.
Torch sat in the passenger seat, hunched over his laptop balanced on his thighs. The blue glow from the screen washed out his features. The bags under his eyes looked like bruises in the harsh light. His fingers moved across the keyboard in short bursts, taptap tap, pause, tap tap, running code that Ghost didn't fully understand but trusted completely.
Behind them, Echo had turned the backseat into something out of a spy movie. Four screens mounted to a custom rig he'd built himself, cables zip-tied in neat bundles snaking across the floor and up the back of Ghost's seat. The equipment gave off heat. The truck's interior was stuffy despite the cracked windows, the smell of warm electronics mixing with old coffee and body odor. The screens cycled through live feeds, traffic cameras, cell tower pings, thermal imaging showing heat signatures as orange blobs moving through a blue cityscape.
Ghost's phone sat face-up on his right thigh. The screen was dark. No notifications or messages from Rachel. Ideally meaning that she was going through the files like they’d discussed, staying out of sight.
Yet his stomach clenched anyway every time he looked at the blank screen.
He shifted in his seat. His lower back was starting to ache from sitting too long in the same position. His right leg had that pins-and-needles feeling from where the phone pressed against his quad. He rolled his shoulders, heard something pop, felt no relief.
"Predator's got eyes on Carver," Echo said from the backseat. His voice was quiet but clear in the enclosed space. "Target's exiting his residence now."
Ghost adjusted his posture, listening to the team chatter filter through his earpiece. The small speaker crackled slightly with each transmission, a faint static underneath the voices.
Across town, Ghost knew the streets by heart, could see the whole tactical map in his head, Rogue was positioned outside a coffee shop, playing the part of someone scrolling through their phone while actually monitoring the street. Predator had the interior, sitting by the window with a clear view of Carver's building exit.
They had Carver boxed. North, south, and visual on the main entrance. If he moved, they'd track him.
Brick and Reaper had the same setup on Langley. Different target, same precision.
And Ghost had Hale.
Except Hale hadn't left his apartment yet. Every minute that ticked past felt like time bleeding away. Vance wasn't stupid. Neither were the men working for him. If any of them sensed surveillance, if they caught even a hint that someone was digging into their operation, they'd burn everything. Evidence would disappear. Digital trails would get scrubbed. Witnesses would suddenly develop amnesia or worse.
Ghost had watched it happen before. Good operators doing the right thing, building solid cases, only to watch everything get buried under classification stamps and bureaucratic bullshit because the truth made someone important uncomfortable. Men he respected getting reassigned to desk jobs in Nebraska or pushed out entirely for asking the wrong questions.
Not this time. This time they'd build a case so airtight that even Vance couldn't make it disappear.
"Carver's moving," Predator's voice came through the earpiece. His tone was conversational, unhurried. "Three deliberate turns through downtown. Just stopped at a bakery. Now he's crossing against traffic."
Ghost's jaw tightened. Counter-surveillance. Textbook. Carver was testing for tails, checking if anyone was following him.
"Clean so far," Rogue added. "No tail visible. But he's definitely testing."
"Stay sharp," Ghost said into the mic clipped to his collar. "He's careful. Always has been."
Carver had been good at his job before everything went sideways. That didn't just go away.
Echo's fingers flew across his keyboard, the clicking rapid and rhythmic. "Carver just pulled his phone. Intercepting now. Running the trace..."
Ghost waited. The seconds stretched. His gaze dropped to his own phone again, still dark.
