I hang up and look at the wall of screens.
“Find me his human weaknesses,” I tell the room.
“Family. Lovers. Habits. Ego.”
Someone laughs nervously.
“Start with ego,” I say. “Men like him always circle back to watch themselves burn.”
Three hours later, we get the first real hit.
A burner phone lights up.
A pattern matches.
A face appears on a traffic cam that shouldn’t.
“There,” I say.
“Is that him?”
“Not yet,” I reply. “That’s his shadow.”
Which means…
We’re close.
And this time, he doesn’t get to choose the battlefield.
92
Rourke Hale
The city turns on you before the people do.
That’s the first lesson.
Cards decline.
Doors don’t open.
Reservations disappear.
Systems that have always bent suddenly refuse.
By the time the news hits the networks, I already know.
Eleanor is down.
Worse — she didn’t just fall.
She broke.
I sit in the back of a moving car and watch three different routes fail in real time on my tablet.
Accounts frozen.
Two safe houses flagged.
