“Their cybersecurity is annoyingly good,” she said finally.
“Whose.”
“Zodiac Tactical. He’s wearing their colors and running their playbook, and they have a network architecture I genuinely respect, which is upsetting.” More keys. “Anything I access from here gets silently logged. The data on the perimeter is almost certainly a honeypot. I could break it if I wanted to, but I would burn six months of operational silence to do it, and the data on the other side is probably manufactured anyway. Whoever set this up has done it before. I am backing out without leaving fingerprints. There. Done.”
“You can’t get in.”
“I can get in. I’m choosing not to. Don’t insult me.”
“Sorry.”
“Forgiven.” Cassandra’s voice had warmed by a degree. The work was steadying her. “Public information instead. Zodiac Tactical. Founded by a man named Ian DeRose, ex-Navy SEAL. Legitimate firm. Serious clients. They do executive protection, threat assessment, tactical security for people who can afford not to be killed. Not a rent-a-cop operation, Fal. These are the real ones.”
“Define real.”
“The kind of firm that gets called when private equity guys start receiving credible death threats. The kind of firm that does not lose principals.” A pause. A breath. “The kind of firm a person should not steal a watch from.”
She grimaced. “Noted.”
“What about Isaac? Can you find him specifically?”
A stretch of keys, then a soft exhale. “Isaac Baxter.”
Fallon sat with that. Four months of carrying a first name and a face, and now he had a last name. He was a real, traceable person in a real, traceable organization.
“Isaac Baxter,” she repeated.
“That’s him. I’ve got a professional profile, some public records, nothing that screams. He’s been with Zodiac for a several years. Works in their protection division.”
“What else?”
“Hold on. I want to cross-reference something.” The typing went rapid again. “I’m pulling your activity history. All our cities, events, targets, for the three years we’ve been working. And I’m running it against Zodiac Tactical’s known movements: public client filings, press mentions, event appearances, anything that shows where their people have been.”
Fallon’s stomach tightened. This was the question that mattered. If Zodiac Tactical’s movements tracked with hers, if they’d been at events she’d worked, in cities she’d operated in, then Boston and Austin weren’t coincidences.
They were surveillance.
Cassandra worked for nearly two minutes without speaking. Fallon listened to the keys and didn’t interrupt.
“Okay, thank God. Clean,” Cassandra said. “No overlap. Zodiac Tactical wasn’t near any of your previous targets. Not Seattle, not even before that. They were actually in Boston before you even got there. The overlap was coincidental.”
Fallon exhaled. Some of the tension left her shoulders.
“Now let me work the Austin angle from the other direction.” More typing. “I’m pulling the guest list from tonight’s event and looking for anyone who’d need a firm like Zodiac. High-profile, high-threat, the kind of client who hires private security for public events.” A pause. “Got it. David Endicott. CEO of a biotech startup that went public about six months ago. Made alot of people rich and a few people angry. He was on the guest list tonight.”
“That’s who they’re protecting?”
“That’s my best guess. He fits the profile perfectly. A man with money, enemies, and a public schedule. That’s exactly the kind of client Zodiac takes on.”
The picture was shifting. Fallon could feel it rearranging in her chest. “So Isaac Baxter isn’t in Austin because of me.”
“It doesn’t look like it. He’s here for a job that has nothing to do with you. You just happened to be working the same room.”
Fallon pushed off the counter. Her knee sent a sharp flare on the way up and she paused, letting the joint take her weight in its own time. She walked to the window and leaned her shoulder against the frame the way she had in this same apartment a dozen times before, staring at the same dark street through the same curtains she’d bought because the originals let in too much light.
But everything beyond the glass had changed.
She’d spent four months filing Isaac underharmless. A rich man at a gala. Someone she’d enjoyed and left behind and would never see again, because she’d made sure of it. No last name, no number, no trail. She’d walked out of that hotel room and closed the door on him completely, and she’d never once questioned whether the door would hold.
