Chapter 8 - The Secure Safehouse
Two hours later, the convoy of matte-black SUVs cut through the rainy Manhattan night, turning off the main highway and descending into the reinforced underground garage of a secure military safehouse in upstate New York.
Maya Lin sat in the passenger seat of our vehicle, wrapped in a warm blanket provided by my security team. She had refused to leave, realizing quickly that once those men saw her face, her life outside the hospital was no longer safe either.
Daniel was resting peacefully in a medical cot set up in the back of the fortified bunker, hooked up to an advanced portable monitor overseen by a trusted military medic.
I stood in the command alcove of the safehouse, staring at the digital tactical maps displayed on the wall while Marcus worked on cracking the encrypted radio seized from the hospital.
“Colonel,” Marcus said, his fingers flying across a laptop keyboard. “We bypassed the rolling codes on the mercenary’s transceiver. The unit was receiving a live satellite downlink from a relay station in downtown Manhattan.”
“Trace it,” I ordered.
“Already did. The signal originated from an unmarked floor inside the federal administration building.”
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That single sentence shattered any remaining illusions. This wasn't a rogue cartel or a street-level vendetta. This was an inside job originating from the very government I had spent twenty-five years serving.
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