The crunch of footsteps outside the safehouse was like a blade against silence. Regan signaled Lila to take cover with a swift hand gesture and swept to the window, weapon steady in his grip. The steel felt cold against his palm, a familiar weight. Someone was out there, moving with practiced precision through the shadows between streetlights.
But they didn't attack. They watched, then vanished.
Regan's breath caught, a hard knot tightening in his chest. He'd seen this pattern before—reconnaissance. Assessment. The prelude to something worse.
Keeping his gaze on the window, he whispered, “Three o'clock, about eighty yards in the pines.” The old warped glass distorted the surrounding forest into a bizarre scene of twisted shadows.
Lila crouched beside the wall, her own weapon drawn, eye
