The computer update had finally finished, and Isa was huddled in a corner sleeping off Hurley’s scotch. Understandable. In his position, who wouldn’t have crawled into that bottle?

Rapp launched an encrypted texting program and sent a brief message to an account that had never been used before. In South Africa, Claudia would get a notification and immediately understand that Hurley’s prediction had come true. The shit had hit the fan.

He adjusted the laptop’s screen so he could keep an eye on it and leaned back against the kitchen cabinets. Blackout shades were closed, along with a second layer of heavy curtains just to be sure. All his and Hurley’s safe houses were set up exactly the same way. It made sense to stick with what worked and to keep protocols consistent.

He’d expected a quick response to his text but after ten minutes, Claudia was still a no-show. The tension in his back and shoulders was getting worse with every tick of the second hand. She was never without her phone. Even when she took a shower, it sat on the counter close enough that she could hear notifications. Had someone gotten to her?

He shook his head violently, trying to clear it. Caution was good, but there was a fine line between it and paranoia. While he, Kennedy, and Coleman were staying off comms to the greatest degree possible, they knew how to contact him. If something had happened to her or Anna, he’d have heard about it.

Ten more minutes passed, and he started to feel the apartment’s darkness sinking into him. Maybe no one needed to get to her. Maybe she’d decided on her own that it was time to bail.

Claudia’s genius for logistics hadn’t been honed at FedEx or General Motors. She’d been the organizational force behind one of the most successful private assassins in modern history. She hadn’t stayed alive this long by being stupid. And she had a daughter to think about. It didn’t take someone with her mental horsepower to figure out that people who got close to him tended to end up dead.

At the thirty-minute mark, Rapp was forced to start reassessing his situation. He had a little cash, a couple of pistols, a stolen SUV, a few fake passports, and a drunk Saudi bureaucrat. Also, the apartment. Hurley had selected it because it allowed access to the roof where it was possible to jump from building to building and eventually disappear down between them. But that plan had been formulated years ago. With modern surveillance cameras and drones, the advantage pretty much disappeared. If the Saudis found out who he was and where he was, things weren’t going to go well.

He was about to stand when the light in the room wavered subtly. Glancing over at the laptop, he saw hesitant writing appearing on-screen.