At the top, a sudden wave of dizziness nailed him. The concussion.… He took a knee and steadied himself against the parapet. Precious seconds were passing. Lightheaded or not, he had to keep working. He assessed his battle readiness at roughly 80 percent. Not great, but acceptable. With a little luck and a lot of skill, this would all be over in the next ten minutes. He ignored the throbbing above his ear and pulled the duffel up to his position, then took a few seconds to scan the immediate rooftops. No one was present.

Staying as close to the parapet as possible to avoid making the roof creak, he traversed over to a position directly above the front door. If any pedestrians or vehicles approached, he’d be able to lie flat and use the parapet for cover. Several buildings distant, a tomcat wailed into the night. Another issued a challenge in return. A sliver moon gave the roof’s galvanized vents a dull, silvery glow. Mixed with the noxious odor of roofing tar, he caught the scent of cigarettes from the men in the alley he’d seen earlier.

“I’m in place above the front door,” he whispered. “I’m going to bypass the camera. If the video feed is being constantly monitored, they’ll come out to check the interruption. Harv, we’ll use that opportunity to gain entry. I’ll drop down from the roof using the rope while you rush in from the south. Grangeland, if that happens you stay put and watch for runners. Deadly force only if warranted. These may not be Montez’s men.”

“Copy,” Harv said.

“Grangeland?”

“Copy.”

Nathan took a deep breath, aware that the interior TV monitor would be snowy or blank during the brief interruption. Holding a tiny LED flashlight in his mouth, he worked quickly but carefully. No one came out to investigate the loss of signal. So far, so good. It took just under three minutes to make two plug-and-play connections in the existing coaxial line and get the battery and inverter set up for use. He plugged the cable from the camera into the first DVD’s input feed and the opposite end of the cable into the output feed. The DVD recorder was now connected between the camera and the monitor inside the warehouse.

Nathan inserted a disk, hit the record button, and looked at his watch.

“Video splice complete, recording normal scene.”

“Copy.”

“I’m going to give it seven minutes.”

Harv clicked the radio.