Chapter 34 - The Mole
"Julian isn't stupid," my father warned, pacing the length of the empty shelter office. "He will have operatives monitoring this building. He will realize we evacuated the women, and he will know we are setting a trap. We need to feed him false intelligence to keep his attention focused exactly where we want it."
Suddenly, my father’s head of security, a gruff former Marine named Reynolds, knocked sharply on the office door. He looked deeply disturbed.
"Mr. Vance, we have a massive internal problem," Reynolds reported, stepping into the room and closing the door tightly behind him. "I just ran a routine localized signal sweep of the perimeter to ensure our communications were secure. I found an unauthorized, high-frequency burst transmission originating from inside this building."
My blood ran cold. "Someone inside the shelter is broadcasting our position?"
"Worse," Reynolds said, handing my father a digital scanner. "The transmission contained an encrypted audio file. Someone recorded our tactical briefing in the lobby an hour ago and transmitted it to an external server. We have a mole inside the security team."
The realization hit us like a physical blow. Julian Cross hadn't just bypassed my father's corporate security; he had infiltrated our inner circle. He had bought one of our own men.
"Lock down the building," my father commanded, his voice a terrifying, lethal rumble. "Nobody leaves. Nobody makes a phone call. Find out exactly whose radio frequency matches the transmission."
For twenty agonizing minutes, we waited in absolute silence. The betrayal stung, but it also presented an unprecedented opportunity. If Julian was relying on an inside man for intelligence, his perspective was completely compromised.
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Reynolds returned, dragging a young, terrified-looking security contractor by the collar of his tactical vest. The young man, named Carter, was bleeding slightly from a split lip where Reynolds had clearly apprehended him with extreme prejudice.
"It was Carter," Reynolds growled, shoving the traitor into a chair. "We found a customized, long-range transmitter hidden in the heel of his boot."
