The rain had a way of softening the city blurring the harsh edges of glass and steel until even the shadows looked tired. It fell steady and thin, a whispering rhythm against the safehouse windows as Victor stared at the cracked laptop screen, his reflection ghosting over lines of encrypted data.

He’d been sitting there for hours, a cigarette burning itself out in the ashtray beside him. The screen’s glow painted his face in shades of exhaustion the kind that came from years, not ...