The Little Safehouse on the Wye
Some friends bring wine. Dar’s bring tactical baggage and plans for a safehouse.
When Logan and Rhys crash her quiet life, the safest house becomes the most dangerous.
Hereford
Rhys sat motionless in the passenger seat of Logan’s Range Rover, watching hedgerows streak past in the dreary afternoon. His jaw ached from clenching it. The folder Veyr had given them lay closed on his lap, its secrets still unread because every time he tried to open it, he saw Dar’s face instead. She analyses patterns. Doesn’t mean she understands what those patterns represent in flesh and blood.
Logan drove with his usual controlled aggression, taking corners as if he had something to prove to the asphalt. Neither of them had spoken since leaving the facility. The silence had weight—the kind that accumulated between men who’d shared enough bullets and bad decisions to communicate in frequencies ordinary people couldn’t hear.
“You’re thinking too loud,” Logan’s eyes remained fixed ahead.
Rhys turned the folder over in his hands. Expensive leather. Government money. “She’s brilliant. You know that.”
“But?”
“But brilliant doesn’t stop rounds. Doesn’t prevent blowback when the people we’re hunting decide to hunt back.” Rhys pressed his thumb against the folder’s edge until the skin went white. “Thompson in Berlin. Rashid in Karachi. We’ve both seen how that ends.”
“Dar’s not Thompson.”
“No. She’s better. Sees connections that take us weeks in minutes.” Rhys stared at his distorted reflection in the windowpane. “Which is exactly why I’m worried.”
Logan’s knuckles tightened on the steering wheel. “Veyr promised she’d stay remote.”
“Veyr can promise all she wants.” Rhys flipped the folder over again, a nervous tic he couldn’t suppress. “You trust her?”
A bitter laugh. “I trust her to use us until we’re spent. Same as every handler I’ve ever had.”
“Then why are we bringing Dar into this?” Rhys took a deep breath. Because we need her. Because those bastards will keep killing, and we need every advantage. The logic was airtight, and he hated himself for not being able to argue with it.
“Because she’s already in.” Logan’s voice went quiet. “Moment Veyr identified her, the choice stopped being ours. We can either bring her in where we can watch her back, or—”
“Or someone else does, and we’re on the outside.” Rhys finished, tasting bile. He opened the folder finally, letting his eyes scan the first page without really seeing it. Codenames. Target profiles. The usual bureaucratic sanitisation of human evil. “She thinks this is about justice. Making a difference.”
“Isn’t it?”
“We both know what this is about.” Rhys looked at Logan properly now, reading the tension in his jaw. “Containment. Elimination. Getting our hands dirty so politicians can keep theirs clean.”
A tractor pulled out ahead. Logan downshifted, engine growling. “Dar’s not stupid. She’ll figure it out.”
“And when she does? When she realises the patterns she’s tracking end in unmarked graves and diplomatic incidents that never make the news?” Rhys closed the folder, pressing it flat against his thighs. “You remember what you were like after Baghdad? First six months?”
“Don’t.”
“You didn’t sleep for weeks. Jumped at car backfires. That was you—trained, prepared, expecting exactly what you found.” Rhys’s voice dropped. “What happens when Dar connects someone’s daughter to a trafficking ring? When her analysis puts a name and face to—”
“I said don’t.” Logan’s tone carried an edge that would’ve made most men back off.
Rhys wasn’t most men. “She’s my concern too. Not just yours.”
Silence stretched between them. Rhys’s mind flashed to the files Veyr had shown them—cold cases Dar had cracked from publicly available data, connections entire intelligence divisions had missed. A weapon they desperately needed.
You didn’t point weapons at targets without accepting they might break.
“We protect her,” Rhys said. “Whatever it takes. She gives us the patterns, we handle the consequences. She never has to see the room where we interview subjects. Never has to smell what gunfire smells like up close.”
Logan nodded slowly. “Agreed.”
“And if it gets too heavy—if we see her cracking—”
“We pull her. Veyr’s orders be damned.” Logan’s jaw set in that stubborn line Rhys knew well. “She’s family before she’s operational.”
The tightness in Rhys’s chest eased. Not gone, but manageable. He re-opened the folder, forcing himself to read properly. Three targets, all connected to an arms trafficking network stretching from Hereford to Minsk. The kind of operation that needed someone like Dar to map the nodes, and men like him and Logan to cut them out. We’ll keep her safe. We’ll use her brilliance without letting the darkness touch her. He almost believed it.
Logan stood at the rain-streaked window in his barracks, whisky glass warming in his palm. His mobile sat on the windowsill, Pam’s last message glowing on the screen: She’s excited, Lo. First time I’ve seen her eyes light up in months. He’d read it four times, searching for permission to intervene. Nothing.
He drained the glass. She didn’t know the actual cost, the way the work embeds itself in your mind until you see patterns in every innocent routine. Untested. You couldn’t explain how the first time you held evidence of a child’s suffering, something inside you broke for good.
Rhys shifted by the door, his own glass empty. “Time to go.”
Logan nodded, grabbing his bag. She was in. The machine was turning. All he could do now was stand ready to catch her. He checked his watch and fired up the Rover.
After her meeting with Veyr, Dar channelled her nervous energy into purpose. She wrestled a sturdy box from the attic, packing away her thesis. Beside her laptop, the two black devices Veyr had provided sat like sleek, silent threats. She hauled the box to the cramped storage room, the stubborn door jamming open. Its industrial shelves and forgotten charity-shop finds sparked an idea: a new office. As the pizza heated in the oven, anticipation replaced her anxiety—until the crunch of tyres on gravel broke the quiet. Barely past six.
Logan came through the front entrance and dropped his kit bag by the door. The heavy thud against the wood floor spooked Twigs from her post at the living room window—she bolted upstairs. That sound was unmistakable to Dar: it meant Logan was staying. Only then did it occur to her that with ‘retirement’ he’d no longer be staying at the base.
Rhys followed a moment later, his stride quieter but still imposing.
Dar wiped her palms down her jumper as they appeared. “You’re back. Wasn’t sure if I should expect you or not.”
Logan leant against the doorframe, arms crossed. “Would’ve been back later if you’d texted that you were cooking.” The barb was met with Dar’s eye roll. He’d made a mistake by not stopping for takeaway. “Plans changed. Rhys volunteered to explain why.” His eyes swept the room—windows secure, exits clear, teapot steaming.
Rhys lingered near the doorway, watching Dar’s expression shift—that subtle bracing she did so well.
“Didn’t know if you wanted the company…but we need to talk, Dar.” His tone was low, controlled. The meeting with Veyr had left them both wound tight.
Dar shot a glance at Logan, then Rhys. “Right. Well, no time like the present.” She picked up the dishcloth from the counter, her fingers working at the fabric.
“Veyr wants to repurpose the house. Put it back to full safe house protocols.” Rhys watched her closely, anticipating her response.
Logan finally pulled off the sunglasses, folding them slowly, as the kitchen light highlighted the scar on his temple. “We get what this house is to you, Dar, and I fought it. But the location’s too good to ignore—river access, the acres, sight lines, low civilian density.” He paused. “Veyr’s not asking, but we get a say in how it’s done. Forty-eight hours before her team shows for assessment.” His gaze flicked to Rhys, then back.
“Safe house protocols mean cameras, hardened doors, sensors. Basement gets comms upgrades—Hawk and I can handle that. We’ll box up whatever you want moved to my suite or storage. Your room stays yours. Zoe’s stays locked—that’s non-negotiable.” His fingers drummed once against the wall. “You set the boundaries. Which rooms, what times. I’ll enforce them.”
Refusing Veyr wouldn’t change anything—the house would become a safehouse, regardless. Dar’s mind began cataloguing what needed moving: her office to the storage area, personal items to… somewhere. The thought had haunted her since Zoe died, but hearing Logan confirm it cut deep. Not mine. Never really mine. She swallowed hard. “It’s always been your house, Logan.” Her voice cracked, and she wrapped her arms around herself, staring at the wall.
She turned towards the window above the sink. The darkness outside pressed against the glass, reflecting her pale face. Beyond, she could just make out the chains of Zoe’s rusting swing set swaying in the breeze.
The house breathed Zoe’s memory. Dar could almost see the faint pencil marks on the doorframe where they’d measured her height each year. How could she explain that these walls held her daughter’s laughter? Grief strangled the words before they could form.
She forced the tears down and turned to face them. “So what’s the plan? I box up my life while you two stand guard?” She paused, then smirked. “Or am I not allowed to leave?”
Logan moved to the table and placed his hands flat on the surface. His voice was low and deliberate. “The house stays yours. We harden it—cameras, secure comms, reinforced entry points. You need protection whether you like it or not. Zoe’s room stays untouched. Off-limits to everyone, including Veyr’s people.” He paused, meeting her eyes. “We’re building a fortress around you, Dar. You can’t refuse that.”
She clenched her trembling hands into fists. The thought of them leaving again, of the house returning to its cavernous silence, was unbearable. Weeks, sometimes months, of nothing but ghosts and Zoe’s cat for company. Of late-night ‘SOS’ calls to Pam. As much as their presence might prove irksome, she needed them here.
“Fine.” She straightened, mirroring Logan’s stance. “The spare room upstairs? Fine. But Zoe’s room stays locked.” Dar motioned to the storage room door, now stuck ajar. “That new office will be mine—no one touches my files. Kitchen and sitting room are communal, but I won’t be treated like a housekeeper.” She met their eyes. “You can have the house, but you don’t get to dictate how I live in it.”
The timer cut through the standoff. Logan went to the oven, pulling out the pizza with practised efficiency. The tension eased fractionally.
Dar huffed. “Outflanked by a frozen pepperoni and cheese. Consider it my terms of surrender.”
She fetched plates from the cupboard, setting them on the counter with deliberate clinks. They settled around the table, the earlier confrontation simmering beneath the surface. “What’s Veyr’s timeline?” she asked.
Rhys’s shoulders eased as Dar’s posture shifted, that quiet command returning to her voice. He took three beers from the fridge, popped off their lids, and poured them into the glasses on the table. “Veyr moves when the intel dictates, not on anyone’s timeline. Could be days, could be tonight.” He pulled out the chair opposite her and sat, the ache in his joints settling into something familiar. “No interior surveillance, just perimeter sensors. If you want it to look like a proper workspace, we’ll manage that. The office gets a secure line—discreet. You’ll have a panic button routed to Logan’s suite and my mobile.”
As Rhys reached for a slice, Dar felt the need to break the tension. “Pam suggested a panic button disguised as a biscuit tin.” The absurdity of it made Logan crack a smile, and Rhys let out a short laugh. Logan paused, considering. “Might not be a bad idea.” He sat down. “You think I’m being paranoid.”
Dar shrugged. “I think you’re being thorough.”
“Eight months ago,” Rhys said, “a contractor we’d used twice—vetted, cleared, worked two jobs without incident—pulled up to a safehouse in Brussels in a delivery van.” He picked at the label on his beer bottle. “Got out with flowers for the occupant’s birthday. Except the occupant’s birthday was in November, and it was March.”
Logan’s jaw tightened. “The team inside caught it. Stopped him at the door; ran the plates. Van was clean, flowers were real, but the driver’s background had been scrubbed and rebuilt in the last six months. Whoever did it even seeded two years of utility bills.“
“They find out who sent him?” Dar asked.
“Eventually.” Rhys met her eyes. “Took four days. By then, two other contractors had gone dark. One turned up in a canal. The other… we never found.”
“The network had been compromised for months,” Logan said.
“It’s not about trust,” Rhys looked at Dar. “It’s about layers. The more barriers between you and someone who wants to reach you, the more chances we have to catch them before they do.”
Dar set down her beer. “Point taken.”
They talked through another beer, the conversation drifting to safer ground. Logan collected the empty bottles and cleared the dishes. Rhys’s phone buzzed once in his pocket. He and Logan exchanged a glance.
Dar saw it but didn’t ask.
Veyr would ring. This peace wouldn’t last.