Page 129 of The Thief
"Secure location. Armed guards, full surveillance. They'll be safe while we handle this."
Good. The last thing we need is to worry about civilian casualties while hunting a traitor.
"Catch us up," Maverick says, settling into a chair.
I fill them in on Murphy's call, the information Trace extracted, the confirmation that we have a high-level mole. Their faces get progressively grimmer as I talk.
"Twelve suspects," Emmanuel says when I finish. "How do we narrow it down?"
"Carefully," Henry replies. "These are good men, most of them. We can't just start interrogating everyone based on suspicion."
"Can't we?" Danny's voice is cold. "Because one of these 'good men' has been getting our people killed."
"Which is exactly why we need to be smart about this. False accusations will tear this organization apart faster than any external threat."
Maverick studies the suspect list. "What's the common factor? What gives all these men access to sensitive information?"
"Different things. Some are soldiers, some are security detail we've been using more now that Alastríona's here, some are your men who've helped with Alastríona. The only common thread is proximity to operational details."
"And opportunity. They've all been in a position to observe, overhear, or access confidential material."
Stephen points to a name on the list. "What about him? Sean Murphy—no relation to Belfast Murphy. He's been acting strange lately."
"Strange how?"
"Nervous. Jumpy. Asking questions about things that don't concern him."
"Could be guilt. Could also be the stress of knowing there's a mole among us."
"Or it could be fear that we're getting close to identifying him."
We go through the list systematically, analyzing each suspect's behavior, access, opportunity. None of us willing to eliminate unless we're a thousand percent sure they're not the mole.
"Six names left," Denis says after an hour of discussion. "Six men who had the access, opportunity, and means to betray us." Three Gallaghers and three Houlihan men left. One of those six is betraying us.
"How do we identify the real mole?"
"Trap," I say. "Feed different information to each suspect and see which version makes it back to Trace."
"What kind of information?"
"False intelligence about our next move. Different details for each suspect, tagged so we know the source when Trace responds."
Henry nods slowly. "It’s risky. If we guess wrong, we could be feeding him real operational details."
"If we don't act, he keeps feeding him real intelligence anyway."
"Point taken. What do you propose?"
I think through the logistics, the timing, the potential consequences. "We give each suspect a different story about where Alastríona will be moved next. False safe house locations, different dates, different security arrangements."
"And when Trace responds?"
"We'll know which story he heard. Which tells us who's been talking."
Maverick frowns. "What if he doesn't respond? What if he's smart enough to know it's a trap?"
"Then we've bought ourselves time while he tries to figure out what's real. Either way, we gain an advantage."
