Page 143 of Joker

Blaze raises a brow. “You just made stalking sound like a scholarship.”

Dom keeps typing. “It is, if you’re literate.”

Blaze flips him off.

Dom doesn’t even glance up.

I almost smile.

Logan points at Shadow and Blaze next.

“You two.”

Shadow pushes off the wall first.

“Town watch,” he says. “We rotate eyes on likely approaches, gas stations, motels, county roads, and anything near the property that gives someone a clean line of sight.”

Blaze nods. “And we start listening harder. Bar chatter. Auto shops. Convenience stores. The kind of places where somebody asking one too many questions doesn’t realize they’re already being remembered.”

Exactly. That’s why I wanted them in here. Men like Cal might know how to work systems. But systems still run through people. And people always talk.

Cain speaks next. “I’ll tighten gate protocol. Nobody comes in without being seen and cleared. Women and kids stay accounted for, especially if they’re off property.”

That lands in my chest for a second becausewomen and kidsisn’t abstract anymore.

It’s her. It’s Lexi. It’s personal enough now that every operational sentence hits a little harder than it used to.

Logan turns to me last. “You?”

That one’s easy. “I’m the wall.”

Nobody laughs. Nobody should. Because I mean it.

I’m the one between Raven and whatever gets through all of this. That’s not ego. That’s math.

Logan holds my gaze for a second longer, then nods once. “Alright.”

And just like that, it starts.

Not the war. Not yet. The preparation for it.

The part where smart men decide what kind of monsters they’re willing to become in advance so they don’t have to improvise when it counts.

The rest of the day turns into motion. Useful motion. The kind that keeps my hands busy enough not to put them around a dead man’s throat in imagination every five minutes.

I walk the property twice. Then again. I check the gate camera angles and hate two of them immediately. I adjust sightlines around the back tree line and make a mental note to clear more brush where somebody could sit too long without being noticed. I clock every vehicle on the property, every bike, every truck, every car, every guest vehicle that shouldn’t be there and isn’t but still gets mentally cataloged anyway.

I map routes. Not casually. Obsessively.

How would I get in if I were him?

How would I sit and watch without being seen?

How would I make first contact?

Would I come alone or with legal backup?

Would I try to snatch?