A Bar Called O'Malley's #1

Scott is already moving when the knock comes again, hard and deliberate from the rear entrance. He plants a hand on the bar edge, listening over the rain.

Darcy’s hand tightens once on Patrick’s shoulder, then she eases it away as she shifts upright in the booth, alert and ready. The pub’s lights glow warm against the storm-dark windows.

Scott crosses behind the bar and angles toward the rear hall, jaw set. He reaches the door and pauses, shoulders squared, listening for the next move on the other side.

The knocking stops. For one breath, only the rain fills the silence, and the back door sits under Scott’s hand like it is waiting to decide what comes next.

Patrick snatches up the barbed bat from beside the booth and rolls his shoulders loose, the motion easy despite the tension. The rear hall stays quiet, but the silence now feels chosen, not empty.

Scott’s head lifts a fraction at the line, hand still on the rear door. Darcy pushes fully out of the booth, the small pirate trinket at her collar catching the warm light as she squares up beside Patrick.

A soft scrape answers from beyond the door, low and close, like something shifting its weight against the frame. Scott’s grip tightens, and he angles his shoulder toward the latch.

The rear handle twitches once from the other side. Whatever is there is no longer pretending to be just a knock.

Scott gives Patrick a sharp look, then yanks the latch and throws the rear door wide. Cold air spills in, carrying rain and the smell of wet pavement.

Nothing stands in the doorway. A narrow black strip of cable lies against the threshold, and the handle has been tugged by an unseen line from outside.

Patrick gets the answer, but the bad news lands with it, the rear alarm light on the wall blinking red from a cut wire just inside the frame.

Scott leans out into the rain, scanning the alley, while Darcy shifts closer to Patrick, ready for whatever the opened door has invited in.

Patrick angles past the open frame and studies the alley while rain threads down the brick. The black cable on the threshold is no loose spill, it runs taut toward the dumpster line, leading his eye straight to a figure half-hidden by shadow.

He spots a crouched intruder in a dark hood, one hand braced on the wet pavement, the other holding a compact cutter. The person is already turned to flee, but their pack hangs open, spilling a coil of matching cable and a tiny red blink of its own.

Scott straightens in the doorway, seeing the same shape. Darcy shifts her weight beside Patrick, one hand coming up as if to spring.

The intruder jerks their head toward the door and freezes at the sight of Patrick, caught in the alley light. At the same moment, a second cable loop dangles from the back gate, showing there is an open path deeper into the alley if Patrick wants it.

Patrick flashes Darcy a sharp hand signal, then blurs out of the doorway in a crackle of speed. Rain streaks past as he cuts the alley in a white-hot line and plants himself at the far side of the hooded intruder's escape route.

The intruder jerks up short, boxed in between Patrick and the pub wall. Darcy is already moving in a low, silent arc toward their blind side.

The hooded figure tightens around the cutter, then stops trying to run. The blinking pack light throws quick red flashes over wet brick and the open rear gate behind them.

Patrick holds the lane clean, body set between the intruder and the deeper alley while Darcy closes the last gap. The cut cable lies at their feet like a trail finally pinned to its source.