Clare refreshed the inbox. Nothing.
“Come on,” she muttered. “Answer. Just...”
Three minutes.
She refreshed again. Still nothing.
Her leg bounced, nervous energy. I put my hand on her knee. She stilled.
Four minutes.
“Maybe they’re not going to...”
The laptop pinged.
We both froze.
New message. Same sender.
Clare clicked it, hands shaking slightly.
Stop using this email. They monitor traffic patterns. Every message you send is another data point for them to triangulate your location.
Go dark. Ditch the laptop. Get a burner phone, cash only. Move locations. Do NOT contact me again.
You want to survive? Stop asking questions and START RUNNING.
Clare’s jaw set. “Fuck that.”
She hit reply before I could stop her.
We’re not running blind. If you know what they did to him, TELL US. Give us something. Otherwise we go to the authorities. Or journalists. Make this public. Force their hand.
I grabbed her wrist, yanking her off the trackpad.
Shook my head hard. Wrote fast:
NO. Bad move
She glared. “We need answers. This is the only person who’s given us any real information.”
Threatening them won’t work.
“Maybe not. But sitting here waiting to die won’t either.”
She pulled free and hit send.
The outgoing whoosh felt like a death sentence.
I wrote fast:
Mistake. Only ally.
“Good. Let them know we’re not rolling over.”
We waited.
One minute. Clare refreshed. Nothing.
