The bunker is emptier now that she’s gone.
She took something with her. Not anything I could name or justify reclaiming.
But it’s significant.
And I carry the weight of that loss with me into the dark, knowing it is the price of choosing control over what I wanted.
I sitat my desk with the lights low, the glow from two monitors washing the room in muted blue. One screen runs numbers. The other tracks messages that do not stop coming in, feeds Wells built to update whether I am watching or not.
The glass of whiskey sits untouched at my elbow. I have not decided whether I want it.
There are too many decisions stacked too close together, and each one pulls at a different piece of the board. I stare at a sticky note that Clara left for me, and I can’t even make sense of the letters to form a coherent thought.
My phone buzzes. I pick it up without looking.
“Rhodes,” I say.
“Hey, brother.” Rhodes’s voice comes through steady and controlled.
“What’s up?”
“I wanted to check in on Tripp. No movement on my end. Are we keeping him pulled for now, or do you want to escalate?”
I lean back in my chair and drag a hand along my jaw, the scrape of my beard grounding me. The pressure in my chest doesn’t lift. It hasn’t since the night my father died.
“Where are we with him?” I ask. “Exactly. I’ve been buried. Walk me through anything new.”
“He’s still secured,” Rhodes says. “Vin said the directive came from you. We’ve gone through what he’s willing to give, but there’s nothing concrete about what he was doing with the Duvalls. No proof he understood what he was stepping into. It’s possible he didn’t.”
My fingers tighten around the phone as I fist my beard.
“Do you think he’s lying?”
There’s a pause. Rhodes doesn’t rush it.
“I think he’s scared,” he says. “Not strategic. Not ambitious. Loyal, if that still matters. But careless enough to cause damage without meaning to.”
Vin sees a compromised asset. I see a system exposed at the wrong seam, at the worst possible moment.
“I’m not interested in making an example out of him,” I say. “I want clarity. If he touched something he shouldn’t have, I need to know how. If someone used him, I need to know who and why.”
“Understood,” Rhodes says.
“Where is he?”
“Warehouse off Elysian Fields. He’s secured and isolated. Do you want to try to talk to him? I can meet you there.”
“I’m going, but I want to do it alone.” My answer is immediate. “I’ll handle it. Who’s on rotation?”
“Guerrard and French. One of them will be on site.”
“Good. Keep it tight. No one improvises.”
We disconnect. I let the phone drop onto the desk instead of setting it down carefully. The sound is dull. Final.
Tripp isn’t the question.
He’s the entry point.
