Every word feels like a risk. A piece of myself I’m handing over without knowing if she’ll handle it carefully. Or if she’ll realize, once she sees enough, that the real me isn’t worth the trouble.
“We should check the simulation.”
The words come out urgent, and I recognize the move for what it is, a retreat. She just told me she likes seeing the real me, and instead of sitting with that—instead of letting myself believe it—I’m diving back into the only world where I know I won’t fail.
I tell myself I’m giving her an exit.
It’s easier than admitting I’m the one who needs it.
She pivots her monitor with a flick of her wrist. “The metrics are still holding. Signal arbitration’s clean, no backlog on any tier. If it does collapse, it’ll be a boundary condition issue, not the algorithm. We’re... past the first stress inflection, at least.” She’s already punchy with the jargon, her safe place, same as mine.
“Want to run a controlled chaos test?” I ask. “We can program in unpredictable spikes—simulate a seizure event or a direct hardware attack.”
Her eyes light up, and I wonder if we’rebothrelieved to be back in the steel-and-code world. “Let’s throw everything at it. If it fails in catastrophic style, it’ll be way more fun to watch it break in real-time.”
CHAPTER 10
Logan
Iwake up to sunlight stabbing through my curtains and check my phone. 10:23 a.m, Monday. No messages from Audrey, which means her shift is going smoothly.
After Saturday night’s breakthrough, we’d agreed to take turns monitoring the simulation through Sunday—six-hour shifts, trading off so neither of us completely destroyed our sleep schedules. I’d taken the last overnight slot, finally stumbling home around 6 a.m. Which means I’m not due back at the lab until after lunch.
So far, the adaptive model has held up through every stress test we’ve thrown at it. Forty-eight hours of continuous operation and counting.
But that’s not what’s keeping me awake.
Saturday night, somewhere between the Thai food and the controlled chaos tests, Audrey had looked at me and said she liked seeing the person underneath. The real me. The mess beneath the brilliant mind.
And then she’d said:Is that why you never learned how to...
She didn’t finish. But she’s starting to figure it out.
And I don’t know what to do with that.
Or how to respond if she does.
I need to talk to someone. Not Dominic—he’d laugh, then send me a BuzzFeed listicle titled ‘10 Ways to Be Less of a Disaster.’ Not Bennett or Caleb. They’d listen, but something about confessing this to them feels like confirming everything they already suspect.
Which leaves David.
He’s the only one of us who’s an actual adult—holding down a job so he can raise his kid alone, never flinching at other people’s chaos. He doesn’t judge. Or if he does, he keeps it to himself.
If I’m going to say this out loud to anyone, it’s him.
I drag myself out of bed, shower, dress, and then head to Luminous before I can talk myself out of it.
Luminous occupies three floors of a gleaming tower in the Loop. I’ve never been here physically—although, digitally, I’ve been all over this place while helping Serena and Caleb with a case not so long ago. It’s nice. As chic as you’d expect a cosmetic company to appear. I immediately feel out of place.
The receptionist looks up and smiles. I’m about to turn around and flee when David appears, all effortless competence.
“Logan.” He erases his surprise after the first syllable. “Didn’t expect to see you in the wild.”
“Needed to talk. You got a minute?”
“Of course.” He nods to the receptionist, who melts into gratitude at no longer having to wrangle me, and leads me down a corridor of glass and matte-black doors.
David’s office is exactly what I would have guessed: zero in the way of personal effects. One framed picture of his daughter. A desk, meticulously neat, except for a stack of thick folders rubber-banded together. Even the art on the walls is beige in intent.
