His jaw twitched as he stepped back into the tunnel to hear over the noise of the generators. He whipped out his phone and tapped Zach’s name.
“Yo,” his brother answered, voice clipped.
“Where are you?”
“Security office. Why?”
“So you know the generators didn’t start automatically. I’m in the tunnel now—I restarted them manually. The interface system was shut all the way down. Hard stopped at 14:35.”
A pause, then Zach asked, “Your theory?”
“I checked the door access log—it was opened at 14:30 with code 240482. Electrical engineer. Thing is, the system wasn’t scheduled for anything today. If he’s not our mole, I’ll eat my laptop.”
He ran a hand through his hair as he thought out loud. “Probably waited for a day we’d almost certainly lose power to cut it without suspicion. Group check-in just started, so perfect timing to scatter our staff. Someone else could have gotten his access code, though. It’s always possible.”
“I’ll handle it.” Zach hung up, succinct as ever.
David exhaled hard and shook out his fingers. The code was still active—he should kill that now before someone doubled down. He walked over to the keypad and inputted the override to disable the engineer’s access. If the guy was innocent, they could reset it later—after a long and uncomfortable talk with Security. And Zach.
He checked the time. Lena would still be at the front desk, managing the group check-in with a skeleton crew. She made it look effortless, but no one was built for that kind of sustained pressure.
The least he could do was sit at a terminal and field complaints until the storm passed. He ignored the little voice that said he’d never helped any other front-office manager like that.
His steps slowed as he moved through Maintenance. A dull pulse throbbed behind his eyes—slow, punishing. The kind that meant he’d pushed too hard. The building’s systems still echoedfaintly in his head—ghost signals flickering at the edge of his awareness.
He exhaled carefully.
Too much.
The sterile air of the admin corridor washed over him, cool and sharp, but it did nothing for the heat building at the base of his skull. His fingers flexed once. A tremor. Subtle, but there
Lena.
She flashed into his mind again. The look she’d given him earlier—steady. Searching. Not fear.
Something warmer. It unsettled him more than a power surge.
He told himself she worried because she cared about everyone. That was her brand of heroism. But the way her breath had caught?—
No.
He hadn’t imagined that. Still. It didn’t mean anything.
He ran an empire of zeros and ones. He wasn’t resort romance material. No crisp button-downs, no effortless charm. Just worn jeans and a talent for whispering to machines.
And Lena had survived hell. Fired. Harassed. Arrested.
The only reason she had landed here was that her best friend in HR had taken a professional risk most people wouldn't have.
His jaw tightened at the thought of what Chester Dinkley had done to Lena.
A dozen darkly satisfying revenge scenarios flickered through his mind. Auto-replies at scale. Improve his autocorrect terms. Schedule him for meetings on subjects like “Q2 Unicorn Mergers” or “Moral Responsibility in Glitter Distribution.” Deep fake humiliation involving sock puppets and interpretive dance.
His smile faltered as another spike of pain split behind his eyes.
Focus.
He could go deeper. Pull threads from the dark web. Expose something real. Ruin the man properly.
