Not a shadow, not a shift of light, not so much as a flicker of dust.
Just the door sensors spiking out of nowhere.
Dawson rubs his jaw. “Well, that’s unsettling.”
I zoom in on the access panel logs. Clean. Too clean. Someone didn’t just trigger it—they understood exactly how to touch the system without leaving a fingerprint.
“Ethan,” Dawson says, lowering his voice, “you’re sure this isn’t a malfunction?”
“No.” The word is flat, certain. “Hardware’s solid. Software too. This wasn’t an error.”
He whistles under his breath. “So we’re looking at someone who knows their way around security tech.”
My stomach goes cold. “Looks that way.”
Dawson folds his arms, staring at the unchanged frame on my screen. “You know what I hate about stuff like this?”
I wait.
“It means someone was there,” he says quietly. “And they knew how to not be seen.”
The back of my neck tightens.
Dawson nods toward the screen again. “This—whatever this is—was intentional. And I don’t like intentional.”
“Neither do I.”
He shifts his weight, eyes flicking to me. “You got enemies, Maddox? Someone tryin’ to make a point? Because this doesn’t feel like some bored teenager playing hacker.”
I keep my expression still. Controlled. “Nothing that ties to a small-town bank.”
Dawson narrows his eyes—not accusing, just thinking. “Right. Then maybe it’s not about the bank. Like those three suits last night.”
A quiet beat.
He doesn’t say,maybe it’s about you.
He doesn’t have to.
I close the laptop. “I’ll run diagnostics again tonight. Off-hours. Quiet.”
Dawson lifts his hat, scratching the back of his head as he eyes the frozen frame on the screen.
“Appreciated,” he mutters, then looks at me—really looks. “Listen, Ethan… if this is connected to—”
He stops, the words drying up. He doesn’t know what name he’s reaching for. Doesn’t know what shadow sits behind me. Just knows thereisone.
He clears his throat, switches lanes. “—anything you’ve been tracking lately… anything from your old work… I’d like to know.”
My jaw flexes once.
Old work.
Military days.
Private security contractors.
Cases I never talk about.
