Eli coughs. “Excuse me?”
I don’t respond.
I’m locked in. Backtrace. Firewall logs. Live traffic. I zero in on the intrusion and pursue it with the precision earned from years of nights exactly like this. My former hacker days.
Yes. I'm a pretty decent hacker. Nothing extreme enough to land me in a super-max prison or earn me a Netflix documentary. I played in the minors—learned the game—but ultimately, I never went pro. I decided long ago to use my skills for good.
Timantha’s been prepping the company for a sale and keeping everything under lock and key is crucial right now. The user data. The algorithm. All the tech I’ve built. If someone gets their hands on any of it before the deal closes, the valuation tanks.
Not on my watch.
I’d reinforced the system months ago, long before anyone else understood how valuable it was.
“Almost got you,” I whisper as the trace narrows. “You little shit.”
Eli lets out a huff. “How colorful you are at two in the morning.”
Then—black.
“The fuck?”
The screen goes dead.
“What happened?” Eli asks.
“The trail vanished,” I respond but I’m not really talking to Eli. I’m thinking out loud.
“What does that mean?”
“He’s gone.”
I stare at the monitor, stunned. I never lose a trace. Ever.
Eli leans against the doorframe behind me, arms crossed and watching the tension roll through me.
“You think you can come back to bed now?” He asks and he sounds genuinely concerned for my rest.
“In a minute,” I say, realizing I woke up next to him instead of the guest room we designated for me while I’m here.
I grab my phone and fire off a message to our cybersecurity manager, detailing everything while it’s still fresh. Logs. Time stamps. Behavior patterns. I tell him I want a full report first thing in the morning.
When I finally glance at the clock, frustration hits hard.
2:47 a.m.
I let out a sharp, frustrated breath.
Behind me, Eli exhales quietly. “Does this happen a lot?”
“More than it should,” I mutter, my fingers flying as I pull up the secondary safeguards. A yawn catches me off guard.
“I don’t like that,” he says softly. “I don’t like how easily your work can just rip you away from your peace like that.”
I let out a humorless laugh. “These days, I’m not sure if my work pulls me from my peace or just blocks it with brute force.”
“I’d say the latter,” he says, his voice steady. “Because you never really turn off.”
Hearing him say it—the simple, blunt observation—makes it impossible to ignore the truth glowing back at me from the screen.
