“A broker,” Ronan says. “He didn’t start this. He facilitated it.”
“He sold her out.”
“Yes.”
“To save the program?” I ask.
“And himself.”
I stare at the screen.
At the name.
At the connection.
“She trusted him.”
Ronan doesn’t soften it.
“Which is why it worked.”
My jaw tightens.
Because trust isn’t a weakness.
It’s something people exploit.
“Find me something real,” I say.
“Something we can use.”
Something that breaks this open.
Ronan goes quiet.
That’s never a good sign.
Keys tap slower now.
More deliberate.
Then—
“I might have something worse.”
I shift slightly. “Define worse.”
He pulls up another layer.
Older.
Deeper.
Buried under multiple access restrictions.
“The original funding for her research,” he says. “I finally got through the masking.”
The screen resolves.
