Page 53 of Reckless

That earns me his full attention. I cross the room, set the laptop on the table between us, and wake the screen. The financial map fills it immediately, twenty years of shell companies, management firms, and committee structures branching across the display until it looks less like accounting and more like somebody spilled a spiderweb over Nevada.

“I started with the mine reports,” I say, zooming out another level. “Thought I was looking for discrepancies.”

“Were you?”

“No.” I tap the screen. “I was looking too small.”

His eyes follow my hand, not trying to read every company name. He learned years ago that’s a waste of time because that’s my job.

Mine is finding the pattern.

Sin is deciding what to do once I’ve found it.

“I kept pulling,” I continue, tracing one line into another. “Management companies became oversight committees. Oversight committees became grant administrators. Grant administrators became another management company.”

“And?”

“They all circle back.” I tap one name sitting quietly in the middle of the map.

Calloway.

Sin doesn’t react straightaway. He studies the screen for a long moment, following the lines without saying anything while I give him the time to build the picture himself. “You’re sure?”

“About the trail?”

His eyes flick to mine. “I’m asking if you’re ready to put his name on it.”

I lean back in the chair. “By tomorrow morning.”

He nods once, accepting that answer for what it is. Not certainty yet, but almost. Close enough that I’ll stake my reputation on finding the last piece before anyone else sees it.

“And the second thread?”

The question hangs between us for a beat. It isn’t hesitation so much as deciding how much I can say before I wander into speculation. Sin doesn’t have much patience for guesswork, and neither do I.

He watches me over the top of the folder. “Ghost, what is it?”

I drag the second monitor across and enlarge the trace running through the middle of the screen. Thin lines of encrypted traffic pulse in steady intervals, disappearing almost as quickly as they appear.

“I’ve been tracking this for a couple of months,” I say. “It keeps surfacing around Calloway’s network.”

Sin leans forward, studying the display. “Same endpoint?”

“Close enough.” I zoom out another layer, exposing the routing history. “Whoever built it changes the path often enough to make it look random, but the timing never changes. The encryption shifts, the destination shifts, but the pattern doesn’t.”

He watches the trace for another few seconds before looking back at me. “Can you tell what’s being sent?”

I shake my head. “Not yet. Whatever they’re using is built to disappear into the background. Most people would never notice it was there.”

“But you did.”

“Patterns don’t stay hidden forever.”

Silence settles between us while another burst of encrypted traffic scrolls across the screen.

Sin breaks first. “You think it’s connected to the money?”

“I think it’s connected to Calloway.” I lean back in my chair, my eyes never leaving the monitor. “Whether it’s tied to the financial network or something else entirely… I don’t know yet. But Calloway doesn’t waste effort. If he’s protecting something this carefully, I want to know why.”