Problem

Chapter 2

Damon’s POV

The boardroom smelled of polished wood and quiet panic.

Three top executives sat across from me, fidgeting like schoolboys waiting to be punished. Jared, head of cybersecurity, was the only one willing to meet my eyes. That was either bravery or stupidity.

“We’ve confirmed the breach,” he said, sliding a tablet toward me. “They were in our server for at least three hours before we caught it. They knew exactly where to look.”

I skimmed the report without sitting down. “Which means?”

“Which means,” Jared replied carefully, 

“They made away with encrypted data, we have to find them before they decode it, cause if that happens, they could sell it and CrossTech’s credibility will take a hit we may not recover from.”

The other two executives shifted in their seats. I could feel their eyes darting toward me, waiting to see if I’d explode. I didn’t. Anger was a luxury for people who couldn’t afford control.

“What’s the fix?” I asked.

“ShadowByte,” Jared said without hesitation.

The name was familiar. I’d heard it whispered in certain circles - the best coder in the world. Untraceable. Untouchable. The kind of talent who could make a problem like this disappear without leaving a footprint.

“Then hire them,” I said, setting the tablet down.

Jared’s throat bobbed. “We tried. They… declined.”

I looked at him. Just looked. The way you’d look at a man who’d told you the laws of gravity had changed overnight.

“They don’t know who they’re saying no to,” I said finally.

“I made it clear,” he replied.

“Apparently not clear enough.” I straightened, my patience already thinning. “Find out who they are. Real name. Address. Everything. If they breathe, I want to know when and where.”

Jared hesitated. “You want to handle it personally?”

“Exactly.”

He nodded, wisely not asking questions.

People didn’t tell me no. Not in business, not in life. When I wanted something, I got it and I didn’t chase. I trapped.

And ShadowByte? Whoever they were, they’d just made the mistake of stepping into my sights.

The next morning.

The floor-to-ceiling windows of his office overlooked the heart of the city. From up here, the city looked orderly, almost obedient. That illusion kept him sane.

“Your eight o’clock is waiting,” said Ethan Voss, his chief of staff and the closest thing Damon had to a friend.

“Tell him to wait longer,” Damon replied without looking up from the file in front of him.

Ethan didn’t flinch. He was used to Damon’s disregard for schedules, everyone else bent to Damon’s time, not the other way around. 

“It’s about the ShadowByte contract.”

Ethan has been tracking ShadowByte for the past 24 hours.

Damon’s eyes lifted. “Still no lead?”

“Nothing we can trace. Whoever they are, they’re clean. Cleaner than anyone I’ve seen.” Ethan slid a thin folder onto the desk. “No code signatures, no repeated routing paths. Every trace ends in a dead drop server.”

Damon flipped the folder open. A few printouts showed lines of code, beautiful in their precision, maddening in their anonymity.

“They covered their tracks this well?” Damon said, almost to himself. There was a thread of grudging respect in his voice, though he’d never admit it.

“They don’t want to be found,” Ethan said.

“They all think they don’t want to be found,” Damon replied, leaning back in his chair. “Until I decide they’re worth finding.”

Outside, the city kept moving, unaware that somewhere inside it, the person Damon was hunting might already be closer than either of them realized.