LOGINNatashaVictor’s words did not just settle into the space around us, they shifted it, quietly but completely, in a way that made everything feel just a little less certain than it had a moment ago, and as I stood there beside Alan with his phone still in his hand and that pause lingering between them even after the call had ended, I realized that whatever line we thought we were holding steady had just been crossed without us even seeing it happen.“It was pulled from inside the system.”The sentence echoed in my mind, not loudly, not in a way that demanded attention, but in a way that stayed, that refused to move aside no matter how much I tried to focus on something else, because it meant that this was no longer just about what Matt could do from the outside, it meant that something, or someone, had already gotten close enough to touch what should have been secure.“Natasha.”Alan’s voice brought me back, and I turned toward him slowly, not because I had not heard him the first time
AlanThe moment the words left Natasha’s mouth, something in me went still, not in the way people went still when they were confused or unsure, but in the way a part of your mind quieted itself on purpose, like it understood that reacting too quickly would only give Matt exactly what he wanted, and as I stood there looking at her with that message hanging between us, I knew without needing to say it out loud that this was not just another attempt to get under our skin, this was something placed carefully, something meant to land at the exact moment when we had just started putting the pieces together.“You should ask him where he really was before he found you.”I repeated the words silently in my head, not because I had not heard them clearly the first time, but because I needed to hear how they sounded without the weight of her voice, needed to strip them down to what they were trying to do rather than what they appeared to say, and even then, even with that distance, the intention
NatashaAfter Alan’s words settled between us, I did not respond, not because I did not understand what he had just said, but because I understood it too well, and that understanding came with a quiet, unsettling weight that made it hard to separate what I felt from what I knew, because footage did not lie, not in the way people could, and yet everything about tonight had already blurred that line enough to make even something as concrete as video feel uncertain.“Say that again,” I said slowly, my voice quieter than I intended, not out of fear, but because I needed to hear it one more time, needed to see if repeating it would make it sound any less impossible.Alan did not look away from me.“Victor found footage,” he said evenly, though I could hear the tension beneath it, the way he was holding his tone steady on purpose, “of me walking into that room before you got there.”I exhaled softly, my gaze drifting past him for a second toward the water, the calm surface now feeling almos
AlanThe moment I heard my own voice echo faintly from beyond that door, distorted just enough to be wrong yet close enough to unsettle even me, I did not hesitate, not because I was certain of what was happening, but because I understood the intent behind it, and intent was always more dangerous than action, especially when it came from someone like Matt, who never did anything without layering it in confusion first, and so instead of stepping forward into whatever trap had been carefully set, I moved in the opposite direction, quietly, deliberately, until I was close enough behind Natasha to reach her before she made the mistake they were waiting for.My hand closed around her wrist just as her fingers touched the handle, and I felt the slight jolt that went through her, not fear, but awareness, the kind that came from recognizing a presence before even turning to confirm it.“Don’t open that,” I said quietly, leaning just close enough for my voice to reach her and no one else, beca
NatashaThe lights steadied again, but something about the way they flickered, sharp and uneven before settling back into place, left a quiet tension in the air that refused to fade, and as I stood there beside Alan with the echo of that sound still ringing faintly in my ears, I realized that whatever had just happened was not random, not a simple malfunction, but something timed, something meant to pull our attention in a direction we could not afford to ignore.“That wasn’t just a power issue,” I said, my voice low, more to him than to myself, because there was no point pretending otherwise.“No,” Alan replied, already moving, his posture shifting back into that focused state that told me he had already started putting the pieces together, “it wasn’t.”Victor let out a faint groan behind us, and both of us turned at the same time, the moment grounding everything again in a way that made the situation feel even more real, because whatever game was being played, it was happening aroun
NatashaFor a second, I honestly thought I had heard him wrong, because the words did not just settle into my mind the way normal things did, they hit something deeper and stayed there, heavy and sharp in a way that made it hard to breathe properly, and even though I could see Victor standing right there, holding that device like it was just another piece of evidence, nothing about it felt ordinary to me, because there was no way, absolutely no way, that he could be standing there telling Alan that there was a recording with my voice on it.“My voice?” I repeated, and I hated how steady I sounded, because it did not match what was happening inside me at all.Victor did not look away from Alan immediately, like he was waiting for him to react first, but Alan did not say anything either, and that silence stretched for a second too long before Victor finally gave a small nod.“Yes.”I let out a slow breath, but it felt tight, like it did not go all the way through my chest.“That’s not p







