Doyle didn't wait long.
The boardroom was already full when he stepped inside—sleek suits, older men and women with tired eyes and sharp instincts. These weren't figureheads. They were the kind of people who held power through silence and legacy.
Lucas wasn't in the room.
Which was the point.
Doyle placed a folder on the table and opened it with deliberate calm. "She's accessed the archives."
A woman at the far end raised an eyebrow. "The girl?"
"She's not just 'the girl' anymore," Doyle said. "She's made the connection."
A murmur moved around the table—subtle, but not quiet.
Another man leaned forward. "You're sure?"
"She opened the Hart file. Saw the fallback clause. Saw the Initiative H notes. She confronted Vale about it within the hour."
"Is she unstable?" someone asked.
"No," Doyle replied. "She's worse."
He paused, then added:
"She's thoughtful."
That word dropped like lead on the table.
Thoughtful meant dangerous.
Thoughtful meant strategic.
Thoughtful meant she wasn't going to run or react like a frightened intern. She was going to figure it out. All of it.
And if she did?
She wouldn't just challenge Lucas.
She'd challenge them.
"We can't afford that," the woman at the end said.
"She's protected now," Doyle replied. "Vale won't let us touch her."
"For now," the man beside her said. "But protection only lasts until she chooses a side."
"She already has," Doyle said. "She just doesn't know it yet."
The room fell quiet.
And somewhere below them, Mia Hart—fallback, bloodline, wildcard—walked through the office halls completely unaware that half the company had just decided she was no longer a neutral party.
I knew something was wrong the second I walked into the office.
No one said anything. No one looked at me sideways. On the surface, it was just another Tuesday.
But the air felt off.
People moved faster. Conversations clipped shorter when I walked past. Isla wasn't at her desk. And when I opened my email, the inbox was almost... too quiet.
No useless chain threads.
No calendar updates.
No "please see attached" from departments I didn't even work with.
Just one message.
FROM: unknown.sender@nullmail
SUBJECT: Watch your six.
BODY: They don't need you alive to erase you.
I stared at the screen.
Froze.
Then re-read it three more times, as if the words would soften or change.
They didn't.
The timestamp was 3:03 a.m.
Someone sent it overnight.
Before I confronted Lucas.
Before Doyle said I was part of the plan.
Before I even understood how far down the roots of this company went.
My fingers hovered over the delete key.
I didn't press it.
Instead, I flagged the message, and forwarded it to a new folder titled "Insurance."
Just in case.
I looked around the office.
Everything looked normal.
But that was the scariest part.
Nothing was.
The second he saw the timestamp on the message Mia received, Lucas's gut twisted.
3:03 a.m.
That wasn't random.
It was deliberate—a signature left behind by someone who knew the protocol, who knew how to hide a threat inside a whisper. The address was masked. No trace. Whoever sent it didn't want her dead.
Not yet.
They wanted her scared.
He stood at the edge of his private office, staring down at the internal security feed looping silently across four monitors. Floor twelve. Lobby. Server hallway. Break room.
Nothing.
Clean.
Too clean.
He turned to Oliver—young, fast, observant, and the only one Lucas trusted with digital blind spots.
"I want a trace of the email Mia received"
Oliver didn't flinch. "The one from null mail? That's not just a ghost domain, sir. That's board-level encryption. Whoever used it had clearance."
"Someone inside," Lucas said quietly.
Oliver nodded.
Lucas clenched his jaw. "Doyle?"
"Could be."
"Anyone else?"
Oliver hesitated.
"There's chatter," he said. "Low level. Not from the board. From staff."
Lucas turned fully.
"What kind of chatter?"
"People asking why she's here. Why she's on secured floors? Why was the system flagged? Her file last week and then cleared it without explanation."
Lucas's voice dropped. "Who's asking?"
"I don't know. Yet. But I'll find out."
Lucas stepped back toward the window.
Mia was visible three floors down through the tinted glass—just a small shape walking from her desk to the break room.
Still in the building.
Still unaware that someone had marked her.
And he had no idea how close they were willing to get.
He picked up his phone and typed a message.
To: Mia
TEXT: Do not leave the building without me. No matter what.
I didn't see the message from Lucas until I was already halfway to the south wing.
Do not leave the building without me. No matter what.
My stomach tightened.
I stopped.
Looked back toward the elevators.
But it was already too late.
Because just two minutes earlier, someone from HR—a woman named Cara who barely ever spoke to me—had approached my desk with a tight smile and a clipboard.
"Quick meeting," she said. "Internal audit follow-up. Shouldn't take more than fifteen."
I'd followed her because it didn't seem strange. I'd gotten used to last-minute reports and pointless sit-downs that didn't mean anything.
But now?
Now I wasn't so sure.
We walked in silence.
Past the usual conference rooms. Past the central stairwell. Toward a part of the floor, I hadn't seen yet—one marked AUTHORIZED STAFF ONLY in small silver letters near the fire door.
"Is this about my onboarding file?" I asked.
Cara didn't answer right away.
She just swiped her badge and held the door for me.
"Just a few questions. That's all."
I stepped through.
The door shut behind me with a heavy click.
And that's when I s
aw, the hallway.
Empty.
Dim.
No office lights.
No sound.
Just one door at the far end. Closed. Red tag on the handle.
I turned to ask Cara what this was.
But she was gone.
The door behind me was already locked.