SOPHIE KEPT the phone steady in her hand, but her attention had already shifted inward, recalibrating everything she thought she understood about the investigation.
Matthew stood beside the desk without moving. He did not ask who it was. He did not assume. He simply watched her face, reading whatever he could from the subtle changes in her expression.
Sophie ended the call and set the phone down carefully. “That was not a mistake,” she said quietly.
Matthew’s voice came after a brief pause. “No. It wasn’t.”
She opened her laptop without sitting down, already moving through encrypted folders and isolated data streams. The message had not been random. It had been a warning delivered with precision, timed exactly when she and Matthew were together, as if whoever sent it understood the imp
