The encounter on the terrace left me deeply shaken. Sterling had found my weakness, and the intimacy of our living arrangement was a weapon he was now wielding with surgical precision. He was deliberately blurring the lines, using unexpected tenderness to disarm me, to make me forget why I was here.
I couldn't let it happen again. I had to refocus. I had to remember the mission.
Project Nightingale.
The name haunted me. For the next few days, I threw myself into work with a manic intensity. I was the perfect strategic advisor, my mind a fortress of cool professionalism. I gave him no openings.
But at night, after he retired to his wing, my real work began. I took out my encrypted hard drives and a burner laptop. Hacking his military-grade network from the inside was nearly impossible.
