**DEREK POV**
I receive the report just after dawn, when the packhouse is still half-asleep and the air smells faintly of brewed coffee and pine cleaner. The halls are quiet in that way that pretends peace, the kind that only exists before everyone wakes up and remembers who they are to each other.
I read it standing at the long table in the strategy room, jacket still on, boots not yet unlaced. I don’t sit. Sitting would make it feel routine, and this isn’t. I know that before I reach the second page.
The report is clean. Structured. No emotional language. No accusations. Just facts laid out in careful order, like someone setting bones instead of breaking them. Whoever wrote it didn’t want drama. They wanted accuracy.
Your name appears early.
Not highlighted. Not emphasized. Just the
