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I don’t sleep. Not really. I drift in and out of consciousness, my mind cycling through the same thoughts over and over again.

Through it all, I keep seeing his face.

Chapter Eight - Maxim

I watch her through the security feed for most of the morning.

The camera in her room provides a clear view of the entire space. I’ve instructed my team to keep the feed running to my private terminal so I can observe without being present.

She doesn’t know I’m watching. She thinks she’s alone, that the camera is just a passive observer recording her movements for some nameless guard.

Except I’m here, studying her the way I study everything that matters. She matters more than I expected.

After I left her last night, I assumed she would break down. That’s what most people do when they’re taken from their lives and placed in a situation they can’t control. They cry, they beg, they bargain. They reveal their weaknesses in ways that make them easy to understand and easier to manipulate.

Davina doesn’t do any of that.

She paces. She checks the door, the walls, the ceiling. She examines the camera with an analytical eye, not the fearful glance of someone who’s never been watched but the assessing look of someone who understands how surveillance works.

She eats, but only after examining the food for signs of tampering. She drinks, but only in small amounts. She sleeps, but only when her body forces her to, and even then she wakes at the slightest sound.

I lean back in my chair and consider this. In my experience, people fall into three categories when they’re afraid. The first group breaks immediately. The second group fights. The third group observes.

Davina is in the third group.

She’s continues to surprise.

I pull up her file on another screen while the security feed runs in the corner. The information my team compiled is thorough. It includes public records, corporate filings, social media accounts, and a few news articles. There’s more than I anticipated. She’s been profiled by business magazines, interviewed for technology conferences, featured in lists of young entrepreneurs to watch.

I should delegate this to someone else. I have people whose job it is to analyze targets, to find weaknesses, to develop strategies for leverage, but I don’t want to delegate this. I want to understand her myself.

So I read.

I read about how she founded her company at nineteen, building it from a one-woman consulting operation into a respected cybersecurity firm with government contracts and a reputation for discretion.

I read interviews where she talks about the ethics of hacking, about the responsibility that comes with the ability to access systems others can’t. She sounds intelligent, thoughtful, careful with her words in a way that suggests she’s always aware of how she’s being perceived.

I read about her personal life, or what exists of it. Her parents are dead, killed in a car accident when she was sixteen. She has no siblings or romantic relationships that appear in any public record. Her closest connection appears to be a woman named Sienna Calloway, who works with her at the company.

She’s alone. Not just now, in this room, but in general. She’s built a life around her work and her friendship with this one person, and she’s kept everything else at a distance.

This is useful information. It tells me where she’s vulnerable.

It also tells me something else. Something I wasn’t looking for.

She’s like me.

The thought comes unbidden, and I dismiss it immediately. She’s nothing like me. She’s a young woman who got caught up in something she doesn’t understand, a tool used by people who didn’t care about the consequences. I’m the one who built the system she breached, the one who controls the world she stumbled into.

I’m still reading when Andrei calls.

“Sir, there’s an incoming communication you need to hear.”

“From whom?”

“He won’t give his name, but he’s asking about the woman.”

I set the file aside. “Put it through.”