He observed Reed carefully. "Did she instruct security to lock down the camera feeds?"
Reed swallowed, eyes shifting. "We... uh, were told it's routine maintenance."
"Routine maintenance doesn't override admin logs," he replied quietly.
Reed stiffened, knowing he just revealed something without meaning to. Another pattern, another weakness. Vivian controlled through fear, but fear always frayed under pressure.
He closed the breaker panel and straightened. "I'll stabilize the system. Don't worry the residents yet."
Relief washed over Reed's face. "Right. Thanks."
As Reed walked away, he returned his attention to the console. The scrub failure meant one critical thing: remnants of the footage were still recoverable. He didn't have authority to access them, but someone soon would.
He logged everything into his notebook when he got back into the apartment: faulty overrides, unauthorized camera scrubs, power misuse, witness behavior. It all painted a picture leading to the same conclusion: Vivian was spiraling, and spiraling leaders always made catastrophic mistakes right before exposure.
He set the notebook aside and checked on his daughter once more. She curled deeper into her blanket, unaware of the storm outside or the quiet battle opening around her. He wasn't rushing. He wasn't acting impulsively. He was preparing. And the more she tried to hide the truth, the brighter the truth would burn once revealed.
He sat in the dim light of the living room, notebook open, the page filled with neat lines of handwriting summarizing the night's discoveries: the failed camera scrub, the overridden access logs, the power surge caused by her tampering. Individually, they were suspicious; together, they formed the kind of pattern he recognized instantly: someone rushing, someone afraid, someone trying to cover a mistake faster than they could hide it.
His daughter shifted in her sleep, and he lowered the notebook slightly, watching her small form curled under the blanket. The towel had finally slipped away from her shoulders, revealing the jagged, uneven patches along her scalp. He reached forward and gently rearranged the blanket so it didn't rub against the sensitive skin. She didn't wake, but her breathing steadied as if she sensed him near.
He sat back against the couch, closing the notebook softly. Tomorrow would be a turning point; he could feel it. Patterns like these always reached a breaking point: either the one hiding the truth broke first, or the truth broke everything open. And Vivian was close—very close.
The night outside was still when a faint vibration buzzed across the floor. His phone lit up with an unknown number. He narrowed his eyes at the timestamp: 2:13 a.m. He let it ring twice, thinking, listening. Then he answered.
"Ethan?" a familiar voice said—steady, low, edged with controlled authority.
He felt something tighten in his chest. "Rowan."