Someone Is Targeting Me
753 Words
It didn’t happen all at once.
That was what made it harder to ignore.
Amara Vale had dealt with problems before, delays, misunderstandings, internal friction. Every company did. Every system had pressure points.
But this… didn’t feel random anymore.
It felt arranged.
She noticed it first in repetition.
Not in the incidents themselves, but in the way they echoed each other.
A delayed approval in finance.
A duplicated document in operations.
A misdirected confirmation in scheduling.
Different departments. Different processes.
Same outcome.
Slowness. Confusion. Friction.
And always just enough plausibility to avoid alarm.
Amara sat at her desk longer than usual that evening, reviewing the last ten days of internal reports.
Her screen was filled with timestamps, approval logs, access histories.
At first, everything looked like normal operational noise.
But the more she looked, the less “normal” it felt.
Because the disruptions weren’t scattered.
They were clustered.
Timed.
Layered.
As if someone was testing her reactions in steps rather than attacking randomly.
Her assistant knocked softly before entering.
“Ms. Vale… you’re still here?”
Amara didn’t look up. “Close the door.”
The assistant hesitated, then did.
Silence settled in the office.
Amara finally spoke. “Have you noticed anything unusual in the last two weeks?”
The question wasn’t emotional.
It was structured.
The assistant thought carefully before answering. “Unusual how?”
“Patterns,” Amara said simply.
That made the assistant pause.
“…No. Nothing obvious. Just the usual workload stress.”
Amara nodded once, but didn’t accept that as confirmation.
Because she already knew the answer would be like that.
People only noticed patterns when they were told where to look.
After the assistant left, Amara leaned back slightly in her chair.
Her eyes stayed on the screen.
Something was wrong.
Not loudly wrong.
Quietly wrong.
And that was worse.
Because quiet interference didn’t come from chaos.
It came from intention.
She opened a separate folder.
Started mapping incidents manually.
Date.
Time.
Department.
Type of disruption.
At first, it looked messy.
Then it started aligning.
Finance delays often preceded operational confusion.
Operational confusion often preceded communication mismatches.
Communication mismatches often preceded external hesitation from partners.
It wasn’t random.
It was sequential.
Controlled.
Amara’s fingers slowed.
A faint tension built in her chest, not panic, not yet, but awareness forming shape.
Someone wasn’t just affecting her systems.
They were studying her response to disruption.
She whispered to herself without realizing it.
“…Someone is targeting me.”
The words didn’t feel dramatic.
They felt like a conclusion.
At that moment, the office phone rang.
Unknown caller.
She stared at it for a second before answering.
“Hello.”
A pause.
Then a familiar calm voice.
“Still working late.”
Her grip tightened slightly on the phone.
Dante Cross.
“Is there a reason for your call?” she asked evenly.
“No,” he said. “Just checking system stability.”
Amara’s eyes narrowed slightly. “What system?”
Another pause.
Then
“Your environment.”
That word landed differently.
Not accusatory.
Not emotional.
Technical.
Amara sat up slightly. “My environment is stable.”
A faint breath on the other end.
“That depends on what you define as stable.”
She didn’t respond immediately.
Because something about his tone didn’t feel like concern.
It felt like observation.
Like he was watching her reach conclusions in real time.
Amara closed her laptop slowly.
“I’m noticing inconsistencies,” she said carefully. “Across departments. Repeating patterns.”
Silence.
Then Dante responded.
“That’s good.”
That wasn’t what she expected.
Her brows tightened. “Good?”
“Yes,” he said simply. “It means you’re paying attention.”
A pause.
Then Amara asked, more directly now, “Do you think someone is interfering with my company?”
Another short silence.
Then
“I think you’re beginning to see what I see.”
That answer didn’t confirm anything.
But it also didn’t deny it.
And that was what unsettled her most.
After the call ended, Amara sat still for a long moment.
The office around her felt quieter than before.
Not because anything had changed.
But because her perception had.
Something was happening inside her structure.
Something deliberate.
Something consistent.
And for the first time
she stopped calling it coincidence.
Across the city, Dante ended the call without expression.
She had reached the threshold.
Not certainty.
But recognition.
And recognition was the point where control started to shift, from invisible influence…
to conscious awareness.
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