Lena's POV
I put the phone in my pocket.
Not from denial — from choice. Whatever the message meant, whatever was still moving out there in the city, the next twenty minutes in this room mattered more than a three-word text from an unknown number. Marcus was talking. The recorder was running. Gabriel was here.
I would deal with the message when the room was secure.
I went back to the table.
Sat beside Damian quietly. He glanced at me — the brief sideways assessment he did when he wanted to know if something had changed without breaking the flow of what he was managing. I gave him the smallest shake of my head. Not now. Later.
He returned to Marcus.
I watched and listened and stayed present.
Marcus talked for forty minutes.
Not willingly — not in the way that genuine confession is w
