Chapter 7: Leverage
715 Words
Information was currency at ValeTech.
But leverage—leverage was life insurance.
Rhea leaned back in her chair, watching activity stream across her mirrored terminal. After her bait had been taken, she’d embedded tracking code deep in the legal archives.
What she saw confirmed her instincts.
Silas Grey had been busy.
He’d mirrored multiple internal files—personnel records, black-site project briefs, even fragmented communications from the Office of National Security.
All timestamped after hours.
All stored in an encrypted folder outside legal protocols.
All circling Project Aeneas.
He wasn’t just watching her.
He was preparing for something.
The summons arrived without flair.
Office. Now. —C.V.
No assistant. No context. Just the kind of message that cut through noise.
Rhea closed her system and crossed the executive floor. The corridor was silent, glass and marble swallowing every footstep.
Caspian’s door was open.
That alone was a warning.
He stood behind his desk—jacket off, sleeves rolled, the top button of his shirt undone. There was something off in the stillness. Not angry. Just… measured. Worn at the edges.
He didn’t look up.
“You’ve been busy,” he said.
She didn’t reply.
He nodded toward the bar cart. “Drink?”
That caught her.
She stepped forward slowly. “That depends.”
“On?”
“Whether this is a toast,” she said, “or a warning.”
The corner of his mouth twitched—half amusement, half something colder.
He poured anyway. Two fingers of whiskey. No ice. No pretense.
He handed it to her. Their fingers brushed.
Too brief.
Too loud.
He walked to the window.
“You’ve been here two weeks,” he said. “And already the temperature’s changed.”
“I didn’t know I had that kind of effect.”
“You don’t yet.” He glanced at her. “But you might.”
She sipped. “That’s not a compliment.”
“No. It’s a risk assessment.”
He turned fully now. “I built this place from code and paranoia. Everything that survives here does so because I allow it.”
“Then why am I here, Caspian?”
“To see if you're an asset…” he paused, “or a liability.”
Her pulse hitched. But she didn’t show it.
“And what do your files say?”
“I don’t trust files anymore.” He stepped closer. “I trust what people do when they think I’m not watching.”
She held his gaze. “Were you watching when your lawyer accessed a flagged set of files last night?”
The air changed.
He stilled.
Just for a breath.
“I see,” he said quietly.
“I didn’t name anyone.”
“You didn’t have to.”
Another step. She didn’t retreat.
“Everyone lies in this building,” he said. “Silas lies for me. Genevieve lies to me. Nikolai lies to himself. The only question is—who do you lie for?”
“And what if I’m not lying?”
“Then you’re the first.”
Silence followed. But it wasn’t empty.
It was intimate in the most dangerous way.
Then, softer:
“When I started ValeTech, I trusted someone. Let them close. Believed they saw the vision.”
“What happened?”
“They did.” A pause. “Their own.”
“And?”
“They sold a prototype. Framed it as a breach. Tried to rewrite the story.”
Rhea’s throat tightened. She knew this narrative.
The public version.
“Did you ruin them?”
“No,” Caspian said. “I bought them. Then broke them. Slowly.”
She finished the drink.
He watched her the entire time.
When she set the glass down and moved to the door, he didn’t stop her.
But just as she reached for the handle, his voice followed:
“You can keep playing detective, Rhea. But this game was rigged long before you stepped onto the board.”
Her office was dark when she returned.
A single envelope waited on her desk.
No markings. No seal.
Inside, a photograph—her father, at a ValeTech press event years ago, shaking hands with a man she didn’t recognize.
Scrawled in ink beneath it:
He was warned.
You won’t be.
- Writer
