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She froze. “Shit.”
Nash leaned in. “What?”
“WTRXN isn’t a vendor. It’s a shell.” She tapped again, fast. “The payments came from OrdoTech’s DoD line-item accounts. Then bounced, three layers deep, into private holdings. Cayman. Liechtenstein. One flagged under an executive asset trust…”
Her breath caught.
“Grace?”
“Fenwick,” she said. “The CEO.”
Nash straightened, eyes narrowing. “You’re telling me this guy’s been embezzling defense money?”
“Not just embezzling. He’s using classified budget cover to hide it. That’s why it’s buried so deep.” She looked up, eyes hard. “He didn’t just steal. He used national security to shield it.”
“Ya Allah,” Nash said.
“Let me run another trace to isolate the full transfer flow.” Her voice hushed out several minutes after the command finished.“That’s not a Fenwick account…”
Nash leaned in. “What is it?”
“It’s...gone. One-time route. No return ping. Like it borrowed a step, then vanished.”
He frowned. “Human?”
“Had to be,” she said, but her voice had dropped. “What else could it be?”
The air in the room felt heavier now. Not like it was closing in, but likesomethingwas breathing with them.
Nash turned slowly. Glanced up at the webcam mounted on the monitor. The green light wasn’t on. But that didn’t mean it was dead.
He stared at it. Something behind his ribs twisted.
“We’re not alone in here,” he said.
Grace didn’t speak.
Then she whispered, “Let it watch.”
The nameWTRXNstill pulsed on the screen, faintly backlit like it knew it wasn’t supposed to be seen.
The click of the keyboard moved in rhythm with her breathing, steadier now, her shoulders rolling back into focus. “I can’t believe you still have all that energy,” she said softly, her voice wrapped in something warmer. “Even after your man nap.”
He stopped pacing. Turned. Let his mouth curve slowly as he faced her. “Man nap?”
Grace gave him that faint, sharp smile, the kind that wasn’t fully let loose yet but promised more if he earned it. “You know the kind. Full tactical reset. Naked. Hair a mess. Comes with a complimentary scowl and a craving for protein.”
Nash stepped toward her, easy, deliberate. “Next time,hebbiti,” he murmured, voice low as he leaned down slightly, enough for the scent of her to touch him again, “you’re going to need a long, sassy woman nap.”
Grace blinked once, eyes lifting to meet his, and there it was. The spark. The kind that burned low and slow. The kind that rewrote baselines and slipped beneath armor before you even noticed the breach.
Her expression didn’t soften, not visibly. But her eyes told a different story, warm, curious, no longer shuttered like they had been when he first met her. She mirrored his lean, just slightly, her hand settling on the edge of the desk, fingers tapping a rhythm that matched his step.
“You flirting with me, Rahim?” she asked, voice steady but bright.
“Depends,” he said, still close enough to feel the heat rising from her skin. “You throwing sass at me, Harlan?”
She looked at him for a long beat.