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My hand falls on the black iron handle. A chill burns my palm, and I press down. Nothing happens.

I look through the glass into an inviting space with the feel of a living area. Fur rugs warm the floor in front of brown leather sofas and loveseats. I half-expect heads of game to hang on the wall, but instead, I see framed photography.

My breath catches, and as if motivated by an unseen force, I push harder on the handle, and it clicks. I push on the door and enter the room.

The photographs on the walls are all mine. I’m not a photographer, but I took lessons, and whenever we traveled to Colorado, I practiced. Blown up to portfolio proportions are my favorites. Shots taken from the mountain peaks and across the streams.

Behind glass, framed in walnut, my photos are stunning. Or maybe it’s not the shots, but the realization he kept them and put them on display.

To the right, the view is of the main section of the house.

I can see what I believe is Dorian’s bedroom window with the shades drawn down.

To the left are trees. At one end of the room is a fireplace, and on the opposite wall is a galley kitchen.

It’s easy to imagine snuggling up beneath blankets and watching it snow.

Bookcases would improve the space, as would personal mementos.

There’s an industrial iron spiral staircase, and I climb.

The open upstairs floor holds Dorian’s office.

The windows are smaller upstairs with functional credenzas below them.

An executive alpine desk commands the room.

A small round table with chairs to one side implies he invites others to this home office, but it’s hard to imagine Dorian inviting others into his home.

He rarely did when we were together. This is a functional office set-up, as a decorator would recommend.

The office is exactly what you’d expect from someone running a corporation: clean lines, minimalist, designed to project power while revealing nothing.

I analyze it the way I used to analyze target locations: primary work zone centered on the desk, secondary meeting area by the round table, likely locations for secure communications equipment.

The credenzas below the windows could easily house signal scramblers or countersurveillance gear.

Framed photographs line the credenza closest to his desk.

A lampshade hangs on his desk lamp, offering another option for placement.

My fingers brush the NightHawk in my bag.

The mission brief replays in my head: clean installations, undetectable footprint, focus on high-value intelligence locations.

Don’t place it where the cleaning service might find it.

Luke’s instructions echo as I assess the frames, calculating angles and audio capture zones.

I step closer to examine the wooden frames and stop in my tracks when my gaze falls on a photo of us, bundled in winter clothes, poles in our hands with goggles and helmets covering our foreheads, smiling.

The photo is from our first ski trip together.

It once hung on a wall in our home, but it sits here, reframed in a rustic wood frame.

The photograph beside it is smaller, but it’s me, walking along the beach, my back to him, sandals dangling from my fingers.

My index finger lightly brushes over a photograph of Dorian’s childhood dog, a Labrador retriever that passed during his college years.

The last framed photograph is of our first home, the one where he carried me across the threshold.

To a casual observer, it might appear as a New York brownstone, the nearby tree a common enough photo for New York City aficionados, but I’m not a casual observer.

He’s kept me close. But he’s chosen moments unrecognizable to others. He’s not a man planning to disrupt the United States. He’s private, wounded, and misunderstood.

He hasn’t let us go.

He has held on to little, but he’s held on to the memories.

Vibrations from my shoulder bag remind me of my purpose. I don’t check the caller, as I assume it’s Sophia reaching out for a status update. I’ll return her call when it’s time for the team to confirm the device’s function.

The team needs to focus elsewhere. Dorian is not the madman seeking to disrupt the free world. But too much is at stake. They won’t take my word for it. I withdraw the first listening device, a small silver piece. I lift one of the heavy frames and search the back.

This will work. I can secure the device behind the back fold, and if someone lifts it to dust, it shouldn’t fall out or be noticed.

I don’t see a similar place on the lamp.

There’s no dust anywhere, which tells me his cleaning service is thorough.

His leather chair, though…I bend to the floor and peer up at the bottom of the throne.

There’s a discreet handle to the side for lowering and raising the chair.

I secure the slim piece on the lever. If it were to fall, he might assume it’s a mechanical piece of the chair.

But it shouldn’t fall, and he would never peer beneath a chair.

The dark monitors reflect my silhouette, and I pause for a minute, wondering if his password remains the same.

I note the keyboard wear patterns, the slight discoloration on specific keys that might indicate frequent use.

But what would I search for? Even with my background in data analysis, I’d never guess his filing nomenclature. And he’s not guilty.

I scan for any signs of the advanced tech we were briefed about: quantum encryption keys, neural pattern locks, biometric scanners disguised as ordinary office equipment.

The setup looks deceptively normal, but that’s exactly what we’d expect from someone potentially orchestrating global disruption events. Yet those photographs...

I might have questioned if he could change, but those photographs show that, if anything, he hasn’t changed enough. I’ve moved on, and he hasn’t. A fact he keeps close to the chest and hidden.

I once had a Pinterest board filled with modern farmhouse architecture. Did he design this mountain retreat with my preferences in mind? Did he hand over my Pinterest board to the designer? Because the longer I take in the architectural details, I begin to wonder.

A sadness fills me, working its way in the way an icy wind infiltrates the thickest wool.

Did I give up too soon? Should I have stayed?

The vibrations resume, and this time, I remove my phone. Sophia’s name flashes on the screen.

“Hey,” I answer, voice soft, weighted with my heavy thoughts.

“Can you talk?”

“Yes. It’s done. Do you want to check if they’re working? He’s asleep, so if there’s an issue, I can adjust them.”

“He’s asleep? In the afternoon?”

“Migraine. He took Eletriptan.” Based on the contents of his medicine cabinet, he likely took Vicodin earlier in the day. The combination would act like a sedative. “I don’t know how much time we have.”

“Excellent. Have you seen Halston?”

“He and his father live in separate dwellings. I hiked up to Halston’s home earlier today and entered the garage.

It’s the main house I showed you on the satellite imagery.

Placed trackers in two vehicles and listening devices beneath the front seats, but I don’t know how often, if ever, his father uses those vehicles.

The man’s ninety-two. He may never leave the compound.

I’ll see if I can convince Dorian to let me say hello to his father before I leave, but I doubt I’ll be left alone inside his father’s home. ”

“We’re going to send someone up to retrieve you. If you can get into his father’s house before nightfall, that’s great. Otherwise, let’s get you out of there.”

“I’m not in danger, Sophia. Dorian’s going to fly me into Denver in the morning.” My gaze crosses the lawn to the darkened main house. “There are still things we need to discuss.” It’s a painful admission, but the truth is in black and white, framed behind glass.

“Caroline, we traced the source of the calls to burner phones found near scenes of the attacks to your geographical area. There are no neighboring properties.”

My brain kicks into overdrive, processing the tactical implications.

Isolated location. Direct access to global satellite networks.

A brilliant but reclusive billionaire with unlimited resources.

It’s textbook—exactly the pattern I would have flagged in my CIA days.

But the personal photographs, the preserved memories. ..they don’t fit the profile. Unless...

A cold realization hits me: What better cover than appearing to be a man still pining for his ex-wife? I, of all people, should know, sometimes the most convincing tradecraft is built on genuine emotion.

“The team has reviewed the evidence, and the decision has been made.” Sophia’s voice carries the crisp certainty I remember from agency briefings.

Burner phones mean planned anonymity; geographical correlation suggests either sloppy tradecraft or intentional misdirection. The analyst in me wants to request raw data, verification protocols, and pattern analysis. But there’s no time for that now.

“Dorian Moore is not the man you think he is, and we need to get you out of there.”

The words hit differently when you’re in the field versus behind a desk. Years of analyzing threat assessments, and suddenly, I’m inside one.