Page 12 of Ground Zero (Lantern Beach Blackout: Detonation #3)

S heridan felt the weight of suspicious stares from the men around the table.

These guys had worked with Maverick for months. They’d trusted him, relied on him.

And now she was telling them that someone wanted their colleague dead. Or that he could possibly be a traitor with multiple enemies.

“Who would want to eliminate Adams?” Colton shook his head as if unable to comprehend the idea.

“Someone afraid of what he might reveal,” Cook replied.

“Or someone who needs him to look guilty,” Sheridan countered. “For all I know, these guys might have been trying to kill me in order to get to Adams. Maybe they need his expertise in order to help them enact whatever plan they want to unleash.”

As the discussion continued around her, Sheridan found herself studying each face at the table.

Were one of these men the mole Maverick suspected? Did one of them know more about this morning’s events than they were letting on?

Tension built in her chest with each passing minute.

There was more going on here than met the eye, but she couldn’t put her finger on exactly what.

Maverick finally broke through another layer of Blackout’s security.

His colleagues had changed some of the protocols since his access was revoked, but they’d overlooked a few pathways he’d built into the system.

The data that filled his screen made his blood run cold.

Someone had been altering files in his personal directory for weeks.

Weeks.

They’d been inserting false communications and creating a digital trail that painted him as a traitor.

The work was sophisticated—professional-level forgery that would fool most investigators.

But not him.

He knew his own code, his own patterns, his own digital signature better than anyone.

As he dug deeper into the system logs, the truth became painfully clear.

The person—or people –behind this had used a zero-day exploit, a previously unknown vulnerability in the very security software he'd trusted to protect his personal network. The attackers had found a backdoor that didn't officially exist, one that even Maverick hadn't known to look for.

It was the kind of sophisticated attack tool that sold for millions on the dark web, typically reserved for nation-state actors or the most elite cybercriminal organizations.

No wonder he hadn't detected the intrusion. You can't defend against a threat that doesn't exist in any security database, and you can't patch a vulnerability that hasn't been discovered yet.

These people had ghost-level access to his system for weeks, moving through his files like shadows, planting evidence with surgical precision while Maverick’s own security measures remained blissfully unaware of the breach.

He continued to scroll through log files, tracking each unauthorized access. The time stamps told a story of careful, methodical sabotage.

Someone with high-level clearance had been setting him up.

The question was who.

Had one of his colleagues stabbed him in the back like this? He’d suspected there was a traitor in their midst for a while, though he didn’t want to acknowledge the possibility. He didn’t want to believe that any of his teammates were capable of something like this.

But he’d be a fool to ignore the risk.

A new folder caught his attention—one labeled “Ground Zero Communications.”

His pulse quickened as he opened it.

Inside were dozens of encrypted messages between unknown parties. The encryption was military-grade, but he recognized the system.

It was one he’d helped design.

If he could decrypt these messages, he might find answers about who was behind the setup. Who had killed Agent Cameron. Who was feeding information to Sigma. Who was setting him up to take the fall.

Maverick cracked his knuckles and got to work. The encryption key would be hidden somewhere in the message headers—a pattern only someone with intimate knowledge of the system would recognize.

He just had to find it . . . before it was too late.