26

The next morning broke over Los Angeles in a soft haze, but there was no rest for the FBI task force.

Morgan had been missing for 14 hours now.

The field office was eerily quiet, except for the soft hum of monitors and the occasional low murmur of agents shuffling between desks.

At the center of it all was Karadec, unmoved from where he'd planted himself the night before.

He hadn't slept.

He hadn't left.

His shirt was wrinkled, his tie loosened, and his eyes, sharp but bloodshot, remained locked on Morgan's phone still sitting beside the keyboard.

The screen had gone black hours ago, but he couldn't bring himself to turn it over.

When the rest of the team arrived, they slowed upon seeing him.

"Adam," Selena said gently, "you've been here all night?"

"I'm fine," he muttered without looking up.

"You should go home, get a few hours—"

"I'm not leaving," he said, more firmly now. "Not while she's still out there."

No one pushed further. Daphne glanced at Selena and Oz exchanged a quiet look with Ronnie, all of them sensing the shift in him.

Before anyone could say more, a high-pitched alert pinged from Ronnie's station. He spun toward his screen.

"Incoming call. Unlisted. Masked IP, heavy encryption."

Karadec was already on his feet. "Patch it through. Record everything."

Ronnie hit a key. The audio kicked on. The voice heavily distorted—unnaturally low, robotic.

"You've been busy," the voice drawled. "I assume you've figured out by now that this isn't just about Morgan Gillory. She was warned. You were all warned."

"Where is she?" Karadec stepped forward, eyes blazing. "Don't you dare hurt her, I swear to God I will find you and there won't be a hole deep enough to hide in."

"Relax. She's alive. For now. That depends on you."

Everyone in the room froze. Even the ambient chatter from agents on the far side of the office stopped as people turned toward the conversation.

"We don't negotiate with terrorists," Selena said coldly.

The voice chuckled. "And yet you're listening. Smart. Because if you want your consultant back, you'll drop the case. Shut down the Protocol investigation. Pull every agent off. Effective immediately."

"And if we don't?" Karadec asked.

"You'll get a body. Maybe two. Maybe three. One for every intel she kept. Every question she asked."

A beat of silence passed. The voice continued: "To show good faith, I'll let her speak. One minute."

There was a brief static crackle. Then, Morgan's voice, muffled, and breathless, came through.

"Karadec?"

"Morgan—hey, are you alright?" he panicked.

"It's fine—I'm okay. I'm not hurt," she rasped. "Just tell Ava...tell Elliot...to feed the cat."

Karadec's brows furrowed.

Morgan paused, then added, "And remember what I told you... about reading between the lines. Sometimes the truth's not in the handshake... it's in the sleeves."

The line went dead.

Ronnie looked up, confused. "What the hell does that mean?"

Karadec didn't answer. He was already rushing back to his desk, grabbing Morgan's phone, charged it, then flicked through the image gallery.

One by one, the same pictures they'd seen before appeared: blurry, cryptic, taken in secret. But now, they weren't just evidence, they were clues.

The photo of the handshake.

He zoomed in.

Two men shaking hands. One in a suit, the other in a blazer with a visible ID tag.

Karadec squinted. The ID tag was slightly turned, but still legible enough to catch the edge of a name. The suit sleeve showed a distinct cufflink. An expensive one. A family crest.

He froze.

Only one person in the Bureau wore that exact crest. A subtle point of pride passed down from military service.

Chief Whitaker.

"She knew," Karadec whispered.

He launched into Morgan's photo app again.

Another shot, Whitaker at a podium. A security badge hanging from his belt. Another photo: a redacted document, but with just enough visible to show initials—R.W.

Selena moved beside him, realization dawning. "She wasn't just documenting. She was mapping the entire conspiracy."

Karadec didn't hesitate. He stood, jaw clenched.

"Cover for me."

"Karadec, what are you doing?" Daphne asked.

"Something I'm not supposed to."

Selena stepped forward, eyes narrowing. "Adam, don't be stupid. What does that mean?"

But Karadec was already turning on his heel.

"Karadec!" Selena called after him.

The team stood stunned as he stormed out, disappearing down the hallway toward the secure server room.

In a secure room behind the server archive, Karadec pulled out a blank flash drive. He bypassed two layers of clearance using Morgan's old scripts and tools she'd once joked about teaching him.

He dug into internal logs, personnel access files, flight manifests, and budget approvals from the past eight months.

At every turn, a familiar name reappeared: Ross Whitaker.

His authorization was on every single movement related to Protocol. Covert meetings. Shell companies. Surveillance reroutes.

The final proof? A security clearance document Whitaker signed. The same one that gave the green light to track Morgan.

Karadec downloaded everything. It was more than enough to destroy Whitaker's career—and get him fired.

—

Back in the team office, the team was mid-discussion when Karadec returned, eyes burning with purpose.

He plugged the drive into Ronnie's monitor.

"You're going to want to see this."

Files bloomed across the screen. As the documents loaded, a suffocating silence fell over the room.

"It's Whitaker," Karadec said. "He's the one behind it. All of it. Every trail Morgan followed led back to him."

Ronnie ran a quick verification. "This is real. It's all real."

Selena's face turned pale. Daphne covered her mouth.

Oz spoke first. "You went through restricted files to get this."

Karadec didn't deny it.

"You broke protocol," Selena said, stunned. "You hacked Bureau files, forged access—"

Ronnie cut in, more measured. "Even if it's all legit, none of this is admissible, Adam. Not in court. Not officially. You know that, right?"

Karadec's expression didn't change.

"I did what Morgan would've done," Karadec snapped. "She's out there risking her life because she did her job. Because she chased the truth. I'm not going to sit here and wait for someone to give me permission to save her."

Silence.

The by-the-book detective was gone, replaced by something sharper, angrier. More desperate.

Everyone sighed heavily.

Then Daphne stepped forward. "She would've done worse to save you."

Karadec blinked.

Selena looked around the room. "We can't go through official channels. If Whitaker knows we're onto him, he'll have her killed."

Ronnie nodded, softening. "Then we don't go through channels. We go off the grid. We find solid evidence. Admissible evidence. Enough to bring Whitaker down, and get Morgan back."

Oz crossed his arms. "We go rogue."

Karadec looked around at each of them. "You're all sure?"

One by one, they nodded.

The team sprang into action.

Ronnie began creating a ghost network, bouncing their digital trail off international relays to avoid Bureau monitoring.

Daphne started voice analysis from the call, trying to find the weakest link in the tech. Oz traced known safe houses previously used by Protocol-related shell companies.

Selena searched Morgan's pictures again for hidden data or geolocation metadata.

Karadec stood at the center, calm but fierce.

They were no longer just a task force.

They were a rescue team.

And they were going to get Morgan back—whatever it took.