**********
The room was silent for a moment.
"I just ordered someone's death," Emily said.
"You authorized necessary action against an active threat," Timothy corrected.
"There's a difference."
"Is there?
"Yes. Kozlov made his choice when he accepted money to kill you. There are consequences."
Emily knew he was right. But it still felt heavy.
Sebastian looked up from his laptop. "Found something. There's been unusual traffic in our communication system from three days ago.
Someone's been monitoring call logs, message timestamps. Not reading content our encryption held but tracking patterns."
"That's how they knew our movements," Timothy realized. "They couldn't read our messages, but they could see when we communicated, who we contacted, and timing patterns."
"Exactly. Smart hacker. Stayed just below detection threshold." Sebastian's expression was grim. "But now that I know he's there, I can hunt him. Give me two hours."
