The Reed Estate had never felt so much like a tomb.
Usually, the house hummed with the invisible pulse of high-end security—the soft whir of cameras, the rhythmic blinking of LED panels, the low vibration of the server room. But tonight, it was dead. The "blackout" Asher had ordered had stripped the fortress of its digital soul, leaving only the cold, oppressive silence of stone and shadow.
I sat in the nursery, the only light coming from a small, battery-operated moon-lamp on Leo's nightstand. The pale glow touched the edges of the crib, where my son's chest rose and fell in a perfect, innocent rhythm. He was the only thing in this house not waiting for a tragedy.
I checked my watch for the tenth time in three minutes. 02:45 AM.
