Page 67 of Hunted

If Malachi weren’t standing at my shoulder radiating suspicion, I’d already be ghosting through Umbra’s restricted sublevels.

Instead, I behave.

For now.

The Lyra Hannigan file is stuffed to the terabyte with data.

Financial histories. Property records. Social event registries. Gambling markers signed by my father in increasingly frantic handwriting. Lists of known associates. Travel manifests. Unconfirmed sightings.

No photographs.

Every physical image burned in the Hannigan house fire that conveniently consumed the estate weeks after I disappeared and Dad died.

Officially electrical.

Unofficially strategic.

Someone, possibly Valentin, erased the past neatly.

But the rest is astonishingly complete. Psychological profiles. Behavioural projections estimating where a girl like Lyra Hannigan might resurface. Speculative marriage probabilities cross-referenced with elite circles in Europe and South America. Height, weight, medical summaries compiled from paediatric records.

There’s even a note about the crescent-shaped scar near my left ankle, the one I covered with a discreet starburst tattoo three months into my first year at the Agency.

My stomach tightens.

He’s rebuilt me from paper and pixels while I thought I had erased myself.

‘You look nervous,’ Malachi says smoothly from behind me.

I resist the urge to reach for my Widow’s Fang and lean back in the chair instead. ‘I’m impressed. Your boss doesn’t do things halfway.’

‘Don Moretti does nothing without purpose.’

‘I gathered.’

I scroll further. Then I see it. Thin. It’s borderline invisible. Tangible. But more importantly, chaseable.

I lean back slowly, allowing my expression to sharpen just enough for Malachi to notice.

Then grimace.

He watches the screen, then my face. ‘What are you up to?’

‘Don’t know what you’re talking about.’ I turn and let my gaze drop to his hand. ‘How’s the wrist?’

He’s too disciplined to lose control, but I feel him bristle. ‘You are stalling,’ he says quietly.

‘Am I? Or are you just unused to seeing someone think?’

His mouth curves faintly. ‘We think quite effectively.’

‘Oh, I don’t doubt that. The Black Twelve have quite the reputation.’ I glance at him deliberately. ‘How old are you, Malachi?’

His expression doesn’t shift. ‘Old enough.’

‘That’s not an answer.’

‘It is the only one you require.’