Chapter 14 - The Phantom Code
The pub in Soho was dimly lit, smelling of stale ale and damp wool.
Elise sat in a corner booth, the collar of her trench coat pulled up. Graham sat beside her, his presence a solid, reassuring weight in the shadowy room.
At exactly 11:00 PM, a man with haunted eyes and a rain-soaked jacket slid into the booth across from them. Liam Croft looked like he hadn’t slept in a month.
“You’re the Bastion Arc people,” Croft whispered, his eyes darting toward the pub’s entrance. “You shouldn’t have contacted me. Thorne has eyes everywhere.”
“Thorne is about to be utterly dismantled,” Graham said, his voice an anchor of absolute authority. “But we need the proof. What did he do to your code, Liam?”
Croft’s hands shook as he reached into his pocket. “I built an impenetrable wall. Thorne took it, and he carved a microscopic door right in the center. He’s selling the keys to syndicate bosses. Anyone who buys Kensington’s security software is actually paying to be spied on.”
He slid a small, encrypted flash drive across the sticky wooden table.
“The original source code, and the transaction logs of every backdoor key Thorne sold,” Croft said, his voice breaking. “If he finds out I gave this to you, I’m a dead man.”
May you like
Elise placed her hand over the drive, sliding it smoothly into her coat.
“You have a first-class ticket on Bastion’s private jet waiting for you at Farnborough,” Elise told him softly. “Go. We’ll handle the rest.”
