Moses leaned back in his chair, letting his fingers drum against the mahogany desk. The city outside moved in slow, indifferent pulses—cars gliding past, distant horns breaking the monotony—but in this office, time seemed suspended.
He glanced at the clock again: 2:40. Too late for routine work, too early for distractions. His eyes swept across the room, noting every detail: the half-empty coffee cup on the corner, the stack of unopened files, the faint reflection of sunlight slicing across the floor through the blinds. Something was off. Something he couldn’t name.
A soft buzz pulled him from his thoughts. His phone vibrated across the desk. The screen displayed a name he hadn’t expected to see. A client? A warning? He didn’t know yet. Carefully, he picked it up.
“Hello,” he said, his voice steady but measured.
The voice on the other end was quiet, almost casual—but it carried an undercurrent of danger that made Moses’ skin prickle. A single sentence hung in the air before the line went dead: “They’re coming. And they know you’re involved.”
Moses sat frozen for a moment, letting the words sink in. Then, like always, he straightened his back, tightened his grip on the desk, and let the calm mask of control settle over him. Secrets could destroy people. He knew it better than anyone. And tonight, it seemed, he was running out of time.