Silence in the Black House was never peaceful.
Adrian didn't wait for sunrise. By 0400, he was already deep into the data mesh of his human network, his eyes reflecting the rapid-fire scroll of anomalies. Almost like he was addicted to it.
Lucian was occupied with the fallout of the board-share dump—a move that had the High Council screaming into comm-lines—and Adrian knew that in the chaos of a financial war, the physical world left openings.
He found the pattern in the mundane. It wasn't a spike in supernatural resonance or a surge in vampire activity. It was fuel.
Three independent fuel shipments, diverted from the municipal grid, like they had been doing since he stepped into this house.
He asked him same question he has been asking all these while:
Just how busy had Lucian been, investigating his parents death, these past few years?
