Chapter 17 #2
"I think it's the same operation," Ignatius corrected.
"Whether it's one individual or an organization, the methodology is identical. Patient. Precise. Targeted at the people closest to dragons on this team, rather than at the dragons themselves." He glanced at us. “And by dragons, I don’t know if we’re just talking hockey players or something else.”
The word hung in the air between us—dragons—and I watched Cinder absorb it without flinching.
He'd known for less than twenty-four hours what Ignatius and I were, and he was sitting in a dragon's study, processing the implications of a coordinated intelligence operation targeting our kind with the composure of someone reviewing lab results.
I didn't know whether to be awed or terrified on his behalf.
"Gavin may not even know what he's really looking for," Ignatius continued.
"Someone could have framed it as a simple sports story—unusual medical data, anomalous player performance, the kind of thing that sells to outlets hungry for scandal.
He doesn't need to know about dragons. He just needs to deliver the data, and whoever is behind this will know exactly what they're looking at. "
Cinder exhaled slowly through his nose.
"Did you keep physical files at home?" Ignatius asked sharply.
"No. Everything's on the team's server, but I detailed all Taz’s readings, and if someone could access them…” He trailed off.
“I have shorthand notes on my phone only I could understand.” Ignatius's expression sharpened further—something dangerous and precise moving behind his eyes, like a predator recalculating the distance to its prey.
"Your phone notes," he said, his voice deceptively mild. "Where are they stored?"
Cinder
I opened my mouth. Closed it. Felt the blood leave my face in a rush so sudden it left me dizzy. "They're in my notes app," I said slowly. "Which syncs to—"
"The cloud," Ignatius finished, and the word landed like a verdict.
My stomach dropped through the floor. I grabbed my phone, fingers fumbling, pulling up the settings with hands that had gone clumsy and numb.
The iCloud sync icon sat there, cheerful and innocuous, the little spinning arrow confirming that every note I'd ever typed had been faithfully uploaded to a server I didn't control, accessible from any device with my credentials.
My credentials. Which were tied to an Apple ID Gavin had created using his own email address nearly a year ago, back when he'd insisted on "streamlining" our digital lives.
Back when I'd been too worn down, too controlled, too desperate to keep the peace to argue about something as mundane as digital account management.
"Oh God," I whispered.
Taz's hand found my back instantly—cold, grounding, an anchor against the vertigo threatening to pull me under. "Cinder. Talk to me."
"My Apple ID," I said, the words coming out thin and rapid. "It's Gavin's email. His actual email. He set everything up. When we were together. I changed the password after I left him, but the Apple ID itself—" My throat constricted. "The Apple ID is still his email address. He controls the inbox."
The silence that followed was painful.
"If he wanted to," Doryu said quietly from his chair, his pen pausing over his notebook, "he could reset your password anytime. He'd get the reset link directly. Your password change wouldn't matter."
"He'd have full access," I confirmed, and my voice sounded like it belonged to someone else—someone far away, watching a disaster unfold through glass.
"Every temperature reading. Every anomalous cardiac rhythm.
Every baseline I flagged as outside normal parameters.
It's all there. Everything I documented about Taz. "
The silence that followed was painful.
I pressed the heels of my hands into my eyes, hard enough to see stars.
Stupid. Stupid, stupid, stupid. I was a medical professional.
I knew about data security. I'd sat through HIPAA training every year for a decade, and I'd left the keys to my most sensitive observations in a digital lockbox my abusive ex-boyfriend could open with a password reset.
"That doesn't make sense though," Doryu said. "A password reset would trigger notices, authentication, and I'm assuming you didn't get that?"
I shook my head, relief rushing through me like a living thing. "No."
Doryu nodded slowly. “Then he didn’t reset it. Did he have any trusted devices on your account?"
I stared at him, horror creeping up my spine. “His iPad. I forgot my password once. We kept it logged in as backup.”
If his iPad is still listed as a trusted device, it would keep syncing. Changing the password wouldn’t matter unless you removed it from your account.”
"The notes aren't formal medical records," I rushed out, forcing myself to think clinically even as panic clawed at my ribs.
"They're personal shorthand—abbreviations, observations, questions I was working through.
Most of it wouldn't make sense to a layperson.
But to someone with medical knowledge, or someone who hired a consultant with medical knowledge—"
"What would they see?" Ignatius asked. His voice was perfectly level, but I could feel the weight behind the question—the centuries of careful concealment, the generations of dragons who'd survived because no one had ever been able to prove what they were.
I swallowed hard. "They'd see a pattern of physiological data that's impossible for a normal human.
Core temperatures consistently below ninety-two degrees without hypothermic symptoms. Cardiac rhythms that slow to levels incompatible with consciousness during high-exertion activity, then spike in ways that don't match any known arrhythmia. "
"And if they chose to pursue this," Ignatius pressed, "if they decided to frame it differently—"
My blood ran cold. Colder even than the man sitting beside me.
"Doping," I said. The word tasted like ash. "They could frame it as a doping scandal."