20. Network
NETWORK
AIDAN — LONDON
Liam and I were at the back of the rehearsal hall, watching the rehearsal and working on our laptops. Even without knowing the choreography, I saw Jin was off.
Half a beat slow on transitions. Stumbling over lyrics I was sure he knew by heart. Ending a dance number five feet from where he was supposed to be. His focus slipping every time he thought no one was looking.
Was it an accumulation of all the threats he had received? Or was it because Sang-hoon had decamped back to Seoul?
Sang-hoon’s departure made our jobs easier.
We no longer had to worry about protecting two men, on the chance that someone would hurt Sang-hoon to get back at Jin.
But Sang-hoon’s absence was taking a toll on Pryzm’s center.
All the technical staff were upset, from the technical director to the music engineer to the choreographer.
Everything revolved around Jin, and if he was off he knocked the whole performance out of whack.
I logged into the secure proxy server Richard had set up for us years before and stared at my laptop screen, at a series of emails that had started arriving at Eun-ji’s inbox shortly after the Amsterdam show, the time normalized to Central European Summer Time.
Three messages, each one escalating in specificity:
Message 1, sent 11:47 PM: The center cannot hold.
Message 2, sent 12:33 AM: Red looks good on him. Like devotion. Like blood.
Message 3, sent 2:15 AM: London will be beautiful. So many ways to fall from great heights.
All three sent from an IP address that resolved to Starhouse Entertainment’s corporate network in Seoul.
Which meant either someone at headquarters was threatening their own talent, or someone had compromised the company’s security from the inside.
Richard’s response had come through twenty minutes ago, characteristically blunt: IP is legit Starhouse, but routing through VPN. Could be internal or spoofed. Need physical access to their servers to confirm. You’re on your own until someone can get that.
Across the room, Liam looked up from his tablet. “The photograph from Paris.”
“What about it?”
“Forensics came back. The frame was purchased at a duty-free shop in Nice airport. Cash transaction, no security footage. The cameras in that section have been broken for three weeks.” He pulled up an image on his screen. “But the photograph itself is interesting. Look at the metadata.”
I leaned over. The image file had been stripped of most identifying information, but traces remained—fragments that told a story if you knew how to read them.
“Canon EOS R5,” Liam said. “Professional camera. The kind of equipment a tour photographer would use.”
“Or any serious hobbyist.”
“True. But I went over the list of people with legitimate credentials who could have been backstage at 21:47 on the night of the Cannes show. Jason’s team documented seventy-three people in Cannes including Starhouse staff and local crew.
Then he checked out eighty-three who had access in Paris to place the gift-wrapped box in Jin’s dressing room. ”
“I’m sure you already cross-referenced anyone who was present at both venues. Can I see that?”
He showed me the filtered list. “Touring staff—that’s our core. And the socials guy doesn’t even have such a fancy camera. Plus two freelance photographers who also shoot for venues in French locations. Both with clean backgrounds, both working in the industry for over a decade.”
“Names?”
“Julien Mercier and Sophie Tran.”
I pulled up the comprehensive background checks Richard had run when we first expanded the investigation.
Mercier was fifty-six, French, specialized in concert photography, married with two kids.
His social media was boring in the way legitimate professionals’ accounts usually were: work samples, equipment reviews, the occasional family dinner photo.
Sophie Tran was more interesting. Twenty-eight, French-Vietnamese, spoke four languages fluently, recent graduate of a prestigious photography program.
Her portfolio was excellent. She had a sharp eye and good instincts.
She was the kind of emerging talent that venues hired when they wanted fresh perspectives at reasonable rates.
Also: she’d been a last-minute addition to both the Cannes and Paris crews, hired through an agency that specialized in multilingual event staff.
“Sophie Tran,” I said.
Liam nodded. “Already flagged her. Check the email that came in from Richard a few minutes ago.”
Ran deep background on Sophie Tran. Clean on the surface, but her financial records are interesting.
Three deposits of ?5,000,000 (roughly €2800) appeared in her account over the past six weeks.
Payments were routed through a shell company in Singapore.
Can’t trace them any further without getting law enforcement involved.
Also: she requested specifically to work the Pryzm events. Both Cannes and Paris. Told the agency she was a fan, wanted the experience. They thought it was cute.
She’s on the crew list for London. Hired as second-unit photographer.
“As soon as we’re done here I’m going into her employment history, financial records, travel patterns. And I want to know who recommended her to the hiring agency.”
I forwarded the email to Jason: What do you think?
His response: I will let her show up for work. I want to see what she does. But I will have eyes on her the entire time.
I sat staring at my laptop screen, connecting threads.
Sophie Tran: photographer with suspicious payments, specifically requesting Pryzm assignments.
The framed photograph: professional quality, intimate access, delivered directly into Jin’s private space.
Yet how could she get emails sent through Starhouse’s network? Did she have a partner? Was she working for someone? The emails and the attacks were too closely linked to be coincidence.
My laptop pinged with another message from Richard to both me and Liam.
Sophie Tran just landed at Heathrow.
I forwarded that message to Jason who responded with a single thumbs-up.