Chapter 7 #2
The woman I've spent years speaking to when I can't sleep.
The woman who sends me half her mouth and beats my encryption for sport.
The woman I invited into Haverhill's wedding.
She's the hacker I've been hunting inside my own company.
A laugh almost escapes me.
Not because this is funny.
Because the alternative may be breaking something expensive.
GHOST: How long?
VESPER: Before I knew Ghost had a surname.
I read it twice.
Then a third time.
Before she knew.
Important.
More important than I want it to be.
GHOST: You weren’t talking to me to get access.
VESPER: No.
Immediate.
No hesitation.
Something tight inside my chest loosens.
Slightly.
I hate that it needed reassurance.
GHOST: Then why Blackwell?
She disappears again.
I wait.
My patience lasts ninety seconds.
GHOST: What are you looking for?
Three dots.
VESPER: Answers.
GHOST: To what?
VESPER: Something your company buried.
My hand tightens around the device.
Across from me, the empty chair waits for a client who will arrive in twenty minutes.
I no longer care.
GHOST: Be specific.
VESPER: No.
GHOST: You broke into my company.
VESPER: Your company broke into my life first.
That lands differently.
Anger disappears.
Not completely.
Enough for curiosity to move beneath it.
GHOST: What does that mean?
Nothing.
Then:
VESPER: Someone died.
The back of my neck tightens.
ARGUS.
Adrien Beaumont.
My father's evasiveness.
I sit straighter.
GHOST: Who?
Vesper doesn't answer.
GHOST: Who died?
Finally:
VESPER: My father.
My entire body goes cold.
I look at the Blackwell tablet beside the Shakespeare book.
I don't need to open it.
The name has been sitting inside my head since California.
Adrien Beaumont.
Dead former Blackwell systems architect.
His archived file accessed during the ARGUS intrusion.
Vesper has been penetrating Blackwell systems.
Looking for answers about a dead father.
No.
Too clean.
Too obvious.
I refuse conclusions without proof.
GHOST: Did he work for Blackwell?
The typing indicator appears.
Then disappears.
I wait.
Ten seconds.
Thirty.
A minute.
VESPER: Once.
There it is.
My pulse hits once, hard.
I reach for the tablet and open the Beaumont file.
ADRIEN BEAUMONT
French-American.
Systems architecture.
Classified government work before Blackwell.
ARGUS access.
Deceased.
The file contains family information, but that portion remains restricted behind an older compartment I haven't opened yet.
I could open it.
Probably in minutes.
Maybe seconds.
Find his daughter.
Find Vesper.
The realization hits with startling clarity.
She's right there.
Her identity may be sitting one authentication layer away.
My thumb hovers over the command.
For years I've wanted this.
A name.
A face.
A location.
Everything.
I don't press.
Not yet.
Instead, I return to NULL.
GHOST: You should have told me.
Her response is immediate.
VESPER: Before or after I discovered you were Xavier Blackwell?
Fair.
GHOST: Before you started sending me Shakespeare about hating me.
A pause.
VESPER: I don’t hate Ghost.
My chest tightens.
GHOST: Xavier?
Nothing.
GHOST: Do you hate Xavier?
Her typing indicator appears.
Stops.
Reappears.
VESPER: I don’t know yet.
I lean back.
That answer should irritate me.
Instead it scares me.
Because Vesper rarely doesn't know.
GHOST: Depends on what?
VESPER: What happened to my father.
There it is.
The entire game changes.
No more bridge.
No Sergei.
No lipstick.
No flirting around what matters.
She believes Blackwell is connected to her father's death.
And she thinks I might be too.
I stare at the book.
My only love sprung from my only hate.
Now I understand.
Not completely.
Enough.
GHOST: Do you think I killed him?
The response takes too long.
My jaw locks.
Then:
VESPER: I think you know things you don’t know you know.
What the hell does that mean?
GHOST: Explain.
VESPER: Not here. Not yet.
GHOST: You trust NULL.
VESPER: I trusted Ghost.
Past tense.
That one cuts.
I type before caution arrives.
GHOST: Did you ever care about me, or was I always Blackwell once you figured it out?
Nothing.
I shouldn't have asked.
Too late.
Thirty seconds.
One minute.
I picture her somewhere in London looking at the same black screen.
Finally:
VESPER: Ghost was real long before I knew Xavier existed.
I read it slowly.
Not an answer.
Also exactly an answer.
My eyes close.
For some reason, that hurts more than it helps.
Because now there are two versions of me inside her mind too.
Ghost.
Xavier.
One she trusts.
One she might hate.
She isn't the only person trying to reconcile them.
GHOST: And now?
No answer.
Then:
VESPER: Now I need the truth.
I look down at Adrien Beaumont’s file.
So do I.
GHOST: Give me time.
VESPER: Dangerous thing to ask from someone who doesn’t trust you.
GHOST: You trusted me for years.
VESPER: I trusted Ghost.
Again.
I hate that distinction.
GHOST: Same man.
Her answer arrives quickly.
VESPER: Prove it.
Then she's gone.
NULL goes dark.
I sit alone in a London hotel bar with an untouched Scotch, a cooling espresso, an old copy of Romeo and Juliet, and a dead man's file open beside me.
A client I no longer care about is due in twelve minutes.
I pick up the paperback.
Read the underlined line again.
Then close it carefully.
Vesper could have sent an encrypted file.
A message.
A photograph.
Instead she gave me something physical.
Cheap.
Used.
Handled by strangers before either of us touched it.
I should send it for prints.
Fiber analysis.
Trace evidence.
I don't.
I put the book inside my briefcase.
Not the evidence case.
Mine.
Then I reopen Adrien Beaumont.
This time I don't start with his daughter.
I start with his death.
Because Vesper asked me to prove Ghost and Xavier are the same man where it matters.
And for the first time in my life, finding the truth feels more important than finding the woman hiding behind it.