Page 157 of Vendetta Vows

I watch Artyom's fingers fly across the keyboard, his brows furrowing deeper with each passing minute. My stomach feels like a block of ice, heavy and cold. Ruslan paces behind us, his footsteps growing increasingly agitated.

"Well, fuck me," Artyom swears suddenly, his fingers freezing over the keyboard.

"What is it?" Ruslan stops pacing, his voice sharp.

"See this?" Artyom turns the laptop toward us. "Someone installed a backdoor into the security system. They've been siphoning the feed for weeks right under our noses and passing it through a third-party gate."

The technical jargon means little to me, but I understand enough. I try to swallow but my mouth is bone dry.

"When?" Ruslan demands, leaning over to examine the screen.

"Like you said. Since the day of the wedding." Artyom points to a timestamp. "Someone must've gained access to the system."

Ruslan's jaw tightens. "How?"

"It's quite clever actually." Artyom scrolls through lines of code I can't begin to comprehend. "They piggybacked off a connection already on the Wi-Fi network to inject a script that bypasses our authentication protocols. Once inside, they used the same path to duplicate the camera feed to transmits it without tripping any alarms. I'd be impressed if I wasn't so fucking furious."

I wrap my arms around myself, feeling suddenly cold despite the warm day. "Can you find out who's doing the transmission?"

"Working on it," Artyom says, his fingers working again. "But whoever did this is fucking clever. It bounces the feed off multiple MAC addresses. I'm tracing it now."

The silence stretches as we wait, broken only by the clicking of Artyom's keyboard. But I can't help my mind turning towards scenarios that get darker with each thought. Kristofer watching me sleep. Kristofer watching me with Ruslan. Kristofer watching the children as he contemplates writing those awful words on the walls of the mansion.

Look what you made me do.

"Found it," Artyom announces, his voice oddly tight. He turns to Ruslan with an expression I can't read.

"Who?" Ruslan's voice drops dangerously low.

Artyom nods, turning the screen for us to see as he takes a trembling breath. "It's Mikayla."

"No, that can't be right," I say, my voice barely audible as I stare at the screen. "Mikayla wouldn't do this. Not to Ruslan."

"Run it again," Ruslan demands, his knuckles whitening as he grips the edge of the desk.

Artyom's fingers fly across the keyboard again, pulling up screen after screen of logs and code.

"It's not a mistake." He points to a series of numbers on the screen. "That's Mikayla's phone. The intrusion originated from there. And the external transfer routes through there as well. I can run this again, but it's going to tell you the same result."

I watch the transformation happen on Ruslan's face—disbelief morphing into rage, his golden eyes darkening to amber. The muscle in his jaw ticks rapidly.

"Ruslan," I reach for his arm, my fingers curling around his tense forearm. "Think about it—Mikayla is fifteen. How would she know how to hack a security system this complex?"

"She wouldn't need to," Artyom interjects. "If someone sent her a link, or even a QR code… She could've done it without realizing what it was."

"I need to talk to her," Ruslan says flatly. "Find out for sure."

"How would she be able to tell you?" I argue, stepping closer to him. "She might have no idea about any of this."

Ruslan shakes his head, his voice cold in a way I've never heard before. "It doesn't matter if she knew. Her phone has been compromising our security for weeks."

"But—"

"Artyom," Ruslan cuts me off. "Bring my nieces inside. Have guards take Stella and Sofia to their rooms and keep them there. I want to speak with Mikayla. Alone."

Artyom nods and disappears through the door, leaving me alone with a man who suddenly feels like a stranger.

"Ruslan, please," I plead. "Don't treat her like a criminal before we know?—"

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