Trap

The silence wasn't peaceful.

It was the kind that gnawed at the edges of sanity, the kind that festered in the shadows of ambition and secrecy, brewing schemes behind closed doors and billion-dollar firewalls.

High above the city, on the top floor of Moon Wealth Management's gleaming headquarters, the air was thick with calculation.

Ryan Anders stood by the floor-to-ceiling window of his office, a tumbler of rare, amber-hued whiskey cradled in his hand.

Behind him was the city sprawled before the gallant building, its twinkling lights swallowed by the bruised purples and fading golds of the dusk sky.

Before him was a massive digital display screen. It had a surface made of mosaic of financial charts, company rosters, and a single, striking graph that dominated the room: Steele Investments' growth trajectory, a meteoric spike that seemed to pierce the heavens.

"It's like watching a startup go supernova," came a voice from the shadows.