Chapter 98 The Web of Shadows

The next few days were a blur of phone calls, meetings, and whispered conversations. Kai and I reached out to every trusted contact we had, from old friends in law enforcement to business associates with connections in the intelligence community. The more we dug, the more it became clear that The Circle was not just a figment of the imagination—it was a very real, very dangerous organization with its tendrils wrapped around some of the most powerful institutions in the world. But the deeper we delved, the more we realized how little we actually knew. The Circle was shrouded in secrecy, its members hidden behind layers of aliases and shell corporations. Every lead we followed seemed to end in a dead end, every contact we reached out to was either too afraid to talk or mysteriously unavailable. It was as if we were trying to untangle a web made of shadows, with no clear idea of where to start. Lily, sensing the growing tension in the house, kept herself busy with schoolwork and her hob