"He'll ask for a position next," she told Ethan one morning in the office corridor. "Or investment in his workshop. They always do."
"Ms. Sterling seems happy," Ethan answered.
Linda gave him a sharp look. "Happiness is not a security assessment."
"Neither is suspicion," he said before he could stop himself.
Linda's eyes narrowed. Ethan excused himself and continued toward the elevators, but he thought about the exchange throughout the day. He had worked closely enough with Victoria to see how isolated success could make a person. Daniel's presence seemed to give her something she had been missing, and Ethan could not remember ever having seen her so willing to listen to an opinion that did not come with credentials or projected revenue attached.
Linda, meanwhile, sought confirmation. She reviewed Daniel's public business registration, the ownership of his house, and his years outside the corporate world. Everything was simple. Too simple, she thought. She had reached a point where the absence of evidence became evidence itself, and the conclusion she wanted seemed to justify any method of obtaining it.
She arranged a meeting with a courier named Bobby Chastain, a young man who took private delivery assignments to supplement irregular warehouse work. Bobby was twenty-four, lived with his brother, and had a habit of accepting unusual jobs without demanding enough explanation. Linda met him in a cafe two neighborhoods away from Sterling Living headquarters and placed a sealed envelope on the table between them.
"I need a package delivered," she told him. "It is part of a discreet integrity review. The recipient is expecting it, although he may pretend otherwise."
Bobby looked at the address. "Why can't you use regular delivery?"
"Because privacy matters."
The assignment involved a leather wallet, a fabricated identification card, and a considerable amount of cash from an account Linda personally controlled. She assured Bobby that the money was protected, that the test was authorized, and that he would be paid whether or not the wallet was retrieved. Bobby questioned the arrangement once more, but the fee was more than he usually earned in a week. He accepted and later said he had convinced himself the story about a security test must be true because an executive who looked as professional as Linda would not risk so much on something dishonest.
On a gray Tuesday afternoon, Bobby left the wallet on Daniel's porch near the welcome mat. He knocked twice, then moved down the street to wait behind a parked delivery van. From there he watched the front door open and saw Daniel bend to pick up the wallet. Bobby expected him to look inside, return to the house, and remain there. Instead Daniel stood in the doorway for several seconds, scanning the street, then took out his phone.