Victoria placed her pen on the desk. "I know his business. I've met his neighbor. I've spoken to him, more than once."
"That's not the same as knowing him. There are people who specialize in finding lonely executives and becoming what those executives need."
Victoria's face tightened. "I'm not asking for a report on my personal life."
Linda leaned forward. "Then why did Ethan gather one?"
That question struck a nerve because Victoria knew there had been something uncomfortable about commissioning even a restrained background summary. She had wanted to understand a person she could not control by using the instruments she used to understand a company. Daniel had not consented to being treated as a transaction. She told Linda that she would not repeat the inquiry, and that the issue was closed.
Linda heard the finality in her voice and interpreted it as proof that Victoria was hiding something from the people protecting her. She remembered another time, early in her career, when an admired colleague had used a personal friendship to gain access to confidential client material. The resulting investigation had almost cost Linda her first management position. She had vowed never again to be the person who failed to notice danger because she wanted to believe someone was kind.
The memory did not excuse what she began to consider. It only made her increasingly certain that she was the one person prepared to act while everyone else was becoming sentimental. She told herself that exposing a dishonest man before he gained Victoria's trust would be a service to both her employer and the company. That certainty made it easier to ignore the fact that she had no evidence of dishonesty at all.
Across town, Daniel was having a more ordinary problem. A customer who had promised to collect a restored wardrobe was three weeks late paying the final invoice. The cost of lumber had risen, his insurance premium was due, and the workshop's heating system had begun making a noise he did not like. He sat at the kitchen table one evening with a notebook open, adding numbers carefully and considering whether to take an assembly job from a contractor whose past payments had been unreliable.
Claire had been better than he was at reminding customers that good work deserved fair compensation. He could still hear her saying that generosity was not a substitute for keeping the lights on. Daniel smiled at the memory, then wrote a polite but direct message requesting payment from the late customer. He had no interest in becoming a martyr to his own principles. He believed in doing the right thing, but he also believed a person who made a promise to pay should keep it.