Adrian leaned forward. "We need to separate isolated procedural defects from allegations of criminal activity. Those are very different matters."
"Agreed," Frances said. "That's why no one has labeled these transactions criminal. Yet. We are asking whether the company paid for services it received, whether the agreements were properly authorized, and whether anyone intentionally prevented staff from discovering discrepancies. Those questions are well within the board's responsibility."
Adrian gave a restrained smile. "Then perhaps the investigation should be overseen by legal."
"Not by the department whose decisions are being examined," Frances replied.
The silence that followed had a physical weight. Daniel watched Adrian close his folder without speaking. It was the smallest expression of resistance, but Daniel recognized the calculation behind it. Adrian was no longer arguing the evidence; he was testing whether the independent directors would hold their position.
They did. The board voted to postpone the service-division sale until an independent valuation could be completed. It authorized outside forensic accountants to examine the vendor network and required immediate preservation of communications relating to the disputed payments. Directors instructed management to cooperate with the review and to prevent retaliation against witnesses. Adrian was directed to have no supervisory role in the investigation of his own department.
Afterward, Victoria found Daniel in the hallway beside a wall of photographs showing the company's earliest products. She had walked through this corridor hundreds of times without reading the captions. Now one caught her eye: a prototype tracking device held by a smiling engineering team. The company looked different when she imagined it as thousands of people rather than lines on a financial statement.
"I want to speak to you," she said.
Daniel stopped. "About the report?"
"About the airport."
He looked toward the elevator. "My son is at school. I have a few minutes."
Victoria struggled with the sentence she had rehearsed in her car. She had apologized to investors and suppliers before, but those apologies had been polished through legal and communications teams until they sounded like announcements. This required something less elegant.
"I should never have handed you that notice in front of Noah," she said. "I didn't read your report. I accepted a summary from people whose decisions you had questioned. I was wrong."
Daniel looked at her without speaking.
"You must be furious," Victoria added.
"I was hurt," he said. "Mostly because he saw it. He thinks if you do your job well, people will treat you fairly. I haven't figured out how to explain the gap between that lesson and what happened."
Victoria's eyes lowered. "I'm sorry."
"Thank you for saying it."
She waited, perhaps hoping for forgiveness, but Daniel did not offer a reassuring speech. He was not cruel. He was simply unwilling to make her feel better at the cost of pretending a public act could disappear with one private sentence.
"You could have told me about Northstar," she said after a moment.
"I could have. It would have changed how you treated me. That's why I didn't."
"Isn't that a test no one can pass?"