By noon, the internal inquiry had already become larger than a dispute about one test report. It raised questions about access controls, personnel processes, the treatment of technical warnings, and how much information the company's senior leaders saw before making decisions. Audrey knew those questions would unsettle shareholders and directors. She also knew that finding answers only when trouble became public was a poor substitute for genuine oversight.
Preston understood the stakes just as quickly. He received an update that the audit had identified an unusual approval session and made three calls before noon. The first went to an operations manager who assured him the consortium remained eager to proceed. The second went to a communications adviser, whom he asked to prepare language about an internal disagreement over technical interpretation. The third went to a board member whose family had known the Blackwells for decades.
Within an hour, Preston had arranged lunch at a private club on Michigan Avenue. The room featured dark wood paneling, thick carpets, and windows looking out over a city disguised beneath new snow. Two directors joined him at a corner table, greeting him with the familiarity of people who had shared charitable dinners and investment conversations for years. Preston waited until the meal arrived before describing the problem.
He did not say that an employee had reported failed measurements or that auditors had found an approval event inconsistent with the employee's session history. Instead, he spoke about urgency, commercial trust, and the hazards of a chief executive becoming emotionally invested in the complaint of a single disgruntled technician. He framed the discussion as concern for Audrey rather than opposition to her. A good board, he suggested, had a duty to protect its CEO from being drawn into operational disputes beyond her technical expertise.
One director, Margaret Voss, asked whether the underlying acceptance evidence actually met the contracted standard. Preston paused only long enough to take a sip of water. "Engineering disagreements are inevitable in a project this size," he said. "The overall system is sound, and there's a danger of allowing perfectionism to defeat completion."
Margaret did not appear satisfied. "That isn't what I asked."
Preston smiled as if indulging an unnecessary detail. "Our specialists are handling it. The immediate question is whether we allow a single employee to threaten hundreds of jobs and a four-hundred-and-twenty-million-dollar agreement."
The other director, Harold Fenwick, leaned forward. "Is Audrey prepared to delay the closing?"
"She's considering measures that could make delay unavoidable," Preston replied. "Perhaps the board ought to hear the facts directly before this becomes a public embarrassment."
He left the club with no formal commitment, but with enough sympathy to request an emergency meeting. The directors had not promised to protect him, yet Preston assumed old loyalties would carry him through another difficult negotiation. He had grown accustomed to people interpreting his confidence as evidence. The audit was the first serious challenge in years that could not be solved by entering a room and sounding certain.
Back at Hawthorne Tower, Tyler Brooks struggled to concentrate on a test schedule. He had watched Nolan's dismissal without speaking and spent much of the night replaying the moment when he could have stepped forward. He knew the failed runs were real. He had helped configure one of them and had watched Nolan spend hours isolating the conditions. He wondered whether remaining silent had made him part of the false accusation.
Tyler went to Marla's office and told her he wanted to cooperate with the auditors. She listened, then explained that the company had established an independent process and that his account needed to be his own, not coached by her. "Tell them what you saw," she said. "If you didn't see something, don't pretend you did. You're allowed to be afraid and still be honest."