Dante looked at him for the first time since entering the room. "I buried my wife and then my closest friend," he said. "I left daily management because my daughter had lost her mother and needed the parent she still had. You remained here and used the company's mission as something to sell for your own benefit. Don't confuse those two facts."
Zane stood so abruptly that his chair struck the wall behind him. He accused Dante of returning for attention, accused Archie Bennett of stealing confidential records before anyone had mentioned the analyst by name, and demanded that the board hear his explanation. Dante let the demand hang in the air. The reference to Archie told him more than Zane intended, and Martin quietly recorded the statement in his notes.
The fifth minute belonged to Calista. Dante placed a contract appendix in front of her, identifying an electronic version of her signature attached to provisions approving the dismantling of the public-service research program. She read the signature block twice, then searched for a memorandum she remembered approving. The words before her did not match the summary she had been given, and the approval trail identified a delegated account that she had trusted Oliver's office to manage.
"I never read this," she said. Her voice was so soft that Oliver tried to speak over it, claiming the appendix was a routine technical schedule. Calista raised a hand without looking at him, the first time that morning she had interrupted one of his explanations. "I said I never read this. Why is my signature attached to it?"
Martin asked to examine the signing logs. A preliminary check showed that the authorization had been applied through a delegated administrative process, leaving the validity of Calista's consent in serious doubt. Dante did not declare that she was innocent, and he did not suggest that ignorance erased the duty to read important documents. He simply set another folder beside her, containing the calendars and communications through which the full contract had been concealed from the acting chief executive.
Calista's hand shook as she turned the pages. She remembered refusing appointments with engineers because Oliver said they would distract her from strategic leadership. She remembered asking for the full agreement and accepting a summary after Zane assured her the appendices were standard. For the first time she recognized how thoroughly her desire to appear competent had been used to keep her from doing the work competence required.
In the sixth minute, Dante placed the founder emergency provision beside the proposed sale. He asked Martin to read the operative language aloud, and the general counsel confirmed that a properly documented threat of fraud, undervalued disposal of protected technology, or unauthorized related-party benefit triggered a temporary founder-led suspension process. Dante signed the formal notice with a silver pen Rosalind had given him on the day their first major contract was executed. Martin countersigned the receipt of the notice and confirmed that the pending sale could not proceed while the designated independent review was initiated.