Declan said nothing when the lift doors opened. He simply nodded and walked beside Margot along the twelfth-floor corridor as though her presence there were the most natural thing in the world, as though waitresses appeared in the offices of CEOs every morning and it required no explanation whatsoever. His office was spacious but less ostentatious than Margot expected. A glass desk. Two bookshelves filled with volumes that looked genuinely read. A window that overlooked the entire city. On the wall behind the desk, a single framed photograph, a younger Declan shaking hands with someone at a ceremony. Margot did not recognize the person, but she recognized the setting. It was an International Chamber of Commerce.
“Sit down,” said Declan, gesturing to the chair in front of the desk. He sat on the other side and looked at her with the same expression from the night before. Unhurried. Without judgment. With the full attention of someone who knew how to listen. “Before we talk about work,” Margot began, “I need you to know everything. Not the abridged version I told you last night. Everything.” “I’m listening.”
Margot told him about the legal proceedings Callum had left behind, about the clients who sued her, about the interpreter’s license that was suspended during the investigation, and which, even after she was cleared, was never reactivated because the stigma was greater than any court ruling. She told him she had tried to start over three times, at translation agencies, language schools, consulting firms, and that every time someone uncovered the scandal, the doors closed before they had fully opened. Declan listened without interrupting.
When she finished, he was silent for a moment. Then he opened a desk drawer and removed a folder. “James delivered this early this morning,” he said, placing the folder in front of Margot. “It’s the full report on Tristan Vickers and Nathan Ashford.” Margot opened the folder. The first pages confirmed what James had said on the phone. Fraudulent diploma. Insufficient German. Connection to Ashford. But the pages that followed contained something she did not expect.
There were records of emails between Ashford and Tristan, exchanged weeks before the dinner at the Bellmore Room. In one of them, Ashford gave specific instructions. Keep the translation generic. Soften any objection from the German. If he questions numbers, change the subject. The Australian doesn’t understand a word of German. Use that. Margot read that passage and had to stop. Not because of the revelation itself, but because of the clinical coldness of the words. The same coldness she recognized. The same calculated indifference of someone who turns another person’s trust into a tool for profit.
“Keep reading,” said Declan. On page six, there were records of bank transfers. Tristan Vickers had received three payments from an account linked to Ashford’s offshore subsidiary in the months before the negotiation with Conrad Weiss. The amounts were substantial, but that was not what made Margot stop breathing. On page eight, there was a name. Callum Rendle.