She didn't walk toward Dante.

She waited.

He finished the call, pocketed the phone, and turned back toward her with the same steady expression he had worn for six years in her service.

Loyal.

Quiet.

Efficient.

The kind of man who anticipated problems before she named them.

She had always considered that a quality.

"Who recommended the catering company?" she said.

Nothing in his face moved.

"I sourced them through the usual channel."

"That's not what I asked."

A pause.

One beat too long.

"Renata," he said.

"She passed the contact to my office three weeks ago.

Said they'd handled two private events for the Ferraro family without incident."

Valentina kept her eyes on him.

"And you didn't verify independently."

"I verified the license, the insurance, the references—"

"But not through your own contacts.

Through Renata's."

Dante's mouth closed.

Renata Ferraro.

The widow of Carlo Ferraro, who had run the eastern distribution network until his death fourteen months ago.

A woman who had attended every Carbone function since, quiet and gracious, always seated two places down from Valentina's left.

A woman Valentina had felt sorry for.

"Where is Renata now?" Valentina said.

"She left the luncheon approximately twenty minutes before the incident."

"Before."

"Yes."

Valentina looked at him for a long moment.

"Did you know what was in the cans, Dante?"

"No." His answer came fast.

Faster than the others.

She studied his face.

Six years.

She knew every tell he had, or she had believed she did.

"If I find out differently," she said, "the conversation we have will not take place in this garden."

"I understand."

"Go find out everything you can about Renata's movements today.

Who drove her.

Where she went after she left.

Who she called."

He nodded and moved.

Valentina picked up the three drives and carried them inside.

The east room was a windowless space off the main corridor, used for storage during events and for conversations that required no witnesses the rest of the time.

Gerald was seated in a chair near the far wall.

Evelyn stood beside the door with her arms still crossed, the cut on her forearm now wrapped in a cloth napkin someone had given her.

Valentina set the drives on the table between them.

"Renata Ferraro," she said.

"Start there."

Gerald looked at the drives.

Something shifted in his expression — not fear exactly, but a recalibration.

He had expected her to take longer.

"Renata contracted us," he said.

"Six weeks ago."

"To do what."

"To place the drives in the cooler.

Make sure they stayed cold and undisturbed until the end of the luncheon.

Someone was supposed to collect them at the close of the event."

"Who."

"We weren't told.

We were told the contact would identify themselves with a specific phrase to the catering lead."

"What phrase."

Gerald hesitated.

Evelyn spoke instead.

"It doesn't matter now.

The collection didn't happen.

Your daughter touched the cooler and everything accelerated."

"What's on the drives?" Valentina said.

Neither of them answered.

"You raised a belt over a three-year-old child," Valentina said.

"Not to hurt her.

To frighten her away from the cooler before she could pick up the wrong can." She looked at Evelyn.

"And you humiliated her in front of every man I employ so the attention stayed on the scene and not on what Gerald was actually doing." She let the silence hold.

"So you knew exactly what was in those cans.

Both of you."

Evelyn's jaw tightened.

"We were told the drives contained financial records."

"Whose."

A long pause.

"Yours," Evelyn said.

The room didn't change.

The light was the same.

The air was the same.

But something in Valentina's chest went very still.

"Records of what," she said.

"Transfers.

Accounts.

Movement of funds over the last four years." Evelyn met her eyes.

"Renata told us the records proved the Carbone family had been redirecting money from the eastern network since Carlo d*ed.

That you had been taking what was his."

"And you believed her."

"We believed the documents."

"You haven't seen the documents.

You've seen drives you were paid to carry." Valentina stepped closer.

"Who else knows about this?"

Gerald and Evelyn exchanged a look.

That look told her everything she needed to know.

The drives weren't just records.

They were evidence meant to be delivered to someone who was already waiting for them.

Someone who had already decided what to do once they arrived.

"How many people," Valentina said, "are expecting those drives tonight?"