Check a number.
Correct a schedule.
Compare two maps.
Then Clara noticed that the transportation assumptions contradicted the proposed construction phases.
She found duplicate costs buried in separate contractor estimates.
She rearranged the financing schedule and wrote a risk summary that Richard praised at breakfast without asking who had written it.
By the end, Clara had rebuilt much of the proposal.
Madison submitted it under her own supervision.
Clara had said nothing.
Of course she had said nothing.
Dante reopened the folder.
“The first version was expensive and careless,” he said.
“The second was polished but still careless.”
Richard swallowed.
“And the third?” Madison asked.
Dante looked directly at Clara.
“The third made me come here tonight.”
Silence spread outward.
Madison laughed once.
It sounded brittle.
“That was my revision.”
“No.”
Dante’s answer landed softly.
Madison stared at him.
Dante tapped one page with his finger.
“The third version contained notes your father’s office apparently failed to remove before forwarding the file to mine.
Different phrasing.
Different calculations.
Different assumptions.
My people asked who produced them.”
Richard stepped closer.
“This is getting unnecessarily technical.”
“Business usually becomes technical when money is involved.”
A man near them coughed into his champagne glass to hide a reaction.
Dante continued.
“My office was told Madison Whitmore prepared the work.”
Madison lifted her chin.
“Correct.”
“So I asked questions only the author should have been able to answer.”
Madison’s confidence weakened.
Clara understood immediately.
Dante had not walked into the ballroom blind.
He had already tested the story.
Richard interrupted.
“Madison has had a very demanding schedule.”
“She couldn’t explain the cost model.”
“She delegates.”
“She couldn’t explain the construction sequence.”
“Again—”
“She couldn’t explain why the third proposal eliminated a financing gap that existed in the first two.”
Richard’s mouth closed.
Madison looked toward Clara.
There was no sisterly warmth in her face now.
Only accusation.
Dante saw that too.
He handed the folder toward Clara.
