He thought the information made him powerful.
Instead, it made Victoria suspicious of something bigger.
She looked at the reader.
Then at Richard.
“You knew which employee was working forty-two tonight.”
His face remained still.
“You knew his daughter’s name.”
“Victoria—”
“You had security coming down within two minutes of me reaching that floor.”
He said nothing.
“You planned for me to leave upstairs looking intoxicated.”
Richard exhaled slowly.
“This conspiracy theory is exactly why you need time away.”
Victoria pressed play again.
The recording jumped forward.
This time there was more movement.
Fabric pulling.
A chair striking something.
Victoria’s voice was sharp.
“Get your hand off me.”
Richard’s recorded voice dropped lower.
“Stop fighting me.”
Then a small sound made Victoria touch the blood at her neck.
Her breath on the recording caught.
Richard said, “Look what you’ve done.”
Victoria stopped playback.
I looked at the wound.
It wasn’t deep.
A narrow scrape ran along the base of her neck, where Richard’s hand had caught her while she pulled away.
The blood had looked dramatic against green silk, but now the meaning mattered more than the injury.
It was physical evidence that the calm story Richard had prepared did not match what had happened behind the closed doors upstairs.
Richard changed tactics.
His face softened.
“Victoria, listen to yourself.
I was trying to keep you from falling.”
“You told me to sign over temporary control.”
“Because you weren’t well.”
“Before or after you gave me the drink?”
“Be careful.”
“No,” she said.
“You be careful.”
She reached into the hidden cabinet and removed the sealed folder I had seen moments earlier.
Richard’s attention snapped to it.
That reaction told me the folder mattered before she ever opened it.
Victoria laid it on the table.
“I started noticing irregular approvals six weeks ago,” she said.
“Contracts appearing after I had rejected them.
Vendor authorizations routed around my office.
Executive decisions carrying my approval when I hadn’t given it.”
Richard laughed once.
“You run a global company.
Do you think every document waits for your personal blessing?”
“No.
But documents assigning authority in my name do.”
She opened the folder.
Inside were printed copies of approval trails, access records, and unsigned authorization documents.
