Chương 5
They were not arguing. The stillness between them looked worse.
Vivienne had set down her wine glass. Her arms were folded across her body.
Daniel’s travel bag remained beside the door.
“You’re accepting the interpretation of a distorted camera angle over my word,” Vivienne said.
“The table moved before the tray tipped.”
“I reached for a glass.”
“You looked at her first.”
“I looked at an employee standing in my way.”
Nora paused inside the corridor, unseen by either of them.
Daniel said, “She isn’t your employee.”
“Fine. A vendor.”
“She’s a person.”
Vivienne gave a short, tired laugh. “Please don’t become moral at me because you’ve had a difficult flight.”
Daniel’s face tightened.
“You told everyone she caused it.”
“I believed she had.”
“The recording shows otherwise.”
“The recording shows confusion.”
“It shows you crushing the flowers while she was trying to save them.”
“Do you hear yourself?”
“Yes.”
“You’re prepared to destroy tonight, embarrass the foundation, and damage our relationship because I stepped on flowers.”
“No.”
Daniel’s voice remained quiet.
“I’m prepared to do those things because you watched her kneel in front of you and knew she hadn’t done anything wrong.”
Vivienne unfolded her arms. “You have no idea what happened before you walked in.”
“That’s what I’m beginning to understand.”
For the first time, fear moved plainly across her face.
It disappeared almost immediately.
Nora should have kept walking. Instead she stayed still, half concealed by the service door.
Vivienne said, “Ask your florist why she was so eager to accuse me.”
Daniel turned slightly.
Nora stepped into the hall before she could be summoned.
“Because of the invoice,” she said.
Jo, who had been checking crates near the front doors, went motionless.
Vivienne looked at Nora as if a household object had spoken.
Daniel’s gaze moved between them. “What invoice?”
“No,” Jo said.
The word was soft but urgent.
Nora looked at her.
Jo’s face had gone pale.
Vivienne recovered first. “A routine billing disagreement.”
“You added charges for services we didn’t provide,” Nora said.
Daniel turned to Vivienne.
She lifted her chin. “The event budget was reallocated. Vendors categorize services all the time.”
“Not after the vendor submits an invoice,” Nora said.
Jo closed the distance between them. “We are not discussing accounting without our records.”
“That’s sensible,” Vivienne said. “For once.”
Jo flinched as though struck.
Daniel noticed.
“How much?” he asked.
Nora answered. “Seventeen thousand five hundred.”
He stared at Vivienne.
She gave him the exhausted look of someone surrounded by unreasonable people. “It was an internal allocation.”
“Paid to Lark and Stem?”
“The foundation had funds assigned to donor programming. The invoice needed to reflect the full scope.”
“What happened to the additional money after payment?”
Nora had not thought that far.
Vivienne had.
“Nothing happened to it because the payment wasn’t processed.”
“Where was it supposed to go?”
“To the vendor.”
Jo found her voice. “We never agreed to the revised invoice.”
Vivienne looked at her. “You said you would handle it.”
“I said I would review it.”
“You said your assistant was overreacting.”
Jo’s eyes moved to Nora.
There it was. A second betrayal, smaller and more intimate than the first.
Nora did not ask whether it was true. Jo’s face answered.
Daniel rubbed a hand once across his mouth. He looked suddenly older.
“Marisol,” he called.
His chief of staff came from the library.
“Secure the foundation’s vendor records,” he said. “Tonight. No edits, no deletions, and no payments until counsel reviews them.”
Vivienne’s face hardened. “You don’t have authority to freeze every payment.”
“I have authority over my family’s contribution account and this event.”
“You’ll hurt people who have nothing to do with this.”
“Then the review should be quick.”
“It won’t be quick. You know that.”
Daniel looked at her. “Yes.”
The answer changed something.
Until then, Nora had assumed he would search for the smallest explanation that allowed his life to remain intact. Most people did. Daniel appeared to understand that there might not be one.
Vivienne picked up her glass from the table, then seemed to reconsider and left it there.
“This is vindictive,” she said.
“No,” Daniel replied. “Vindictive was making her clean the floor.”
Vivienne turned to Nora.
The alarm had left her face. What remained was attention.
Cold, exact attention.
“You should be careful,” she said. “People often mistake being noticed for being protected.”
Jo stepped between them.
Daniel did not move aggressively. He did not need to.
“You’re leaving,” he said.
Vivienne looked at him for several seconds.
Then she walked through the open doors without her wrap.
A staff member hurried after her with it.
The sound of her heels faded across the limestone terrace.
No one spoke until a car door closed outside.
Marisol exhaled and looked at Daniel. “I’ll call counsel.”
“Call Priya, not foundation counsel.”
“That will be noticed.”
“It’s already noticed.”
Marisol went into the library.
Daniel turned toward Nora and Jo. “I need copies of both invoices and the email chain.”
Jo answered before Nora could. “We need to speak with an attorney.”
“You should.”
“We also need to know whether our contract will be paid.”
“It will be.”
“And whether you’re going to release that video.”
Daniel looked at Nora.
She knew what he was asking without words. Permission, perhaps. Or preference. It irritated her that he could offer either only after owning the recording.
“I don’t want to be in a video,” she said.
“I won’t release it without discussing it with you.”
“Vivienne might.”
“She doesn’t have access.”
Nora thought of the guests, their phones, the angle from the staircase. “Someone else might.”
Daniel glanced around the hall as though seeing the room differently. “Yes.”
Jo gathered her folders against her chest. “We’re leaving.”
Daniel nodded. “My driver can take you.”
“We have a van.”
He looked at Nora’s garment bag. “Then at least let us pay for the dress.”
“No,” Nora said.
May you like
Jo said, “Yes.”
They looked at each other.
