Chapter Four
Mario
She is sitting behind the desk in the office I chose for her with both hands on the keyboard and a look on her face that tells me I am not the person she expected.
Good. I like that.
“Good morning,” I say.
Her chin lifts slightly. “I was told you were in the building.”
“Were you?”
“Yes.”
“Then you were told the truth.”
She seems a bit irritated at my amusement, and it only deepens it.
She removes her hands from the keyboard and stands. “I was hoping to schedule an initial interview with you at some point today.”
“Were you?” I repeat.
“I was planning,” she corrects, and I watch the smallest flicker of frustration cross her face. Not at me; at herself.
Victoria Murray does not like revealing more than she intends.
It’s a feeling I understand.
I step farther into the office, leaving the door open behind me. Her gaze flicks to the opening, then back to me.
Still thinking about boundaries.
I should be as well.
The office suits her better than I expected. I chose it because it is far enough from mine to be proper and close enough that I will know when she is here. Lorenzo noticed this, because Lorenzo notices everything.
He was amused endlessly after they left yesterday, and he picked it right back up this morning.
Victoria’s briefcase sits on the desk, the leather a rich cognac, structured and elegant.
Not new enough to look untouched, but new enough that she still treats it with care.
Her laptop is open. Folders arranged neatly.
Pens aligned beside a notebook. One of her business cards sits in the holder near the edge of the desk.
She is wearing a dark green suit today. It’s warmer against her skin than yesterday’s gray. Her chestnut-brown hair is swept back again, smooth at the crown, gathered low. A few strands soften near her temple, and I wonder whether they came loose in the car or if she left them there deliberately.
Either way, it was a mistake.
Mine, for noticing.
Her blouse is cream silk, buttoned high enough to be appropriate and fitted well enough to bring my attention where it should not be.
Small gold earrings. A watch with a narrow band.
No unnecessary jewelry. No bright lipstick, only something soft and neutral on a mouth that has already proven too distracting.
She looks exactly as she wants to look.
Capable. Composed. Difficult to dismiss.
She does not know that everything she chose to make herself look untouchable only makes me want to see what it would take to disturb her.
That thought should end here.
It does not.
“Is now inconvenient?” I ask.
“For the interview?”
“Yes.”
She glances at her laptop. “IT has not finished setting up my access.”
“They will wait.”
“I’m sure they will,” she says, and the dryness in her voice is subtle enough that most men would miss it.
There’s nothing about her I miss.
My mouth almost curves.
“Would you like to sit?” she asks.
It is her office only for now, and still she offers the chair like she is receiving me.
I like that too.
I take the seat across from her desk instead of the chair near the window.
She reaches for her notebook.
“Do you record interviews?” I ask.
“Not unless a client prefers it.”
“I do not.”
“Then I’ll take notes.”
She picks up her pen.
Her fingers are slim, nails neat and short, pale polish that does not draw attention. Practical. Everything about her says practical until I remember how her pulse jumped under my hand yesterday.
She hid that well, but not well enough.
“What would you like to know?” I ask.
Her eyes lift to mine. “That’s a dangerous question to ask an attorney.”
My lips do curve this time.
“I assume you have a list.”
“I do.” She opens her notebook. “I’d like to start broadly. What are your priorities for this engagement?”
“Efficiency.”
“That’s broad.”
“You asked broadly.”
She holds my gaze for a beat.
“Efficiency in what sense?” she asks.
“I do not want to spend six months creating papers no one reads and policies no one follows.”
“That’s not what I do.”
“I know.”
Her pen pauses.
“I researched you.”
Her eyes lift to mine, and I know she caught the phrasing.
Not her firm. I researched her.
Her pen starts to move again.
“Then you know what I can offer,” she says.
I don’t trust myself to answer that one.
“Your previous firm made a mistake,” I say.
That stills her pen again.
“What mistake?”
“They let you leave.”
Her face remains composed, but something shifts behind her eyes. Surprise, first. Then suspicion.
She does not trust compliments.
That is useful to know.
“They didn’t let me do anything,” she says. “I resigned.”
“Yes.”
“That was not a mistake on my part.”
“I did not say it was.”
Her mouth closes.
She does not look away from me, but I see the correction land exactly where I want it to.
She doesn’t like being seen, but if she’s going to, she likes being seen accurately.
I understand that.
“My priorities,” I say, before the silence turns into something else, “are simple. I want a structure that can support expansion. I want weaknesses identified before someone else finds them. I want unnecessary exposure removed. I want my legitimate businesses able to survive attention.”
“Legitimate businesses,” she repeats.
One word too careful.
“Yes.”
She writes it down. “That implies some concern about the legitimacy of attention, not the legitimacy of the businesses.”
Clever. Too clever.
“You hear implications in everything?”
“I hear wording.”
“And what does mine tell you?”
“That you choose it carefully.”
“Good.”
Her eyes sharpen. “Was that a test?”
“Everything is a test, Ms. Murray.”
“Then you should know I don’t enjoy wasting time with them.”
“No?”
“No. I prefer direct questions and useful answers.”
“And have I not been useful?”
“You’ve been careful.”
“That is useful.”
“Not always.”
The pen rests against the paper. Her posture is straight, her expression composed, her eyes steady on mine.
She is challenging me in an office I gave her, inside a building I own, with a visitor badge on her blazer and my name on the contract that may keep her firm alive.
She knows all of that and does it anyway.
Something old and hungry flexes in the cage I’ve kept it in for ten years.
“Careful keeps people alive,” I say.
Her expression turns thoughtful.
“Sometimes,” she says.
I study her. “And other times?”
“Other times it keeps them from doing what needs to be done.”
For one moment, I do not speak.
There are people who mistake recklessness for courage. She is not one of them. There are people who think caution is cowardice. She is not one of them either.
She understands the space between.
No wonder Lorenzo liked her.
No wonder I noticed her.
My phone vibrates once in my jacket. I ignore it.
Her eyes dip toward the sound, then return to my face.
“You can take that,” she says.
“I know.”
A faint line appears between her brows before she smooths it away.
That, too, amuses me.
She does not like men who pretend importance. She thinks ignoring a phone is a performance.
Sometimes it is.
This time, it is not.
“You were asking my priorities,” I say.
“Yes.” She looks back at her notebook, though I suspect she does not need to. “You want structure, risk identified, exposure removed, and the legitimate businesses ready for scrutiny.”
“Correct.”
“What kind of scrutiny are you expecting?”
“The usual kind.”
“There is no usual kind.”
“There is always the usual kind. Competitors, reporters, consumers. Former and current employees.”
“And which of those are you most concerned about?”
“All of them.”
“That’s not prioritization.”
“It is honesty.”
She leans back slightly to study me.
“Do you always answer questions this way?”
“What way?”
“In a way that sounds complete until someone looks closer.”
I’m really starting to enjoy her. I shouldn’t be.
“Not always,” I say. “Sometimes.”
Her mouth twitches.
She looks down before it becomes a smile.
A small victory.
Foolish to think of it that way.
I do anyway.
“I’ll need access to senior leadership,” she says. “Not just prepared documents.”
“You’ll have it.”
“Will someone be standing over every conversation?”
“That depends on the conversation.”
Her pen stops again.
I can see the argument forming. The professional refusal to accept constraints that would make her work performative. The part of her that is ready to remind me what I hired her to do.
I let her reach it.
Then I say, “If you are interviewing employees who report to senior directors, no one will interfere. If you are interviewing family, someone will know.”
“That affects candor.”
“Family affects everything.”
“You understand that makes my job harder.”
“Yes.”
“The job you hired me to do.”
“I’m aware of that,” I say simply.
She studies me for a moment.
“You won’t make this easy,” she says.
“No.”
“At least you’re honest about it.”
“Would you prefer easy?”
“No.”
The answer is immediate.
My attention settles more fully on her, and she realizes it a second later.
Color rises beneath her skin. Just a touch of warmth at her throat. She looks down at her notes and draws a short line beneath something she has written.
I want to know what.
I want to know too many things.
Her perfume reaches me faintly across the desk. Clean, subtle. Not chosen to announce itself.
“I’ll also need to understand decision-making authority,” she says, voice steady again. “Formal and informal.”
“I told you yesterday. I am the chief executive.”
“That’s formal authority,” she says. “I’m talking about informal authority.”
“Yes.”
Her eyes lift.
“Across all divisions?” she asks.
“Yes.”
“Even those managed by your brothers?”
“My brothers have authority.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
“No.”
This time, her mouth does curve.
She makes a note. “All right.”
“All right?”
“I can work with honest obstruction.”
“Obstruction?”
“What would you call it?”
“Protection.”
“Of the company?”
“Yes.”
“And of yourself?”
“Yes.”
The honesty costs me less than lying would. It also gives her more than I planned.
Her eyes flicker, and I know she heard it.
“Then we should be clear about something,” she says.
“Go on.”
“My job is not to expose you unnecessarily.”
“I know.”