Friday, 9:00 AM.
The black town car was waiting for me at the corner of 4th and Main, just as Victoria had promised. The windows were tinted dark enough to swallow the morning light. I opened the door and slid into the back seat.
Victoria Sterling was already there, scrolling through her phone. She didn't look up.
"You're late," she said.
"I had to be careful," I replied, placing a thick manila envelope on the leather seat between us. "Thorne has eyes everywhere."
Victoria finally looked at me. Her eyes flicked to the envelope, then back to my face. "Is that it?"
"The procurement logs," I said. "The shipping manifests. The change orders signed by Thorne himself. He swapped the Grade-A structural steel for Grade-C scrap from a shell company in Eastern Europe. He saved four million dollars, but he built a death trap."
Victoria picked up the envelope. She didn't open it. She just held it, feeling the weight of it.
