As Joshua approached the conference room, he immediately noticed several familiar faces outside. The corridor leading to Conference Room B had filled with the same organized cluster he'd encountered in the lobby less than an hour earlier — the brisk-moving assistants, the two bodyguards positioned with their practiced, watchful stillness, the manager checking something on her phone with the specific urgency of someone managing a tight schedule. To his surprise, Kate Horton was there as well. She stood near the conference room entrance, dressed differently now than she had been at check-in — the casual travel attire replaced with something more polished, the kind of effortless-looking outfit that had clearly required considerable effort. She was speaking with her manager in low tones when she caught sight of Joshua walking down the corridor toward them. Her face darkened immediately. It happened fast — the shift from neutral conversation to sharp, narrowed focus, her entire po

Kate stared at him, unmoved."And I still don't believe you," she said flatly. "Saying it a second time doesn't make it more true. If anything, it just makes the whole thing more obvious." She glanced at her manager with a pointed, knowing look. "People who are actually telling the truth don't have to keep repeating the same explanation over and over hoping it eventually sticks."In her eyes, Joshua was simply inventing another lie — a more polished version of the first one, recycled now that the lobby story hadn't worked.Her manager stepped forward, positioning herself beside Kate with crossed arms and a sharp, scrutinizing once-over directed at Joshua's appearance."Let's be honest," the manager said, her tone carrying a clipped, condescending edge. "Look at him. Plain shirt, no watch worth mentioning, a folder that looks like something from an office supply store." She gestured vaguely at Joshua's general presentation. "This is a high-level entertainment negotiation. The kind of m

Before Joshua could explain himself, Kate quickly spoke first.She moved with the specific, practiced speed of someone who understood that whoever established the narrative first usually kept it — the rapid, deliberate pivot from her frozen, faltering expression back into something controlled and purposeful. The wronged expression assembled itself on her face with the fluid efficiency of a woman who had spent years in front of cameras and understood instinctively how to produce the exact emotional register a moment required."Lorenzo," she said, her voice shifting into something softer and more vulnerable than the sharp, commanding tone she'd been using moments earlier. "I'm so glad you came out. I was actually about to ask someone to get you."Lorenzo looked at her."This man," Kate continued, gesturing toward Joshua with the careful, slightly pained expression of someone describing an unpleasant experience they've been forced to endure, "has been following me since I arrived at this

The shock quickly spread through Kate's entire team. It moved through the group with the specific, rapid quality of a current passing through connected things — starting with Kate's frozen expression and traveling outward to her manager, to the assistants, to the bodyguards, each person processing the same information at slightly staggered intervals and arriving at the same destination. Kate's manager felt it first. The specific, cold, sinking quality of someone whose mind had just replayed a sequence of events through an entirely different interpretive lens. The lobby. The boarding pass comment. The snickering. The way she had stepped forward and said, with such clipped, confident authority, that nobody who actually belonged in this meeting would show up looking like that. She had said that directly to a man who was Lorenzo Gatti's business partner. To a man Lorenzo had personally invited to this island. She became aware of her own hands — still crossed, a posture she had held throug

Meanwhile, Natalie and Mark finally arrived on the island after their flight.The plane had touched down at the island's small, well-maintained airport with the specific, unhurried quality of a destination that understood its own appeal and didn't need to announce it through infrastructure. The terminal was compact and elegant, the kind of space that processed its relatively small volume of arrivals with the polished efficiency of somewhere that expected a certain kind of traveler and had organized itself accordingly.The moment they stepped out of the airport, Natalie felt her mood improve considerably.It happened immediately — the specific, physical quality of warm air and open sky and the particular, golden light that this part of the world produced at this time of year landing on her face with the clean, uncomplicated pleasantness of something that required nothing from her in return. No performance, no management, no sustained effort to maintain a position under pressure.Just w