Julian Cross contacted me directly on a Monday morning.
Not through his outlet. Not through a journalist or a source or any of the professional machinery he had used before. A personal email, to an address I had not given him, which was its own message, sent at six forty-seven in the morning, which was another. The subject line was blank. The body of the email was four sentences.
Miss Vale. I think we've been approaching this incorrectly. I have material you'd prefer I didn't publish. I also have material that could be useful to you. I'd like to propose an arrangement. Lunch this week, your choice of venue. J. Cross.
I read it twice. Then I forwarded it to Lucien with a single line: He's pivoting.
Lucien called in under a minute. He was already awake, which meant he had been awake for
