# THOMPSON-HAYES: BLOOD MONEY
## Chapter Thirty-Four — The Board Meeting
The Thompson-Hayes spring board meeting was on a Thursday in late March.
Mia drove herself. She parked on the street. She checked her reflection in the rearview mirror — not the navy blazer this time. Something lighter. The season had turned and she had turned with it and some transitions were worth dressing for.
The boardroom on the fourth floor had a different quality than it had had in December. She noticed this when she walked in — not a dramatic difference, more like the specific shift that happens in a room when the people inside it have stopped managing a crisis and started making actual decisions. The air was different. The bodies were different. The meeting had the particular ease of something that had fo
