"So," Ambrose Ward said, his voice light and conversational, though his eyes remained as cold as a winter morning in the Capital City. He adjusted his position, leaning against the gilded bedpost of the Golden Sanctuary, watching the n***d, shivering Director through the lens of his recording smartphone. "You say what I want is just a matter of a few words? One phone call and it’s mine?"
Maxwell Crawford nodded so frantically his jowls shook, his eyes wide with a desperate, pathetic hope. He looked like a drowning man who had just been offered a frayed rope, and he was prepared to sell his very soul to keep a grip on it. In the high-stakes world of the Midlands, he knew that an incident like this could be handled in two ways: it could become a career-ending scandal that led to administrat
