Seattle
AMARA' S POV
Private plane.
I don't comment on it. I sit across from him at thirty thousand feet with the David Park file open on my lap and I read for the entire flight, making notes in the margins, building the case I'm going to make to a seventy-one-year-old retired CFO who trusted the wrong man and doesn't know it yet.
Damien reads for approximately fifteen minutes.
Then he stops reading and starts watching me.
"You're staring, I say, without looking up."
"Yes."
"Stop."
"No."
I look up. He's watching me with the specific attention he brings to things that matter to him — complete, unhurried, entirely unabashed about it.
"We have a meeting in four hours, I say."
"I know. I'm preparing."
"By staring at me."
"By reminding myself why the meeting matters."
I look back
