The walk from the business center to the staff locker room was a march to the gallows. Isabella’s heels clicked a steady, hollow rhythm on the linoleum, a counterpoint to the frantic drum of her heart. She focused on Xavier’s instructions: Shock. Confusion. Demand evidence. They were words on a page, impossible to embody when every instinct screamed to run, to fight, to name the real thief who wore a bespoke suit and a patriarch’s smile.
The locker room door was propped open. Inside stood two men from Corporate Security—not the friendly hotel guards, but Alistair’s personal enforcers, their suits a shade too dark, their expressions professionally blank. Roy, the head of Facilities, stood beside them, looking deeply uncomfortable, a ring of master keys in his hand. Her locker, number 47, w
