My lawyer did not pick up the paper.

She simply looked at me, leaving the decision entirely in my hands.

And I looked down at that document, and I understood exactly what it was and exactly what they believed.

It was a golden parachute, and they were offering it in the sincere conviction that my silence, like everything else, could be purchased — that I was, in the end, the same as Luca, a person whose cooperation had a price, whose principles would bend to a large enough number.

They had bought Luca’s obedience for thirty years, and they assumed they could buy mine now, because in their world everyone had a price and the only question was ever the amount.