Cressida lifted her chin, still playing the hand she thought she held.

“A kiss isn’t fraud.”

“No,” I said.

“But stealing four point eight million dollars is.”

The ballroom erupted — not in laughter this time, but in shock, a sound with an entirely different shape.

Chapter 11 — Four Point Eight Million

The screens behind the stage changed.

The gold CEO banner — RUPERT BRANDT, in letters three feet tall — vanished, and in its place came the evidence, sized for a ballroom.

Bank transfers.

Invoices with the altered figures highlighted.