She pointed at him instead — at the man she had kissed under a banner an hour before.

“He ordered all of it,” she said, loud, to the detectives now, to the board, to anyone.

“He created the accounts.

He set up the firms.

I only did what he told me to—”

“You signed every invoice,” Rupert said, and his laugh was hollow and terrible.

“Your name is on every single one of them.

You’ll go down with me.”

And there it was: the two of them, who an hour ago had stood together at the top of everything, tearing at each other with the microphone still live, each one certain that the truth — finally, uselessly — would save them.

It saved neither.