The event was Alehandra's idea.
That was important to understand.
Not the Walker Corporation board's idea.
Not a publicist's idea.
Not a calculated response to the press coverage that had been running for three weeks.
Her idea.
---
She had planned it two weeks ago.
Before the verification order.
Before the terrace conversation she did not witness but whose aftermath she had read in Kendrick's posture at every subsequent meeting.
Before the photograph that Victor's people had taken in the library and that Victor had not released and that Alehandra had seen anyway because she had her own sources and had been paying attention.
She had planned it because it was the correct move.
Because the engagement had been allowed to drift into ambiguity — not officially, not in any way anyone could point to, but in the specific atmospheric way that happened when one party stopped performing commitment with their whole self.
She had noticed.
The room noticed.
