She had been watching Victor's moves from a distance for two weeks.
She knew what he was building.
She had sources in the Walker board she had cultivated for years — not maliciously, just professionally, the way everyone in their world maintained a comprehensive map of power and its movements.
She knew about the acquisition timeline.
She knew about Gerald Holt's nervousness and Victor's cultivation of it.
She knew that Victor had pivoted from attacking Damian Roberts to attacking Walker Corporation directly.
She sat with this for three days.
She was angry.
At Kendrick — not deeply, not the kind that required anything, but the specific anger of someone whose plan had been altered by another person's choice.
At circumstances — at the specific shape of a situation she had been managing correctly and that had resolved in a direction she had not chosen.
