“Who controls security command?”
No one answered because everyone knew.
Victor’s composure began to crack.
“This is absurd.
My credential and my equipment were used because I ordered the inspection.
Someone under me could have copied the access token.”
“Then give me the tool,” Amelia said.
His head turned sharply.
“What?”
“The portable unit.
Give it to me.”
“It is not here.”
“Where is it?”
“At security command.”
Marco was already making a call.
Victor reached toward him.
“End that.”
Luca’s voice remained quiet.
“Let him speak.”
Marco asked someone to verify the location of the service unit.
The call lasted less than thirty seconds.
When it ended, his expression had changed.
“It was signed out by Victor at 7:40 tonight.
It has not been returned.”
Victor looked around the garage as though searching for the weakest witness.
He chose Amelia.
“She planted the record.”
Amelia almost laughed.
“When? On the roadside while you were reading my bank mail?”
“You knew the car was valuable.
You created a failure, waited nearby, and presented yourself as the rescuer.”
“My truck’s location history will show I drove straight from this garage.
The rain on the severed wires will show they were cut before I opened the hood.
And your encrypted credential was logged hours before I ever saw the car.”
Victor’s mouth opened, but she kept going.
“You also knew the backup had been disabled.”
He went still.
Amelia pointed toward him.
“When I said the harness was cut, you called the record unreliable.
When I opened the log, you said it did not store names.
When I found the service-tool handshake, you already knew which unit had been used.”
Marco’s eyes narrowed.
“You knew too much,” Amelia said.
Luca turned toward Victor fully.
“Why this road?”
Victor spread his hands.
“I told you.
Flooding.”
“The road was dry beneath the rain before the storm intensified,” Marco said.
“And the false alert redirected the escort convoy, not Luca’s car.”
Amelia pictured the Bentley alone among the rusted warehouses, its throttle dead, its communications possibly compromised, its driver waiting for help that Victor controlled.
The roadside had not been chosen merely because it was isolated.
It had been chosen because whoever arrived first would own the situation.
Luca understood at the same moment.
“The call I made,” he said.
“Who received it?”
