Page 5 of His Wall

Declan exhaled through his nose. "Klein."

"We said we'd revisit the allocation."

"We said you'd revisit the allocation."

"I have revisited. I am reporting back. The allocation is bad."

"The allocation is what the client signed off on."

"The client signed off on it in a different market."

"Eight weeks ago is not a different market, Julian."

"It is when rates moved forty basis points."

Declan sat back and folded his arms. Nolan set his glass down with a small click, and the sound pulled both our heads half an inch toward him.

"He's not wrong," Nolan said.

Declan looked at him. "He's not right, either."

"He's not," Nolan agreed. "But the client called him on Friday and told him, unprompted, that his daughter just got into Stanford, and he wants to de-risk the education bucket by 22%. Did he tell you that part?"

"No."

"Tell him that part, Julian."

"I was getting there."

"Tell him now."

I told him. Declan listened. His jaw unclenched a millimeter at a time. By the time I finished, he was already reaching for his pen.

"Fine. Move the number. Revised allocation on my desk by the end of the day."

"Done."

Claire wrote something down.

Declan flipped the packet to the last tab. The page made a short sound against the table. He didn't look up right away.

"Last thing. Graham."

I felt my pulse move. I did not look at Claire. I did not look at Nolan. I looked at Declan, and I let the grin sit on my mouth.

"What about it?"

He tapped the packet. "We put a private team working on it after the leak last spring. Top people. Every thread we pulled, every account we audited, every name we ran against the irregularities. It had been months and months, Julian. And they've come back with nothing."

"Nothing as in nothing?" Nolan asked. "Or nothing as in no one's found it yet?"

"Nothing as in there's nothing to find."

Nolan turned his water glass a quarter-turn on the table. His thumb ran along the rim.

"If someone was behind Graham, they'd have moved by now. Time is dragging. Whoever it was, it was a one-off. We chased it. It didn't chase back. I'm inclined to let it go."

Declan nodded. "Same read. Time to move on."