(Sebastian)
The board meeting ran long, which was the first sign something was wrong.
They never ran long. I'd built them to be short on purpose, the way I'd built everything, no wasted motion, no room for a man to make a speech. So when Warren Pryce asked to add an item to the agenda after the quarterly numbers were done, and the room settled in instead of reaching for their coats, I understood the meeting had stopped being about the quarter.
Pryce was the patient one. My grandfather had named him without naming him, weeks ago, on the phone. A man on the board who'd like the leash shorter. You'll know him by his patience. I'd known him by it. Pryce had sat on this board for eleven years and never once moved against me, because Pryce didn't move until the ground was ready, and he'd spen
