He hesitated.
"Not directly."
Her eyes narrowed.
"What does that mean?"
Thomas looked away.
For the first time in their fourteen-year working relationship, Victoria realized she might not know nearly as much about the company's operations as she'd believed.
She had trusted the numbers.
The polished presentations.
The explanations that difficult customers were simply resistant to legitimate standards.
But she hadn't asked enough questions about how those numbers were produced.
And now the records were exposing decisions made under her leadership that she couldn't explain.
That evening, Victoria drove home through Sterling Oaks.
She passed Malik's mansion.
The Ferrari was parked inside the open garage.
For a moment, she slowed.
Then stopped across the street.
She watched Malik working beside the vehicle.
He was wearing a plain gray shirt, holding a small wrench, and examining something near the engine compartment.
The scene troubled her.
She remembered accusing him of stealing the car.
The officer shoving him.
And the moment Elliot told her he controlled fifty-one percent of Whitmore Communities.
She had spent days telling herself that Malik was using the acquisition to punish her.
But the audit documents showed the concerns existed before the driveway confrontation.
He'd been examining homeowner complaints for months.
He'd brought financial advisers into the company.
And he was asking questions her own executives had avoided.
Victoria looked toward his house.
For a moment, she considered approaching.
Then she saw Malik place the wrench carefully inside an old metal toolbox.
The box looked worn.
Almost out of place beside the expensive Ferrari.
He stood still for several seconds, looking down at it.
Then gently closed the lid.
Victoria wondered what it meant to him.
She had no way of knowing.
And for the first time, she realized how little she actually knew about the man she'd been so certain she could judge.
The investigation into Sergeant Rourke proceeded separately from Whitmore Communities.
Malik insisted on that separation.
The fact that he controlled a large company didn't give him the right to command a police department. It didn't make his testimony more truthful than anyone else's, and it didn't entitle him to a special disciplinary process.
He was a homeowner reporting an encounter involving an officer.
The department had to examine the evidence.
Its conclusions needed to depend on what happened in the driveway, not on Malik's financial position.
An independent investigator reviewed the available recordings.
The house's security cameras showed Malik opening his garage, driving the Ferrari onto the driveway, and cleaning it when Victoria approached.