Noelle requested one additional action.
“I want a technical review of the maintenance expenses.”
A director frowned.
“Finance is already reviewing them.”
She shook her head.
“Finance can determine what was paid. A qualified maintenance specialist must determine whether the work was actually performed.”
Diane nodded.
“That distinction matters.”
The board agreed.
Noelle looked toward the screen.
For the first time that day, she felt something resembling control return.
Not certainty.
Not victory.
But a process capable of producing answers.
Then her phone vibrated.
A message from the company's maintenance director.
We have a problem with the replacement-part records. Please call before any further aircraft are released under the affected work orders.
Noelle stared.
For a moment, she couldn't breathe.
Then she looked toward Margaret.
“I'm afraid the finance investigation just became an operational one.”
Tessa Navarro had worked in aircraft maintenance for nineteen years.
She was forty-one, with dark curly hair, strong hands, and the steady patience of someone who had learned that mechanical problems rarely became easier when people shouted.
She began as an apprentice technician.
Earned the required qualifications.
And worked her way into maintenance management through long nights, difficult inspections, and countless decisions that were invisible to passengers.
When Noelle hired her, Tessa had one condition.
“If I say an aircraft needs attention, I don't want commercial operations deciding I'm being inconvenient.”
Noelle smiled.
“That's why I'm hiring you.”
For six years, Tessa believed the promise.
Now she was standing in a maintenance hangar looking at two records that should not have matched.
The first described a replacement component installed on an Ashford aircraft during a scheduled maintenance visit.
The second described the same serialized component being installed on another aircraft at a different location.
The same part couldn't physically occupy two aircraft at once.
There could be an administrative explanation.
A clerical error.
A mislabeled inventory record.
Or a correction that had not been entered properly.
But it required investigation.
Tessa had begun checking the records after noticing unusually high maintenance expenses associated with a vendor called Keystone Aero Logistics.
The company supplied specialized parts and maintenance coordination services.
Ashford had worked with it for several years.
But its recent invoices had increased dramatically.
Several work orders referred to accelerated component replacement programs.
Tessa hadn't authorized the full scope.
When she asked why, a coordinator explained that the work had been arranged through a commercial operations initiative to improve fleet availability.