Chapter 515

Chapter 515:

I stopped myself from rolling my eyes and flashing him the engagement ring on my finger. I knew what he meant, but still. Couldn’t he find a better way to phrase it?

“We need names,” he said. “Who helped him move the funds, who cooked the books p>

“I know, I know.” I cut him off. “He’s not smart enough to pull this off alone. You’ve told me. Repeatedly p>

After our first meeting at the café, once he was sure I was on board, Silva had briefed me very thoroughly on Fabrizio, possibly too thoroughly.

Whatever brainpower Fabrizio had in design clearly didn’t carry over to running a business.

As the founder of Valmont & Cie, he used to do everything himself. At one point, he was CEO, CFO, COO, and every other C-title, as if he were running a corner shop, not a rapidly growing company.

As things took off, he overinvested in stock, mispriced goods, overhired, and paid too generously. When the invoices started piling up, he turned to investors. That bought him time, but the mismanagement continued. Soon, he needed to make the numbers look better before investors started asking questions. From there, it wasn’t a huge leap to falsifying reports, forging documents, and committing loan fraud.

Even Silva admitted the crimes came more from incompetence than greed. “But a crime’s still a crime,” he insisted. “Just because he didn’t mean to hurt anyone doesn’t mean his investors and suppliers aren’t taking the hit p>

“Worried I’ll go soft on him?” I scoffed. “Don’t. He owes me five million p>

Silva nodded. “Shall we run through the script again p>

“If you must.” I sighed and sat down for another dry run.

“If anything goes wrong, give the signal. Our team will move in straightaway p>

I nodded. I was actually a little excited. Who hadn’t dreamed of being an undercover cop after watching Infernal Affairs?

“Wait. He’s not dangerous, is he p>

Your next favorite is on gⱯlnσν𝓮𝓁s．𝒸o𝗺

“No. No registered firearms. No history of violence, as far as we can tell p>

“Not even a pub fight p>

“Not even p>

“All right.” That lined up with my impression of Fabrizio. Charming. Polite. More brainy than brawny.

An hour later, I stepped out of the hotel and caught a taxi to Le Meurice. From the location and the price of the menu, you’d never guess the man was technically bankrupt.

He greeted me with his usual charming smile. It was getting harder to ignore the dark circles under his eyes.

I ordered foie gras, sea bass with lemon confit, and a chocolate soufflé, along with a bottle of Château Margaux. I matched him drink for drink.

There’s a saying that people tell the truth when they’re drunk. I was hoping that held true for Fabrizio.

I’d taken a couple of RU-21 pills before leaving. Hopefully, they’d help me stay sober enough to get what Silva needed.

Maybe it was the booze. Maybe it was the stress. Or maybe he genuinely saw me as a friend. Whatever the reason, the usual cool, collected Fabrizio finally dropped the act.

“It’s not as easy as it looks,” he said, swirling his sixth glass of wine. His words were starting to slur. “Everyone said the gold price would keep going up. Stockpiling it made sense. I needed it as raw material anyway, right? How was I supposed to know the price would crash a month later p>