“And nobody in Executive Country has asked any questions,” Miriam concluded. “If I was paranoid, I’d say it’s like a conspiracy of silence. Hmm.” She put her mug down. “Paulie. You worked for a law firm. Would you call this … circumstantial?”

“ ‘Circumstantial?’” Paulette’s expression was almost pitying. “Who’s paying you, the defence? This is enough to get the FBI and the DA muttering about RICO.”

“Yeah, but…” Miriam nodded to herself. “Look, this is heavy. Heavier than usual anyway. I can guarantee you that if we spring this story we’ll get three responses. One will be Bowers in our hair, and the other will be a bunch of cease-and-desist letters from attorneys. Freedom of the press is all very well, but a good reputation and improved circulation figures won’t buy us defence lawyers, which is why I want to double-check everything in here before I go upstairs and tell Sandy we want the cover. Because the third response is going to be oh-shit-I-don’t-want-to-believe-this, because our great leader and teacher thinks the sun shines out of Biphase and I think he’s into Proteome too.”

“Who do you take me for?” Paulette pointed at the pile. “That’s primary, Miriam, the wellspring. SEC filings, public accounts, the whole lot. Smoking gun. The summary sheet—” she tugged at a Post-it note gummed to a page a third of the way down the stack—“says it all. I was in here all day yesterday and half the evening—”

“I’m sorry!” Miriam raised her hand. “Hey, really. I had no idea.”

“I kind of lost track of time,” Paulette admitted. She smiled. “It’s not often I get something interesting to dig into. Anyway, if the boss is into these two, I’d think he’d be glad of the warning. Gives him time to pull out his stake before we run the story.”