Ron slammed his palm on the table. “This is a power play. You don’t see it?”
Claire didn’t blink. “I see it perfectly. And you’re losing.”
Anna entered the lobby fifteen minutes later, composed but alert. As she approached the reception desk, the new protocol was clear. Every member of the Japanese team nodded to her with quiet respect. The staff at Laurel Palace—many of whom once barely noticed her—stepped aside, eyes wide. Power had shifted, but Anna didn’t wear it loudly.
She made her way toward the conference suite Takada had temporarily converted into his headquarters. Before she could enter, a hand grabbed her arm gently. It was Claire.
“I hope you understand what you’ve just stepped into,” Claire said softly.
“I understand enough to know I can’t back down now.”
Claire gave her a long look, then nodded. “Good. But be careful. You’re not the only one who understands leverage.”
The morning meetings went smoothly—at least on the surface. Takada’s team began mapping out the early stages of a tech integration project that would funnel millions into Laurel Palace’s operations. Anna translated, clarified, and when necessary, made decisions on the spot. She noticed Ron wasn’t present, which was both a relief and a warning.
After the meeting, Takada pulled her aside. “There is a man arriving tonight,” he said. “He was supposed to stay in Tokyo, but I’ve asked him to come. His name is Mr. Oda. He is not loud, but he listens better than anyone you’ve ever met. If he asks questions, answer carefully. His job is not business. His job is people.”
Anna tilted her head. “You mean, like an internal investigator?”
Takada smiled. “I mean, he sees behind curtains. And right now, I believe there are many curtains in this hotel.”
Anna nodded, a ripple of unease moving through her chest. “Understood.”
That evening, Anna went for a walk outside the hotel. She needed air—real air, not the crisp, recycled calm of conference rooms. She wandered past the marble fountains and into the side courtyard where the staff took smoke breaks. There, she saw Henry, the night doorman, sitting alone, sipping coffee from a thermos.
“Evening,” he said, tipping his cap.
“Evening,” she replied.
“You look like someone who just found out the walls have ears.”
She smiled despite herself. “Something like that.”
Henry patted the bench beside him. “You know, I’ve been here twenty years. Seen people come in and out. Tourists, presidents, criminals dressed as CEOs. But there’s always one thing in common.”
“What’s that?”
He looked her straight in the eye. “They all think no one’s watching. But someone always is.”
She let the words settle.
Back upstairs, Anna returned to her room and found an envelope slid under the door. No markings, just her name in block letters. Inside was a printed screenshot—security footage. Grainy, but clear. It was Ron, meeting with a man in a parking garage. Cash exchanged hands. Papers were passed. On the back of the page, a typed message: You’re not crazy. Keep going.
No name. No signature.
Anna’s stomach dropped. She grabbed her phone and called Claire. “Come to my room. Now.”
Ten minutes later, Claire was there, arms crossed. Anna handed her the photo. Claire’s eyes narrowed. “Where did this come from?”
“I don’t know. But whoever sent it wants me to keep digging.”
Claire studied the image. “That’s not just anyone he’s meeting with. That’s Harold Dennings. Used to be a contractor for the State Department. Rumor is, he runs backdoor channels now. Gray money, blackmail, you name it.”
Anna swallowed. “Then this isn’t just about corporate power.”
“No,” Claire said. “It never was.”
They sat in silence for a moment, the photo between them like a landmine waiting to go off. Then Anna stood. “We need to find Mr. Oda. Before Ron finds us.”
Claire nodded, already pulling out her phone. “I’ll arrange a secure meeting.”
Later that night, a soft knock came at Anna’s door. A small, quiet man in a charcoal suit stood there, bowing slightly. “Miss Jones? I am Oda.”
His voice was calm, his gaze unblinking. Anna stepped aside. “Come in.”
As he entered, he looked around once, then sat. “I hear you have something to show me,” he said.
Anna placed the photo on the table. Mr. Oda stared at it for a long time. Then, finally, he looked up. “This changes everything,” he whispered. “And now, we must change everything with it.”
Anna sat across from Mr. Oda, watching the way his eyes scanned the grainy photo again and again—not with shock, but with confirmation. As though what he saw was simply the final piece in a puzzle he’d already begun to solve. The room was silent, save for the distant sound of jazz music playing in the lobby below and the steady ticking of the wall clock.
“You’ve known,” Anna said slowly, “haven’t you? About Ron?”
Mr. Oda folded the paper and placed it on the coffee table with the kind of precision that made her uneasy. “I suspected. Now I know.”
“Why now?” she asked. “Why come all the way to Los Angeles?”
He looked up. “Because you acted. And because Mr. Takada watches those who take action when others remain still.”
Anna absorbed that in silence, the weight of it slowly settling. This wasn’t just about language. It never had been. “What happens next?” she asked.
Mr. Oda leaned forward slightly. “I investigate quietly. You assist quietly. We find what has been buried beneath layers of politeness and power. And when we have enough, we strike—not with anger, but with truth.”
Anna felt a chill crawl up her spine. “You want me to keep working inside?”
“Yes. As translator. As observer. And most importantly, as someone no one expects.”
The next morning, Anna resumed her duties, returning to the crisp cadence of translation and the seamless flow of Takada’s meetings. But now, every interaction carried new weight. She watched Ron’s movements carefully. He was growing bolder, stepping into rooms he had no authority in, pushing for updates on Japanese contracts, even suggesting more flexible clauses to accommodate “unnamed investors.”
At lunch, Anna found herself seated beside Takada, a silent nod of trust now uniting them. He offered her miso soup and rice, served in small porcelain dishes he insisted on importing from Kyoto.
“There’s a rhythm to power,” he told her as they ate. “It pretends to be chaotic, but if you listen closely, it repeats. Like music. Like fraud.”
That evening, back in her suite, Anna opened her laptop and logged into a secured channel Mr. Oda had installed. She uploaded the photo of Ron and Dennings, along with timestamps and locations. The screen blinked once, then displayed a new message: Follow the transfer logs. Payroll. Vendor contracts. Week of the 14th of July.
She didn’t sleep that night. She combed through line after line of financial data, most of which was buried in innocuous expense reports—guest services, kitchen renovations, temporary staffing. But one vendor kept surfacing: Horizon Event Logistics, a company supposedly hired for a tech conference last month. The payment? $280,000. The event? Never happened.
She highlighted the entry and pinged it to Oda. Ten minutes later, a message appeared: That is your thread. Pull it.
The following day, a press conference was scheduled in the Takada suite. Local media had been invited. Claire was overseeing production, and Ron—frustratingly dressed in a flawless navy suit—hovered like a vulture, greeting reporters with his politician’s grin.
“Anna,” Claire said under her breath, pulling her aside. “We have a problem.”
Anna followed her into a side room where a younger staffer waited, pale and shaking. “Tell her,” Claire urged.
The girl looked like she was barely twenty. “I… I was told to modify the sign-in logs,” she stammered. “The Horizon vendor. Mr. Wilkins said if I didn’t erase the delivery records for the 15th of July, I’d be blacklisted from every hotel in the city.”
“Did you do it?” Anna asked.
The girl looked at her shoes. “Yes. But I kept the originals. On my phone.”
Anna’s heart pounded. “Send them to me. Now.”
With fresh evidence in hand, Anna approached Oda discreetly in the hallway just before the press conference began. “He used hotel accounts to funnel funds,” she whispered, “and coerced the staff into hiding it.”..
