Page 11 of Under Arthur’s Protection

“You saw it?” Lance asked.

“Morganna sent it. I’ve read it twice. It’s well-written, which is irritating.”

Irritating was an appropriate word for it.

“I thought your father was paying with private money?”

“So did I.” I’d planned to distance myself from Pendragon, because the truth was, I had received special treatment because of my father. It pissed me off every time I found out about it, particularly because I normally found out after he’d pulled whatever strings he wanted to.

“The Prague details are specific enough to sting but vague enough to be legally safe. The nepotism framing is editorial, not reporting.” Merlin’s tone sharpened. “The real question is who benefits from this right now.”

A traffic light turned red, and I stopped. A few raindrops hit the windshield, and my wipers automatically reacted. “What do you mean by right now?”

“Timing, Arthur,” said Merlin. “RTS has been active for six months.”

Six months on paper. Two of those as a functioning company. The rest had been filing incorporation documents and arguing about the office floor plan.

“Nobody wrote about us during any of that,” Merlin continued. “Now someone publishes a deep dive in Crécy under a staff byline? That’s intentional.”

What would Gwen think?

Why in god’s name would she visit a defense industry website?

And why do you care?

“It doesn’t matter why they published it,” Lance said. “The fact is they did. We need to get ahead of this. Statement to clients, preemptive outreach, maybe a response piece.”

“That’s step two,” Merlin said. “Step one is figuring out who the staff reporter actually is.”

“Already on it,” Morganna said.

The light turned green, and the rain picked up as I drove through. “Morganna, do your thing. But go deep. Whoever wrote this had access to information that isn’t public. I want the author and the source.”

“Noted.” She was the best human intelligence specialist I’d ever worked with. Unfortunately, she was still working for White Spring Security. She’d join us at Round Table eventually—as soon as I conceded to her long list of salary and perk demands.

I made a left onto Birch, where the storefronts gave way to houses with porch lights on. “In the meantime, we need talking points for clients. Sam and Antonio just had us to dinner. If this gets traction, we need to be the ones they hear from first.”

“Lead with Tristan’s case,” Lance said. “The krater repatriation was a big deal, Sam was involved, and the bad guys are in jail. Pendragon didn’t have anything to do with that mess. It was us, doing the work.”

I nodded as I slowed for a woman looking to cross the street in the dark. “Agreed. Plus, it sounds like Tristan’s mother is a friend of Sam’s, so that will help strengthen our relationship with Caine-Ferraro’s. And Sam’s role with the FBI is another positive for us.”

“What about Prague?” Merlin asked.

I stared through the windshield. Our principal had gotten out safely, her Fabergé egg had been delivered, and the bad actors were in custody. But the cleanup had required my father’s people and my father’s influence, and that was the part the article demanded its readers remember.

“Prague is harder,” I said. “Don’t lead with it. If someone asks, we were two months old and supplemented with Pendragon’s local contractors due to safety licensing requirements. Don’t mention firearms; stick with ‘safety licensing.’”

“And your father’s calls to the police?” Merlin asked.

“I didn’t ask him to make those calls.”

“You didn’t have to.” He dropped out of strategy mode. “But the article doesn’t care about what you asked for. It cares about what happened.”

Per usual, Merlin was right.

“Okay,” I said. “Morganna, journalist identity by morning. Merlin, talking points and monitoring brief. Lance, client outreach draft. I’ll review before anything goes out.”

“Copy,” Morganna said.