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This operation is more disciplined than I expected. Every layer is built to survive the collapse of the one beneath it.

“Who controlled the money?” she asks.

“I don’t know.”

“Who benefited?”

“I don’t know.”

“Who authorized the transfers?”

“I told you.”

“No. You told me how instructions reached you. I’m asking who gave the authority.”

Karras looks up, and bitterness finally appears beneath his polish. “People above my pay grade.”

I almost laugh. Very few people in this world are above Dimitris Karras's pay grade.

“Inside the Crown?” Elena asks.

He hesitates.

“Yes.”

“Which family?”

“I was never told.”

“You moved money through all five.”

“Because I was instructed to.”

“By whom?”

“I don’t know.”

Elena's patience thins. I can see it in the way her fingers flatten against the table.

“You’re expecting me to believe you helped move hundreds of millions for years without knowing who controlled it?”

Karras finally looks directly at me. “I believed I was serving the Crown.”

“By stealing from it?” I ask.

“I believed certain funds were being repositioned for contingencies.”

“Contingencies.”

“Internal security. Political pressure. Emergency reserves.”

“Assassinations?”

His face flickers as I lean forward.

“Did you know the money paid for killings?”

“No.”