Chapter 6: Dinner with Wolves

Three days after the gala, I am at the investor dinner.

Smaller event. Twelve people around a long, candlelit table in a private room of a restaurant that doesn't have a sign outside — just a door on a side street in the 1st arrondissement, unmarked except for a small brass plaque that says nothing more than the street number. You have to know it exists to find it. You have to be invited to enter.

These are Celeste's actual inner circle — not the public-facing investors who appear on the company's filings, but the real power players, the ones who operate behind the scenes. The investors, advisors, and strategic partners who exist one layer beneath the public-facing empire, the people whose names don't appear in press releases but whose approval is required before any major decision is made. This is the room where real conversations happen. This is where Celeste Laurent does her actual work.

Getting here required a specific invitation. Adrian's contact came through, but barely — there were three rounds of vetting, two phone calls with people who claimed to be confirming my background but were clearly assessing something else, and a last-minute change of venue that suggested someone wasn't entirely comfortable with my presence. I'm seated at the far end of the table, adjacent to a quiet Swiss fund manager who hasn't spoken ten words all evening and a tech attorney who looks like she's been awake for forty hours. Not the power seats. I'm on the periphery, being evaluated, my presence tolerated rather than welcomed.

Celeste is at the head.

From this distance — fifteen feet of polished mahogany and candlelight — I spent the first course observing her. Working the table without appearing to work it. She draws information out of people without seeming to ask for it, using the same technique I use myself: open-ended questions, strategic pauses, the willingness to let silence do the work of extraction. She redirects conversations with a lightness that makes you feel like you steered yourself — a subtle shift of topic, a reframing of the question, a gesture toward a different angle of inquiry.

By the time the second course arrives, three people at this table have volunteered strategic information they probably didn't mean to lead with, and none of them appear to realize this has happened. They think they were just having a conversation. They think they were just sharing their thoughts in a collegial environment. They don't realize that Celeste has mapped their priorities, their concerns, their red lines, all without asking a single direct question.

She is, professionally speaking, extraordinary.

I eat my food — it's excellent, though I couldn't tell you what it was afterward — and I stay in my lane. Isabelle Renaud tonight is measured. Present. I'm interested. Not seeking attention. I let the conversations come to me, respond when addressed, offer opinions when asked. I'm building a reputation here: not as someone who needs to be the center of attention, but as someone who's worth talking to when you have something substantive to discuss.

The tech attorney asks about my Seoul work. I give her the cover story with enough texture to feel real — specific details about specific projects, names of people I supposedly worked with, challenges I supposedly faced — and enough modesty to seem genuine. I don't brag. I don't downplay. I present the information as if it's simply true, which is the best way to make something feel true. She relaxes slightly, the way people do when they've decided someone is safe.

I file away three things she tells me about Laurent Axis's board dynamics without asking a single direct question. The attorney is worried about an upcoming vote. She mentions it in passing, as if it's common knowledge, but the way she mentions it — the slight tension around her mouth, the way her eyes flick toward Celeste as she says it — tells me more than the words themselves.

Dessert arrives. A chocolate mousse that probably contains ingredients I can't pronounce.

Celeste speaks to the whole table, something about the Singapore summit next month. Her voice carries without effort — not loud, but clear, the kind of voice that doesn't need to compete because everyone else has already fallen silent to listen. She's discussing international AI policy compliance, a topic that could be dry but becomes fascinating when she talks about it because she clearly finds it fascinating herself.

And then, in the middle of a point about跨jurisdictional data frameworks, she looks down the table at me.

"Ms. Renaud," she says, like we've spoken before, like this is natural, like there's nothing unusual about the CEO of a billion-dollar company addressing a peripheral consultant in the middle of a strategic discussion. "You were in Seoul during the KyungHan data breach last year. What was the industry response like on the ground?"

Twelve pairs of eyes turn toward me.

Twelve people who were, a moment ago, absorbed in their desserts and their private conversations, suddenly focused entirely on the woman at the end of the table. The weight of their attention is almost physical — the Swiss fund manager's curiosity, the tech attorney's professional assessment, the other investors' casual evaluation.

My cover includes a detailed answer to exactly this question. I've prepared for it, rehearsed it, stress-tested it against every possible follow-up. I could answer it in my sleep.

I give it — measured, specific, slightly self-deprecating about the chaos of those weeks. I describe the industry response without oversimplifying, acknowledge the gaps in my knowledge without undermining my credibility, and tie everything back to the point Celeste was making before she asked the question, demonstrating that I was listening to her as well as formulating my answer.

It lands well. The table responds. A few follow-up questions from the investors, which I handle cleanly. A nod of acknowledgment from the tech attorney. Even the silent Swiss fund manager offers a small grunt that might be approved.

But what I'm actually doing, while all of this is happening, is watching Celeste watch me answer.

She already knows the public record on the KyungHan breach. She probably knows more than the public record — someone with her resources and her intelligence network would have access to information that never made it into the news. She didn't ask this question because she needed information. She asked to see how I hold myself under unexpected attention from a full table.

She's testing the cover — does the story hold up under pressure? She's testing competence — can I think on my feet and speak with authority? She's testing the composure — do I seem rattled by the sudden focus, or do I take it in stride?

And she is watching me very, very carefully. Her eyes haven't left my face since she asked the question. She's not looking at my hands or my posture or my clothing — she's looking at my eyes, my expression, the micro-movements I can't completely control. She's reading me the way I've been reading her, and the realization sends a small chill down my spine.

I finished my answer. I smile — warm, slightly self-aware, conveying the sense that I didn't expect to be the focus of this but here we are and that's fine. I redirect back to the broader policy point she was making, a polite signal that I'm not trying to hijack the conversation.

Celeste's gaze holds on me for one beat longer than necessary.

Then she moves on. She turns to the investor on her left and asks a question about Singapore regulatory frameworks, and the table's attention shifts away from me, and I'm once again just another person at a long table eating dessert.

Under the table, I unclench my hand from around my napkin. My palm has left damp marks on the fabric.

By the end of the evening, I have been spoken to three more times — each time by Celeste, each time ostensibly about the topic at hand, each time with that quality of attention that feels less like interest and more like examination. She asks about my work in Geneva. She asks about my perspective on European data protection laws. She asks — and this is the one that makes me pause — whether I've ever considered moving into the private sector full-time, working directly for a company rather than consulting.

It's a simple question. It could be casual. It could be recruitment. It could be nothing.

But the way she asks it — the slight tilt of her head, the way her voice drops just fractionally — suggests something else. Suggests she's asking not what I want but what I am. What drives me? What I would do for the right opportunity.

She is not charmed by me. I realize this with a clarity that should be comfortable and is instead the opposite. She is not charmed. She is not fooled. She is studying me, the way I've been studying her, and she is finding something that interests her but doesn't yet satisfy her.

The difference should be comfortable. It is the opposite.

I leave when the other guests leave, at the appropriate time, with the appropriate goodbyes. I shake the right hands. I make the right eye contact. I perform the role of Isabelle Renaud, satisfied consultant, pleased to have been included.

In the car back to my hotel, I check my phone. A message from Adrian: Progress?

I type: Moving well. Give me time.

Then I stare at the ceiling of the car and try to identify exactly what kind of game Celeste Laurent is playing.

I can't.

That almost never happens.

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