Page 80 of Omega's Formula

“I’m so sorry. I was just so angry. I shouldn’t have claimed it was mine. I guess I just wanted it to be.”

I stop the recording. My hands are trembling.

“Play it again,” Anna says.

“Anna—”

“Play it again. The whole thing.”

I do. This time she listens with her eyes closed, her head tilted slightly to one side. When it ends, she opens her eyes.

“Where did you say this was recorded?”

“A bar. After some industry conference.” I pull up the notes I’d taken when Alistair first played it for me. “The Brass Anchor. He said it was about six months after the lawsuit settlement.”

Anna’s frown deepens. “Play the beginning again. Just the first thirty seconds.”

I do. Nolan’s voice, the ambient sound behind it—clinking glasses, muffled conversation, the general noise of a busy establishment.

“Now play the part where he makes the admission.”

I skip ahead.“I shouldn’t have claimed it was mine. I guess I just wanted it to be.”

Anna holds up her hand. “Stop. Listen to the background.”

I replay it, focusing this time on the sounds beneath the words. The ambient noise is different. Quieter. The quality has shifted somehow, more muffled, less echoey.

“The acoustics don’t match,” Anna says slowly. “The first part sounds like a bar. The second part sounds like... I don’t know. Somewhere smaller. More enclosed.”

My mouth has gone dry. “What are you saying?”

“I’m saying something’s not right.” She’s frowning now, working through it. “Also—the Brass Anchor. That name sounds familiar.”

“It’s a bar downtown.”

“Itwasa bar downtown.” Anna pulls out her own phone, typing rapidly. “I’m pretty sure it closed. There was some issue with the building...” She trails off, staring at her screen. “Erik. The Brass Anchor closed six years. Fire code violations. It’s been demolished. That was before you even bought the research.”

The world tilts.

“That can’t be right. Alistair said the recording was from six months the court case”

Anna’s voice is flat. “Which means this recording was supposedly made years after the bar stopped existing.”

I stare at my phone. The audio file sits there innocently, a weapon I never thought to examine closely.

“It could be a different bar,” I say, but even as the words leave my mouth, I know I’m grasping. “Maybe he got the name wrong.”

“Or maybe the recording is fake.”

The word lands like a stone.

Fake.

“Wallace wouldn’t—” I stop. Because would he? I’ve known Alistair Wallace for years, dealt with him professionally, considered him a competent if somewhat slick business partner.

Nolan accused him of fraud, of betrayal, of taking years of his work and selling it like it was never his.

I didn’t really think about it. I instructed the legal team to defend it because that’s what you do.