I read it.

Then I read it again, and I felt the whole shape of Wendy’s scheme click into place.

Under the terms of the debt Meridian Capital now held, any new corporate lien, any transfer of major assets, required the explicit, written consent of the primary secured lender.

And the primary secured lender was Meridian.

Flynn.

Which meant that Wendy could not close Luca’s bailout — could not grant him his warrants and his lien and his control — without Flynn Sterling-Vance’s signature.

And Flynn was sitting across a desk from the bleeding, barefoot girl she had tried to sell the night before.