The moment she believed the company was hers, she began stripping it, and every keystroke went straight into the investigators’ file.

Chapter 16 — Oscar Breaks

The investigators brought Oscar in for questioning, and Oscar, faced with a badge and a table and a closed door, did what men like Oscar do.

He denied everything.

He kept denying it right up until the prosecutors laid his own signature in front of him on a stack of fraudulent invoices, and explained to him, without drama, the arithmetic of his situation: that he was personally facing federal wire-fraud charges, that he had no company and no cover and no one protecting him, and that Maya and Ryan — the people who had used him — were insulated by layers he was not.

They asked him whether he intended to go to prison alone, to keep other people warm.