Chapter 6: The Last Conversation
I told Grace about the text.
"Do you want to meet him?" she asked.
"Yes," I said.
"But not alone.
And not at the house."
We arranged it for that afternoon — a conference room at Grace's office, neutral ground.
Flynn arrived with Warren Holt.
I arrived with Grace.
Daniel waited in the hallway in case he was needed.
Flynn looked like he had aged since the night of the video call.
The easy confidence he usually carried like a second jacket was gone.
He sat down across from me and for a long moment he just looked at the table.
Warren Holt opened his briefcase.
"My client would like to propose a settlement framework that—"
"Flynn," I said.
He looked up.
"I'm not here for a settlement framework.
I'm here because you texted me and asked to talk.
So talk."
Holt put his hand on Flynn's arm.
"Flynn, I'd advise—"
"It's fine, Warren." Flynn's voice was quiet.
He looked at me across the table.
"How much do you know?"
"Everything," I said.
"The transfers.
The shell accounts.
The dissolution plan.
The timeline you moved up because you were afraid I was getting close." I kept my voice level.
"And I know Selina came to Grace's office this morning."
Something moved across his face.
Not anger.
Something closer to exhaustion.
"She was never supposed to be part of this," he said.
"She was the one holding the accounts."
"I know." He pressed two fingers to his forehead.
"I know what it looks like."
"It looks like fraud, Flynn.
Because it is."
Holt leaned forward.
"Mrs.
Vance, I'd remind you that any characterization of—"
"Warren." Grace's voice was pleasant and absolute.
"Your client asked to speak.
Let him speak."
Holt sat back.
Flynn looked at me.
"I didn't plan this from the beginning.
I want you to know that."
"The emails suggest otherwise."
"The emails show the end of a process that started when the company started failing." He exhaled.
"Vance Global has been losing ground for three years.
Bad contracts, a market shift, two acquisitions that didn't perform.
I was looking at personal liability.
I was scared." He paused.
"I made choices I can't undo."
"You chose to protect yourself by stealing from your own company and planning to leave your wife and daughter with nothing."
He didn't answer that.
"You told Selina I have no assets," I said.
"You told her I'd get a standard settlement and move on.
You said I had no idea what was in that company." I leaned forward slightly.
"My father made sure I had every idea."
Flynn's jaw tightened.
"Your father never liked me."
"My father was a corporate attorney for thirty-one years.
He didn't have to like you.
He just had to protect me." I sat back.
"He did."
Holt tried again.
"If we could return to the settlement framework—"
"There's no settlement framework," Grace said.
"The SEC inquiry is open.
The injunction stands.
The transfer records are in federal hands.
What happens next is not in this room." She looked at Flynn.
"What is in this room is the question of whether your client cooperates or doesn't.
That decision will affect everything that follows."
Flynn looked at his attorney.
Then he looked at me.
"Clara," he said.
It was the first time he'd said her name.
"She's safe," I said.
"She's with Ruth."
"I didn't mean—" He stopped.
Started again.
"I don't want her to be caught in this."
"Then you should have thought about that fourteen months ago."
The room was quiet for a moment.
"What do you want, Mabel?" Flynn asked.
His voice was different now.
Stripped of strategy.
"I want you to cooperate fully with the investigation.
I want the transfers documented and the accounts frozen.
I want the dissolution plan abandoned." I paused.
"And I want you to tell Clara the truth when she's old enough to understand it.
Not your version.
The truth."
He looked at the table for a long time.
"And the company?" he asked.
"Vance Global has a 34% shareholder who was never consulted about any of this," Grace said.
"We'll be discussing the company's future through the appropriate legal channels."
Flynn nodded slowly.
He looked like a man watching something he'd built for a long time finally come apart — and knowing he'd been the one to loosen every bolt.
Warren Holt closed his briefcase.
"We'll need time to review—"
"You have until Friday," Grace said.
After they left, Grace and I sat in the conference room for a moment without speaking.
"He'll cooperate," she said.
"He has no other viable path."
"I know."
"Are you all right?"
I looked at the empty chairs across the table.
May you like
"I think so." I picked up my bag.
"I need to get back to Clara."
