Chapter 113
The Interim Injunction
The judge signed the injunction at 4:17 a.m., while the company’s payroll system was still running its overnight checks.
Mara learned this from Nia, who called from the employee council office and read the order without celebration. The court had barred any transfer, pledge, or voting instruction involving the Ellison block until the proxy, the employee-trigger clause, and the Harker term sheet were fully examined.
“Does it protect payroll?” Mara asked.
“It protects the shares,” Nia said. “The judge ordered the board to identify another source for wages.”
“That is not the same thing.”
“No.”
By seven, the board had issued a statement calling the injunction “a temporary inconvenience.” By eight, Harker Capital released a statement saying the injunction made its ten-million-dollar bridge impossible. By nine, three hundred employees had posted photographs of overdue rent notices in the council’s private channel.
Mara read the messages from her kitchen table while her niece Lena packed a school lunch. The practical emergency had entered the apartment without knocking. Mara closed the laptop.
“You’re not eating,” Lena said.
“I will.”
“That means no.”
Mara put the bread on a plate. “You have an exam.”
“And you have a company.”
“It is not my company.”
Lena tied her hair back. “Then stop letting it eat like it is.”
The sentence landed with the accuracy of family.
At Voss Meridian, Imani presented a payroll plan using restricted operating cash, but the reserve would last only eleven days. Harker’s bridge would last ninety, if the board surrendered the vote. Nia’s delegates wanted neither choice offered as charity.
“We need a third source,” Mara said.
Julian, attending by secure video from counsel’s office, placed a document on his camera. “There is an insurance recovery account. It was created after the 2018 systems failure. Felix kept it off the operating schedule.”
Ruth looked up. “How much?”
“Twenty-two million, subject to a coverage dispute.”
“You knew about this?” Mara asked.
“I knew there was a policy. I did not know Felix had isolated the recovery account.”
“That distinction will matter to the regulator.”
“It should.”
Adrian joined late, still wearing the shirt from Arthur’s hospital room. “The insurer will not release funds without a board authorization.”
“Then the board must authorize it,” Nia said.
Martin Kaye entered the conference room before anyone could answer. His lawyer followed, carrying a copy of the injunction.
“The insurer will not recognize a board whose authority is under challenge,” Martin said.
“You challenged it,” Imani replied.
“I identified a governance defect.”
Mara turned to him. “You removed the original proxy from the archive. Did Harker know?”
Martin’s face stayed blank. “I have no comment.”
“Then your silence is now part of the record.”
Price’s clerk appeared at the door. “The court has ordered Martin Kaye to surrender his passport and remain available for examination.”
For the first time, Martin looked uncertain.
The board convened at noon. The injunction did not remove Felix, but it prevented him from using the disputed block to manufacture a quorum. Nia insisted the meeting be public and transcribed. Mara sat with the employee delegates, not at the board table.
Felix attempted to open with a motion to authorize Harker’s bridge. Ruth objected that the bridge was conditioned on the very transfer barred by the order.
“Then authorize it without the condition,” Nia said.
“Harker has refused,” Felix replied.
“Ask the insurer.”
Felix looked toward Julian. “The insurance account is not confirmed.”
Julian stood from the audience. “I will sign a declaration confirming the policy and the recovery claim. I will also waive any severance payment owed to me until payroll is secure.”
Mara watched his face. The offer was material, not theatrical. It would cost him money and weaken his position in the executive dispute.
“I will match that,” Adrian said. “Any payment to me from the trust remains frozen. Use no claim proceeds for wages.”
Nia’s delegates whispered. Their distrust did not vanish. It acquired terms.
The board voted to pursue the insurance recovery and authorize eleven days of restricted cash. It failed by one vote to approve Harker’s bridge. The failure did not save the company. It bought time without selling the block.
As people left, Mara received a sealed notice from the court. The authentication hearing would begin in forty-eight hours. Nia Park had been named as the proposed trustee under Evelyn’s employee-trigger clause.
Nia read the notice over Mara’s shoulder. “I never agreed to this.”
“You don’t have to,” Mara said.
“If I refuse, who takes the vote?”
The answer was not written on the notice. That omission was the next pressure placed on them.
She called Price’s clerk and requested that the order include a plain-language notice to employees. The clerk warned her that courts did not write communications for management. Mara replied that management had already written three versions, each turning a legal freeze into a threat against wages.
By evening, the notice was posted in English and Spanish on the council bulletin board. It stated what the injunction stopped, what it did not stop, and where workers could file questions without routing them through the company. Nia read it aloud to the night shift. No one cheered. A mechanic asked whether his direct deposit would arrive Friday. Imani answered with the current forecast, including the shortfall.
The answer did not solve the payroll problem. It gave the workers a fact they could plan around, which was the first honest thing the injunction had purchased.