“And you texted Keith Shellington to tell me this? Watch it. Next time I might not call back at all.”
“I know where you live.”
“Ah, but do you know my schedule?”
Touché. Lucas has been traveling over the last two years, and I haven’t been able to catch him, not even by barging into his home unannounced.
“So. What’s the meaning of your text?” he demands.
I prop my butt against the edge of my desk. “Watch your back. I think he’s up to something.”
“Like?”
“Who knows? He’s a rat.”
“Yeah, but he won’t jeopardize what he has by trying to fuck with us. He got away, stealing from us, and he knows the only reason he’s able to continue is because we never pursued the matter. Nobody wants a money guy with even a hint of embezzlement attached to his name.”
“Maybe not. Still, he blames me for stealing ‘his’ millions.”
Keith raged at me when I confronted him. Face mottled, he yelled, “You fucking bastard, you have no idea what you’re doing. It’s not stealing if you plan to pay it back!”
Sort of like it’s not shoplifting if you plan to give it back. That logic didn’t fly with me, and I didn’t like the way he set his assistant up to take the fall that should have been his. By the time the forensic accountants were through, I had all the evidence I needed, but our business mentor and advisor Marlin thought it would be better if we just moved on, and Lucas agreed.
After all, Keith didn’t get the millions of dollars he would’ve received if he’d been honest, and that would have more than made up for the money he stole. He was a small-thinking rat back then too, only helping himself to a few tens of thousands here and there. Then again, if he hadn’t had such tiny balls, he would’ve been caught much faster.
“You’re being paranoid,” Lucas says. “He knows you have evidence of his embezzlement. He wouldn’t want to provoke you into releasing that and killing what he’s managed to build since then.”
I sigh. What Lucas is saying makes sense, but still… “He’s approached my wife.” Admittedly, not directly…but then that isn’t his MO. He needs a fall guy.
“You sure?”
“Positive.”
“For what?”
“He probably wants to use her to get something. I just don’t know what.”
“Maybe he’s going to convince her to divorce you and take you to the cleaners.”
I shake my head. “Not possible. Prenup.”
“They can be gotten around. You saw what happened to Ryder’s uncle, right? That prenup was supposed to be unbreakable.”
Shit. That’s true enough. I heard some whispers about that from a few people, mostly those whose sole purpose in life is to keep track of juicy gossip. But Belle doesn’t seem like the type to do something like that. It’s just…low and not like her. If she were, she wouldn’t have been cleaning toilets for a living. “I’m having a hard time wrapping my mind around it,” I say finally.
“Well, get your mind-wrapper fixed. ASAP. You know how people can be when there’s a lot of money involved,” Lucas says, his voice quiet. “I’m not the one who discovered the embezzlement. Keith blames you more than me for the fallout. So be careful, Elliot.” He hangs up.
I grind my teeth. Suddenly everything about life is pissing me off. I have an old enemy making a move against me…and a wife I crave but can’t trust. Whenever I think of the times she told me she loved me, my skin crawls. I can’t help but wonder if it was genuine or attempted manipulation, and then I feel hollow inside because I want her love to be real.
I grip my phone hard. It’s that or hurl it against the wall, and I’m likely to regret the latter.
I march to the kitchen. It’s a quarter after twelve, so Belle should be downstairs, about to have lunch.
I don’t want to eat. I don’t want her to eat. I want to hash it out, yell at her, have her scream at me—
The kitchen’s empty.
The fridge has a note stuck to it.