“Tiffany?” This is getting Kafkaesque. “How the hell do you know her?”
A shit-eating grin splits his face. “Her mother invests with me. When Tiffany was in town, we all decided to have dinner to discuss her money situation. She’s smarter than people give her credit for. She knows the Julian gravy train won’t last forever, and was eager to tell me all sorts of things about her marriage. Wasn’t happy at all to think about those paintings going to you kids. I guess they’re worth quite a bit of money.”
“They are,” I say to keep him talking.
“Yeah. So anyway, it wasn’t long before I came up with the idea of telling your former love interest and mine, Annabelle Underhill, about your sudden need to marry. You know, just to see what she would do to kill the good thing she has going with Stanton.”
“How would knowing about me do that?”
He laughs and shakes his head. “Elliot, Elliot. Such a genius with computers and such a moron about people. Annabelle has always been obsessed with you. I mean, don’t ask me why. No accounting for taste, eh?”
“She can’t be that obsessed. She tossed me over for Julian.”
“What can I tell you? Greed is a marvelous thing. But it just about ripped her apart to have to choose between you and Julian’s fortune.”
Damn. That explains so much. I can feel the pieces of the puzzle falling into place.
“But now you have money!” Keith goes on. “And you got it after she was already married to your father. Oh, the irony!” He laughs again. “And I knew that that fact, along with your dad’s forcing you to get hitched, would be more than the poor girl could resist. All I had to do was point her in your direction.” He makes a pistol with his fingers and pretends to shoot me with it. “Pow. It’ll be amusing to watch her flail around, even though she won’t go down easily,” he continues. “She knows all there is to know about your wife, and she’s going to do everything she can to get rid of her competition. She is positively obsessed with the need to have what she believes she deserves: you.”
His unnaturally bright eyes send a nasty feeling coiling around my gut. He doesn’t give a shit about Annabelle Underhill. Or Belle, for that matter. He wants to see me fall.
“But it won’t matter if that doesn’t work,” he says. “I have other pawns in play. It’s really too bad your wife is such a poor judge of character.”
He’s so damn smug. Then another detail clicks into place. Belle said she ran into Keith after lunch with her friend. “Traci.”
He nods, pleased that I’ve figured it out. “She’s a great lay. The poor ones tend to be, because they really love your money. I’m sure your wife is good in the sack, too.”
My teeth clench. “Don’t drag my wife into this.”
“But she’s already in it, just like her little friends.”
Friends?
“I help Traci get a job at OWM; she helps her high school crush get an internship. Of course that boy’s an idiot, trying to get me to hire him as an analyst by stealing the firm’s data. Like I would hire a known traitor. Besides, what would I do with OWM’s positions? The timing’s all wrong, and I know Gavin likes to play the market dangerously.” He tsks. “I had to let Gavin know. It was only right…even though it would mean that Idiot Boy blamed your wife for his misfortune. So sad.”
I feel cold, as though I’m covered with a layer of frost. I recall the pure venom in Dennis’s expression as he looked at Belle on his way to the elevator with the security personnel.
“Amazing what young people will believe when they feel grateful and trust that you’ll always have their best interests at heart.” Keith is entirely too gleeful as he lays a dramatic hand over his chest.
The pit inside me grows bigger and uglier.
“Dennis’s obsession is troubling, though. After all, he once crossed a line with your wife that most decent men wouldn’t. He blames her for that, too, since she was unreceptive to his advances when sober. What’s a man to do in a situation like that except take advantage when she’s inebriated?”
A low growl rises from my chest as a killing rage pumps through me. Dennis is the rapist from all those years ago? “Fucking bastard.”
Keith sticks his lower lip out. “Pretty much. And he’ll cross the line again. Just the kind of person he is. I’m going to enjoy it when he does because you love her. You thought you were being smart and freeing her from my clutches when you paid Grayson off, but all it did was let me know how much you love your little wife.”
“Dennis isn’t getting anywhere near Belle,” I grate out, standing up. “And this conversation is over. If anything happens to my wife…if she so much as breaks a nail, I will fucking destroy you.”
“Is that a fact?” Keith gets up slowly. “What are you going to do? Have me arrested? I haven’t done anything illegal, just like I didn’t do anything illegal before…except you still decided to fuck me over, keeping my millions for yourself.” He laughs in a way that makes the hair on my neck stand. “Tell me something, Elliot.” Humor vanishes from his face, leaving a hard mask. His voice is low and soft as he whispers, “Where’s your wife now?”
Terror like I’ve never experienced before slams into me. My heart accelerates, blood roaring in my head. It’s the same tone he used when he told me I’d never find any hard evidence tying him to the embezzlement because somebody else was responsible, except this time his eyes are glittering with sinister intent. Pulling out my phone, I run out of the office.
I have to find my wife before it’s too late.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Annabelle