Billionaire Misery (8 page)

The sheer audacity of their demanding more money and offering it to the other corporation was breathtaking. She had to admire them even as she was shocked by their idiocy.

The copies were made slowly and surely. Jessie put the files into a thick envelope then tucked it into a wide inner pocket of Craig’s jacket, which she still wore. The file was thick, but if she draped the jacket just right it wouldn’t show much.

She took a deep breath and looked at Craig, her eyes shining.

He said, “Here, we need a few of these.” He tucked a few more papers into his back pocket and then he tucked a few more into Morgan’s.

Jessie frowned. “What are those?”

“Bearer bonds.”

They all turned their heads at the sound of the voice.

Blake Wilkes.

He stood beside the door. He had opened it and come in so silently none of them had even heard him. He closed the door and came in closer.

Tonight he wore a very natty suit, and he exuded power and money. His eyes went to Katie and he said, “Well, Kathleen. You’re looking very well. I’m surprised. I somehow thought you would be wearing cheap clothes and participating in gangbangs by now.”

Morgan uttered an oath and stepped forward.

Katie grabbed his arm and said, “Father. I’d have thought you would be in jail by now. But here we are.”

Wilkes grimaced and glanced at the others before settling his gaze back on Katie. “You never had to know about any of this. This was never any of your concern and if you hadn’t gotten mixed up with that...piece of shit...you would never have had to know about this. And you would most certainly not have ever betrayed me. You know, that really surprised me. I didn’t think you had enough backbone to do that.”

Her chin lifted and, just as she opened her mouth, Wilkes slapped her.

Morgan moved forward but Craig held him back.

Jessie straightened, her voice taking on her I’m-a-cop tone, “Get out of the way, Wilkes. We’re walking out of here.”

His eyes went to the file that she held in her hand. The other was in the jacket and she’d gathered the original all together in preparation to put it back. Realizing her best bet was not to let him know how unimportant it was to her now, she drew it into her body and clutched it in her a white-knuckled grip.

His smile was nasty. “What is it with you people? This was supposed to be easy. Craig did his part; all you had to do was do yours.”

Jessie’s eyes went wide and her breath sucked into her chest.
Craig had done his part?
“What do you mean?” Her voice came out sharp and shrill, and she winced at the sound of it, but she couldn’t help it.

Like the psychopath he was, Wilkes had to gloat. “He agreed to set in motion the things that would end with those men dead. He set up the drug deal and then, when they paid him, he hid that fact.”

Morgan swore again.

Craig said nothing.

Morgan asked, “Dude, is that true?”

Craig sighed. “I wasn’t the bag-man on the money. I had no idea until after. He didn’t tell me it would end in murder. He just said they had to be put out of business, and, that, since it was his money and his dope, he could call them on it and they’d walk. He never said he was going to smoke them, or I never would have had any part in it.”

Wilkes tutted, “Well, that is not what I would have expected a son of mine to say. Really, Charles, that’s very disappointing.”

J
essie’s jaw sagged open. Horror crawled all over her and she tried to speak, but no words came out.

It wasn’t true! Her mind screamed those words, but no words came out of her straining throat. Craig, the man she had fallen in love with, the man she’d slept with, and shared her body and a bed with, was the son of the man she had sworn to take down, no matter the cost? Charles was dead; killed as a child, according to the file. Except it made sense.

He was the son of the man who had ordered her father’s death.

Jessie closed her eyes, pain lancing through her heart so fast she was unable to stave off that involuntary reaction to the words that had just come from Blake Wilkes’ mouth.

Katie staggered. Literally staggered. Jessie caught the movement when her eyes flew back open. She had the feeling her face was as ashen as Katie’s, but for different reasons.

Her mind went careening back to that day. She’d been sitting in one corner of the garage when she’d heard the car pulling up into the driveway of the house she’d lived in then. She’d been learning how to rebuild an engine, and the bike had been leaning into a puddle of deep shadow. Her father straightened up, squinted out into the bright dazzle of sunlight and said, in a quiet but firm voice, “Jessie, go into that little corner. Now.”

Her blood froze in her veins. Her eyes darted toward the sunlight, and the car cruising to a stop at the end of the driveway. She was close enough to the spot her father had told her to get into to reach it without being seen.

That he thought she needed to was what scared her. Her mother had gone grocery shopping. It was just her and Big Red in the garage.

She didn’t ask why. The corner he wanted her to go to wasn’t just a corner. It was a false wall that slid neatly aside when certain levers were pushed, and when opened there was a tiny little crawlspace behind it, one that was just big enough to stash dope or a small human.

She went and closed the door. It slid into place silently. The wall and the space behind it were so tight that her budding breasts pushed against it on one side, and her butt pressed against the other. It reeked of motor oil, weed, and something else—something rusty and thick. She had to force herself to breathe slowly as she heard footsteps echo on the concrete, and then a man spoke.

“Big Red. You were light on your last order.”

Her father snorted. “That’s bullshit. That damn Wilkes is all over everything. Why he can’t stay up there in his own city, let alone his fucking state, is anyone’s guess, but he’s cutting me off at the fucking knees here, Thomas, and you know it.”

Thomas. The businessman in the nice suit. His buddy was probably Billy, a dull and plodding man who wore cheap and wrinkled button-down shirts and slacks, and unpolished shoes.

Her heartbeat sped up again as Thomas spoke, “You knew going in that we’d be doing shit across state lines, Big Red. That takes capital. You and your boys have one job, and you aren’t getting it done.”

Big Red scoffed, “The hell you say. We got it all done. We came back from Vancouver loaded, and we rode across a lot of miles to get back here with that shit. It was all there. If it got to Wilkes light, that’s not my problem. I took it where it was supposed to go, and it went right.”

“Wilkes says no. He also says you’re in the way.”

Dead silence. Jessie’s breath came in short, hard bursts and she opened her mouth, forcing herself to stay silent. Terror crawled all over her body as she heard her father say, “Is that right? What’re you planning on doing about it?”

The boom of a gun was the only answer.

In the tiny hidey hole, Jessie’s eyes went wide and she jerked, her knee bumping the false wall. It didn’t open but there was a rattle. She froze, her heart thudding so loudly she was sure the men on the other side of the wall could hear it. Her blood literally ran cold in her veins.

“What was that?” Thomas’ voice was sharp.

Jessie stared at the wall ahead of her. Had they, maybe, seen her going into the open door, vanishing? They hadn’t been all the way in the driveway, and the angle of the drive and garage from the street was sharp. They might not.

But they might have.

If they had, wouldn’t they have already asked where she was?

Was he dead? Had they killed her father? She had the terrible feeling that the answer was yes, but she couldn’t wrap her head around that. It was impossible to imagine. She closed her eyes. Little red dots danced in the edges of her vision, and a weird tingling feeling began in her toes and fingers then spread upward, sending buzzing sensations all along her limbs.

Feet shuffled. Her pulse sped up again, and she realized she was seconds away from fainting. If she did, she’d fall into the wall ahead of her. It would hold, but it would make a hell of a racket.

A cough sounded, far too close to the wall. She had to restrain herself from leaping right out of the tiny claustrophobic space and into the arms of the men who’d...had they killed...

“There’s nothing over there. Probably just an echo.” Thomas’ voice was right across from her. Jessie began to cry silently. Huge tears ran down her face and her fingers clenched so tightly that her nails cut into her palms, leaving bloody half-moons there. “Come on. Wilkes will want some proof, you know.”

There was an odd grating sound. Jessie couldn’t imagine what it was. She didn’t want to imagine. Her mind drifted and she stared at the wall, waiting. Waiting forever, it felt like.

She’d stumbled out hours later, dazed and sick, on the verge of fainting. Big Red lay on the garage floor, his eyes turned toward the ceiling and his beard—the beard he had always been so proud of—gone. As was his right hand.

Craig stared at her and she realized she hadn’t spoken, hadn’t even moved since Wilkes had scoffed at her. Katie had; she’d fallen into a chair and she sat there, silent and unmoving, shock carved deeply on her face.

Katie said something, cleared her throat, and spoke again, “No.”

Morgan put a hand on her arm. His own face wore an expression of utter disbelief and hatred. Jessie’s heart lurched. Was that hatred directed at Craig? It shouldn’t be...or, should it? Her eyes went to him. His expression was impassive.

Katie asked, “You put him in foster and told us he was dead?”

Wilkes smiled... a nasty and vicious curl of his lips. “I needed to protect my son. I kept tabs on him, always.”

Jessie’s heart quivered, literally quivered. What kind of monster did that? She couldn’t speak, and, what was more, she couldn’t even think. How had Wilkes pulled it off? And why? Why would he put his only son into an unforgiving foster system?

Katie asked that question for her. “Why would you do that to your own son?”

Wilkes said, “It’s very simple. I’d angered a few men. They wouldn’t come after me personally, but they swore to wipe my seed from the earth. Now, they might have waited ten years to do it, or even twenty. I needed him to be safe, and I figured as long as there was at least one Wilkes heir, they would take that one, and when it was over I could bring Charles back in, without anyone ever being the wiser.”

Jessie’s gut dropped. He’d forced his wife to allow him to bear another child solely so he could allow her to be killed? Her eyes went to Katie, to the ghostly white pallor on her face, and then to Craig’s face. Dear God, he’d known, and he had never said anything!

This was the son of the man who’d destroyed her father, and who had sent her into the same foster system he’d assigned is own son to. The sheer wickedness of that man threatened to overwhelm her. How could anyone do that?

But Craig wasn’t evil.

He was still Blake Wilkes’ son, though.

Craig said, “I didn’t know, Katie. He came and told me right after Lisa died. He thought I’d want to join up with him.”

Morgan asked, “Was he wrong?”

Jessie’s heart thumped painfully in her chest. Her whole body tensed. Craig could not be trusted, and she knew it. She’d always known it. This might just be another move on the chessboard for him and Wilkes.

She had no doubt he was Wilkes’ son. Looking at the two of them, she had no idea how she hadn’t seen it before. She’d studied Wilkes’ face for years, and she had seen him in Katie’s features. But she had also seen him in Craig’s, and now she understood all too clearly that she
had
seen it, but that she’d been too blinded by the powerful emotions he created in her to truly comprehend what it was that she was seeing.

She should have known. He had had access to places Blake Wilkes would never have entrusted anyone with access to. He had had knowledge of things that he should never have known.

The only explanation was the true one, and she had not even considered it because it was just too far-fetched and impossible to grasp.

Craig said, “No, I didn’t join up.”

Wilkes snorted. Craig glared at him. Wilkes, completely calm, and believing he was in full control of the situation, said, “You betrayed them often. You betrayed them by buying into that deal I asked you to buy into...”

“I didn’t know you were setting them up for murder!” Craig’s face was scarlet with rage.

Wilkes rolled his eyes. “I kept you out of it, just like I promised. I had no idea you were going to come here to try to rob me, or whatever the hell it is you’re doing. You bastard; you’re my son!”

The files. Jessie’s eyes went to them. The copies were safely tucked into Craig’s jacket that she wore. Her heart beat even faster. They had to get out of there, and alive. What was more—and as much as she would have liked to put a bullet right through Wilkes’ black heart—they had to get out with him still alive.

There were literally over a hundred people downstairs, many of them high-ranking political figures. There were a few multimillionaires who held legitimate businesses and even more who, like Wilkes, ran illegal businesses as well as their legitimate businesses. She’d also spotted an elusive cartel official down there, and a few presidential campaign hopefuls.

Killing Wilkes now was out of the question.

Maybe getting out of there was too.

Katie had begun to cry silently.

Morgan had one hand on her shoulder, and the black hatred in his face when he looked at Wilkes was boundless. “You sonofabitch. You painted a target on her back that will never go away, and you know it.”

Wilkes shrugged. “Oh, those men are long dead now. No worries there. But since she was still alive, I sent her to the best schools, and made sure she had the ability to run a large corporation. She never would have known about the other side of my business, and if she’d behaved, she’d have married well and had a nice life. Imagine my shock when she started hanging around you lot.” He laughed and pointed at Katie and then her brother. “There was a moment there when I was wondering if she’d fall for Craig. That would have been complicated.”