Unyielding (Tortured Love Book 1) (14 page)

She didn’t respond because she wasn’t sure where he was going with this.

“And I also didn’t know that one day, my business dealings would cross paths with that girl’s father.”

“Merrick, I’m so sorry that I—”

“I’m not trying to extract an apology from you. You don’t owe me one. I understand now why you told me that bullshit story about the teens. What I want to know is what did your father say when you told him what your uncles had done?”

“He accused me of lying. He said his brothers would never do that. He was really upset with me.”

He shook his head, and the tender look was back in his eyes. “Was there no one else you could have told?”

“No. There was no other adult I trusted by then. I held it inside and avoided them as much as possible.”

“Did they ever try anything again?”

“No. But what happened that night is one of the main reasons I left home as soon as I could. I never felt safe in my house again.”

He pulled her close for a few moments, and then looked into her eyes. “If you meant what you said before, and are determined to tell me everything, I need a straight answer to this question.”

“Okay.”

He took a deep breath first, as if asking the question was difficult. “Why did you marry me?”

She frowned, certain she’d misunderstood. “What do you mean? You already know the answer.”

“Tell me anyway. I want to hear it straight from you.”

What the hell had her uncles said to him while she’d been sitting on the bathroom floor? Lynda wasn’t certain she could take any more shocks tonight. She only wanted to sleep now, not talk about the company, her family, or the reason they had married. She wanted everything to go back to the way it had been earlier, before her uncles had arrived.

She’d learned too much tonight to believe things would ever go back to the way they’d been mere hours ago. Her husband was a killer. Or at least, he had people killed. That fact wouldn’t stop bouncing around her brain. Who else knew this? Had her father known? He’d lied about everything else, so he’d probably known that little tidbit, too, and never bothered to mention it to her.

“Lynda, I’m waiting.”

She studied his face, wondering if she’d ever truly know this man, or whether she even wanted to. A few hours ago, she’d been contemplating the possibility of them falling for each other. Now, that seemed like nothing but a fairytale. They were back to square one. Forced into a marriage neither one wanted, and still strangers.

But she’d come this far, so she might as well play his game through to the end.

Chapter Twenty

Lynda sighed. “My father told me you wanted Shelton Energy because of the wind turbine technology, and also because it’s—correction. Because it
was
the largest wind energy supplier in the country.”

“Yes, that is why I wanted the company. What else did he tell you?”

“He said you both agreed that since he’d fucked it up so badly, the only way to save it was for you to take it over and work your magic on it.”

He nodded. “Keep going.”

“He told you about the trust provisions. They meant he couldn’t sell the company to you because technically it belonged to me. The only way for you to acquire it before I turned thirty was to marry me, and then I could turn it over to you. He said it was in so much trouble that if you waited a year for me to turn thirty, when I could have sold it to you, it would have been too late for you or anyone else to save it.”

“All true. But there’s more, isn’t there?”

She didn’t like the look in his eyes. Something wasn’t right. Why was he making her say this now, after everything else that had happened tonight? Hadn’t her world been ripped apart enough for one evening?

“He told me that you agreed to marry me, but also assured him it would be a marriage in name only. That you would never love me. The decision to marry you on those terms was mine to make. I agreed to save my family’s company by marrying a man who only wanted the business, not me. As opposed to walking away and letting the business fall into ruin.”

She shook her head and snorted as the irony of that statement hit her. “If I’d known what I know now, I’d have told my father to go fuck himself.” She wiped her eyes. “He got what he wanted on all fronts, didn’t he? He got away with what he’d done at that party, and he got the profits from a company that probably was only in trouble to begin with because he…”

Lynda’s eyes widened as another probability finally struck her. “Oh fuck me sideways. There are two sets of books, aren’t there? There have to be, or he’d never have been able to get away with the embezzlement. You’d have checked the books before you agreed to this. And if you’d suspected he’d been stealing from the company, you wouldn’t have gone through with it. Son of a
bitch
!”

She watched his face, wondering why he was looking at her like that. “But you already know this. What else do you want to hear?” He said nothing. “Merrick, tell me what’s going on.”

“I never told him that.”

Lynda was confused now. “You never told him
what
?”

“I never told him this would be a marriage in name only, or that I would never love you.”

She couldn’t speak. Her mouth had suddenly gone bone dry.

“Lynda, I did
not
say that to him.”

“Are you saying he
tricked
me into this?”

His face filled with regret. “Your father told me you had other reasons for agreeing to this marriage.”

“What reasons?” Her father had played them against each other. How could he have done that to her? “What did he say to you?”

“He told me you agreed to the marriage not because you gave a shit about the company, but because of what I could give you in terms of material comforts and social standing.”

She tried to wiggle off his lap but he held onto her too tightly. “What the
fuck
? Merrick, that’s
horseshit
! You know how I lived. I left home as soon as I could. You saw me at that ridiculous wedding reception, and you saw the way I reacted when I first got here. This isn’t me. This has never been me. I don’t give a shit about any of this. I did not marry you for your money or your
social standing
, whatever the fuck that even means.”

He finally released his grip on her enough that she was able to stand and face him. “God damn it all to hell and back. He lied to you. He lied to
me
. He used us both. He tricked us into this, and now we know why. He had this planned all along. Son of a bitch! He screwed us both, Merrick.”

“I know that now. I suspected something was off when you told me about what André had done to you regarding the wedding plans, but I had nothing else to go on. I was reluctant to ask you outright because I didn’t want to hear the answer. I didn’t want you to tell me that’s why you’d agreed to this marriage.”

She stared at him as those words sank in. “Why didn’t you want to hear it, Merrick? If you went into this thinking it was true, why couldn’t you listen to me say the same thing my father had told you?”

Her heart pounded as they locked gazes. She swallowed hard at the look in his eyes. She’d seen it before, especially this past week.

“Because a lot has happened in two weeks. If I heard it now, it would hurt me.”

“Why?”

“I didn’t expect to care for you.”

She now had confirmation that the tender looks and gentle tone of voice he occasionally let slip through weren’t her imagination. “I care for you, too, Merrick. I didn’t think I would, but I was wrong.”

“Even though you now know I have people killed when it suits my purposes?”

Hot fear shot through her. She didn’t want to have to deal with that issue, but she had no choice. It was part of who he was. “How many times have you done that? I want the truth.”

“Twice.”

“Who was the first and why?”

He shook his head slowly. “Not the right time for that story, Lynda.”

She wasn’t getting anymore on that subject out of him tonight. She saw that in his eyes, and she was okay with it. She wasn’t sure she wanted to know anyway. “So what happens now?”

“Now, we have our dinner.”

“Just like that. We pretend none of this happened.”

“That’s not what I mean. What do you think we should do? How should we handle this?”

She threw up her hands in a gesture of helplessness. “I don’t know. I honestly don’t know what to do right now.”

“We should eat. We’re going to need our strength. And two nights from now, we have a fundraiser to attend. We’ll need to put on happy faces for that.”

Shit!
“I’d forgotten about that.”

“We have to go. I can’t get out of this one.”

“All right. But then what? How do we go on after this, knowing what we now know?”

Merrick rose and pulled her into a tight embrace. Lynda closed her eyes as he held her. Even after everything that had happened tonight, being in his arms still felt heavenly.

“We go on, Lynda, because we have no other choice. We go on with this marriage, and see where it takes us.”

****

Merrick was emotionally drained by the time he finished dinner. Lynda hadn’t eaten enough, and he’d kept pushing her to, but she finally told him her stomach still hurt and she didn’t want to be sick again.

After they’d both eaten as much as they were going to, he went to his office to outline a plan to deal with this latest shitstorm. Lynda said she was going to work on designs. He told her he was concerned about her being alone, but she assured him that concentrating on her work was the best thing for her right now.

He called Jimmy Landers and asked about Lynda’s theory that there were two sets of books, because now that she’d put it out there, he needed to know he hadn’t missed anything in the business accounts. She’d been right about him checking out the company’s assets before the marriage.

Jimmy reiterated what he’d already told Merrick. While Todd hadn’t been exaggerating about the mess the company was in, as far as he could tell, it had been because Todd was an idiot with money, not because anything underhanded had been going on.

“Then he must have hidden the proof of the embezzlement in his personal accounts,” said Merrick.

“We didn’t find any personal records,” said Jimmy. “The office is empty, Merrick. He cleared out everything including his computer. So if they were on there, we’ll never find them.”

“Fuck. Let’s try this from a different angle. What about his house?”

“You want me to break in? Doesn’t your wife still have the security codes and keys?”

“She hasn’t lived there in over ten years, so I doubt it.”

“Well, all right then. We’ll get inside our own way. Not a problem.”

“I want Tom’s and Ted’s places checked, too.”

He heard Jimmy typing. “Okay. We’ll need to watch their homes and find out when they’re—”

“No one will be there.”

Jimmy was silent for a few seconds. “I see. Okay, then. That’ll make it easier.”

“And Jimmy, I need that done fast before any of their neighbors start asking questions or call the cops. In fact, it might be better to search their homes before searching Todd’s, since no one knows he’s gone yet.”

“Except everyone at the firm where Dean worked.”

Merrick grunted. “Yeah. True. But they’re not going to break into his house and go searching for anything.”

“Got it. I’ll set it all in motion, Merrick. What about Dean’s place?”

“No. Too risky. He has family who might have access to the house. We’ll have to hope we find what we need at the other homes.”

Tom and Ted lived in the same condo complex, close to each other, so that would make it easier. Neither man had any ex-wives, current wives, or children who would start asking questions. Both dated casually, as their brother had done.

Their neighbors might start asking questions when the mail piled up outside their boxes, but that would take a while. Plenty of time for Jimmy’s associates to search. Todd’s house would be a bit trickier, but Merrick had faith in the people he and Jimmy hired for such necessary tasks.

After Merrick got off the call, he put his head in his hands and forced himself to relive everything that had happened this evening. The look on Lynda’s face when she learned her father had
watched
those two fucking pigs rape her, and had then jerked off instead of stopping them, wasn’t something he would ever forget.

If Todd was found and extradited, Merrick would have some alone time with him if he had to bribe every fucking FBI agent in the state to get it. His first question would be that one. How the
fuck
could he have let that happen to his daughter? The second question would be why he’d lied about why Lynda had agreed to marry him.

Although Merrick could probably work out that one on his own.

Todd had wanted animosity between them from the start. He didn’t want them liking each other, or even worse uniting against him. If he could assure they started their married life as anything but friends, the possibility was greater that he’d get away with what he’d done.

Merrick wondered whether he thought he’d have more time, and if something had made him change his mind and leave sooner than expected. Either way, it didn’t matter. It was done. But at least Merrick now knew the truth.

Lynda had married him for one reason only. To save the company. After all those three had done to her, she still felt loyalty to her family’s business. That either made her the biggest chump on the planet, or an extraordinary woman.

His protective instincts had kicked in tonight, and now he had time to analyze why. He was falling in love with his wife. Merrick wasn’t sure how he felt about that. She was a beautiful woman. No doubt about it. And she was incredible in bed. But great sex wasn’t enough to sustain a relationship for very long, let alone a marriage.

He had vowed this would never happen again. He’d never fall in love again. If you loved someone, they got hurt.
You
got hurt. And the pain never went away.

But how the fuck was he supposed to stop it? Did he even
want
to stop it?

Lynda was a special person, even without the sacrifice she’d made for those three assholes. She was kind and talented. She gave him his space and didn’t push her way into it. She gave him plenty of sex.

She was trying very hard to make this a real marriage, but what the fuck did that even mean? What constituted a “real” marriage? Who the hell knew if there was such a thing?

Were they both doing enough in this relationship? Could they make this marriage work, despite all the baggage they each brought to it? Hell. What did he know about sustaining a marriage? He and Theresa had only been married three years. It was a pathetically short time, in the grand scheme of things.

Thinking about Theresa inevitably brought on the guilt these days, and this evening was no exception. He hadn’t told Lynda anything about her, or about that time in his life. The months following Theresa’s death had inexorably changed him.

He
should
tell her, but dear God in heaven how was he supposed to find the words? What was the perfect segue into
that
conversation? Especially after the way she’d reacted tonight when he’d told her that her uncles would never bother her again.

It was better if she never found out about the events surrounding Theresa’s death. She didn’t need to know, and after what her uncles had forced her to face down today, she probably wouldn’t want to know. He was only protecting her, after all.