The DECEIT Collection: A Romantic Suspense full of lies, deception, passion, and DECEIT... (The DECEIT Series)

by Emma Shae

  “Well, Grandmother, Mother, Vanessa, whoever the hell you are-you forget I grew up in this mausoleum, and I know all of the secret ins and outs of this place.”

  Vanesa reached for the bottle of wine that she had poured her prescription medication into earlier, and asked Emry, “Would you like a glass of vintage wine? I broke out the good stock for Damon and Sasha’s wedding ceremony today.”

  “Ah, so my brother married the bitch. Well, I’m sorry I missed the party, but someone forgot to send me an invitation. I guess I might as well enjoy their expensive wine as a consolation prize, but only if you join me. I need to make sure that you aren’t trying to poison me.”

  As Vanessa began to pour two glasses of wine, she asked, “What makes you think that I would want to poison you, Emry?”

  “Well, I think we both know the answer to that question, so I won’t waste my time explaining.”

  Emry pulled the gun that he had brought with him out of his back pocket, and then slowly lay it down on the nightstand beside the glass of wine that Vanessa had just poured for him. Then he sat down in the chair that was beside Vanessa’s bed and took the wine glass and held it up toward the light.

  Vanessa quickly said, “Let’s have a last drink together before you kill all of us, Emry. How about we toast to your victory over your family?”

  Emry laughed as he watched Vanessa take a drink from her glass, and then he said, “Alright, I’ll drink to that,” then he downed the entire glass and said, “That’s not half bad, fill me up again.”

  Vanessa poured Emry another glass and continued to sip on her drink as she watched him down the second glass, then Emry reached for the bottle. Vanessa continued to sip on her drink as she watched Emry pour the last of the wine into his glass and, within seconds, empty that glass as well. Then he stood up, but as he went to place the empty container on the nightstand beside Vanessa’s bed, he misjudged the distance, and it fell to the wooden floor with a clatter. He almost fell back into the chair as he sat back down.

  “Oops, I wonder who will hear that and come running to your aid, whoever they are, I’m afraid they will have to go first, and you’ll have to be second.”

  Emry paused with his ranting for a few seconds and put his ear toward the door, anticipating a knock on the door. When there was no response to the noise of the bottle dropping to the floor, he laughed. Then said, “Well, I don’t guess anyone thinks that noise was possibly an old lady falling to the floor and needing help, or someone would have already been here by now. So much for your loyal staff.”

  “This house is virtually soundproof, Emry, so when you pull the trigger, no one will hear.”

  “You can’t take away my pleasure in killing you that easily, Vanessa.”

  Then Emry reached for his gun that he had laid on the nightstand and stood once more. On slightly unsteady legs, he moved toward Vanessa’s bed, where he almost fell onto it as he went to sit beside her. Then Emry began to haphazardly wave his gun around, smiling sarcastically, and saying, “You know Mommy dearest, I’ve dreamed of killing you and seeing you in a pool of your own blood, lifeless, for a very long time. You don’t know how many ways I’ve envisioned your death.”

  “Oh, I can imagine, Emry. I’ve watched you shoot fire at me with your eyes more than once in your lifetime. But, I’m not your enemy, and I have never been against you, Emry. I don’t know why you see me that way.”

  Emry raised his voice, shouting at Vanessa, “I know it was you that turned my father against me. You never loved me like you did, Damon. He was everyone’s favorite, but I was the oldest, and I was the one that was supposed to inherit everything, but when Damon came along. He ruined my life and destroyed my future. Damon took away my heritage, and for that, I’m going to take everything from him.”

  “Emry, Damon didn’t take anything from you. You destroyed your own life. You had everything you ever wanted, but you still were not happy. Your father granted your every wish.”

  “My father! My father gave me nothing! Trenton took everything from me that was rightfully mine. I know that Edward was not my father, he was my uncle, but he wasn’t even a good uncle. He was never there for me, and neither was my mother. They were both always busy off doing their charity work or business luncheons. I had no real parents, just two people playing at being parents, and they were terrible at their rolls. I took care of them, though. I got them out of my life, and then I made my way toward my rightful position with the company. I was supposed to be the Chief Executive Officer instead of Damon. When he got my position, I may have seemed to have given up when I stormed out of the meeting that day, but I never gave up. I needed time to plan. Once I set my plan into motion, everything finally started going my way. I knew that I had to take care of Edward first because he was standing in my way, so I got rid of him first.”

  “What do you mean, you got rid of Edward, Emry? Did you have something to do with your parent’s accident?”

  “Accident? That was no accident, Vanessa. A few days after Damon stole my position, I carefully slipped into the garage and replaced the brake line on the Limo with a faulty line. Nobody noticed me because, as I said, I know all the secret passages in this house, I created some of them myself when I was a little boy. Installing that faulty line set things into motion, and then the limo took care of the rest. Both of my substitute parents went up in smoke, and my tampering went completely undetected after the explosion blew the car to hell.”

  “But getting rid of Edward and Amilia wouldn't secure your position at Lockheed. Trenton was still the major stockholder, and you already knew that he wouldn’t vote you in, even if you were somehow able to get away with murdering your parents.”

  “Ah, yes, good old father, Trenton, the man who hated me the most. I accidentally found out that Trenton was my birth father when I dug to find out who Damon’s birth father was. I secretly took some of Damon’s hair and had it tested, along with mine. That’s when I found out that we were related, closely related. Edward’s DNA was a close match too, which made no sense at all. So, then I secretly snatched some of Trenton's hair from his brush in the bathroom. Trenton’s DNA was a perfect match for both Damon and me, and that was when I knew for sure. I overheard Amilia berating Edward when I was younger, about him being sterile. That automatically ruled him out as being anyone’s father, mine included. It all made perfect sense then. Of course, Trenton would want the bloodline to stay pure. Naturally, he would want to be the one to donate. You see, Vanessa, I’m not as stupid as you thought that I was.”

  “Emry, I’ve never thought you were anything less than a genius. You just never applied that knowledge to anything good and decent. You were always too busy trying to think of ways to manipulate your family.”

  “Well, well, well, you do understand me, don’t you, grandmother. It’s just sad that now, I’m going to have to kill you, but since you’re fixing to die anyway, I guess it’s time that you knew the truth about how your husband, my real father, actually died.”

  “He had a heart attack, Emry, and everyone knows that.”

  “Well, that is what the coroner said, but that is not the truth. I didn’t get credit for his demise, but I should have. Nobody but me can claim that victory.”

  “What are you talking about Emry, you aren’t making any sense?”

  “Think about it for a minute, Vanessa. You’re a bright woman. First, my dear mommy and daddy bite the dust, and then dear old sperm donating father flies away on a heavenly cloud. Don’t you think that it’s an odd coincidence that they both died within weeks of one another?”

  Vanessa was fighting hard to keep it all together because she refused to let Emry get the best of her. “Trenton had a heart attack, Emry.”

  “No-no-no! Let me explain it all to you, sweetheart. It really isn’t all that complicated. When I left the meeting that day with my dear old dad and loving grandfather, threatening to leave and never return, I never left. I planned my vengeance very carefully. You see, first, I got
rid of my dear old mom and fake dad, which wasn’t easy to do with all of the security following him all of the time, but I was finally able to get to the old limo and make a little adjustment in the break line, and viola. Too bad that the former chauffeur had to die, but hey, he should have known the job came with risks. The explosion took care of both of them, and my tampering went undiscovered. Then I had to do away with daddy Trenton. That was a little easier. Being old and on medication already, all I had to do was encourage him to up his dosage. For future reference, it only takes ten blood pressure pills to stop a heart, oh, and a very sharp knife to the throat for encouragement. Just a tidbit of information that I thought I’d share with you for future reference, in case you should ever want to aid in the death of an unwanted individual. Trenton was too feeble to run the company anyway. Lockheed International needed new blood, my blood, but Trenton had already appointed Damon to be his successor. The CEO position was rightfully mine, so, Damon would have been next on my wish you were dead list, but nature stepped in and killed Damon’s precious Carla and their unborn brat. With him, mentally occupied, that was the perfect time for me to make my move, and it would have all fell into place perfectly if I just hadn’t sat down at that poker table that night for one last game, I would have made it back here with time to spare. You see, I lost a lot of money that night, and since I was broke at that point, you know from being kicked out of the company and all. I didn’t have the funds to cover my ass, and everyone at that table knew it, so I had to go into hiding for a while.

  “Is that why you showed up on my doorstep, dying of cancer- because you were broke? How did you expect to take over the company if you were supposedly dying?”

  “Don’t jump ahead, Grammy, this is my plot, not yours. You see, I just needed a place to hide out until the gambling losses blew over. Keeping my head down by playing the sick card, with you and pretty little Sasha taking care of me was working, and soon the guys looking for me gave up, or so I thought. I got careless, though. Staying in that dungeon of a bedroom was more than I could handle, I needed release. I had to slip out to meet my lover, James, for a rendezvous, and that’s when they caught up with me. I had to come up with their money and fast. That is when I decided to stage my fake death so that I could get my inheritance and pay those guys off to leave me alone. I had my lover, James, help me out with the medications I needed to pull off my plan, and he also provided me with fake doctor’s recommendations, along with the proper x-rays to make it all appear real. James was extremely helpful with all of that. It’s too bad that I had to kill him. It was his fault, though. He was going to snitch on me, and I couldn’t allow him to do that. Is it hot in here or what? Did you forget to pay your electric bill, I’m burning up.”

  Emry unbuttoned his shirt and said, “Let’s see, where was I? Oh, yes, that’s when you, of all people, stepped in and pulled Damon back from the abyss by forcing him to love again. I must admit, that was a pretty good plan on your part. I didn’t think that you had it in you, Vanessa, but your meddling messed up my plans. You caused me to have to step back and reassess my thinking. I decided to take what money that I had left and enjoy myself for a while, so I died, fake death of course, then I met up with James on our island, and we got married. My money started to run out though, expenses you know, so I needed to tap back into the Lockheed banking center, AKA grandmother Vanessa and the best way to do that was to kill two birds with one stone. I’d kidnap brat Trenton, and then after getting my ransom money, I’d kill the favored heir, and when Damon messed up and came after me, I’d do away with him too, but those two idiots I hired jumped the gun on me and screwed up my plan. Then James of all people, the man that I thought loved me, found a conscience and ratted on me. It was all over then. The only thing left to do was justify my pain by killing all of you. I might have let you live Vanessa, but you had to go and put me in a nuthouse, and that did it. Now, I have to take you out too, because of your actions. I figured I’d take your life last that way you would have to watch as everyone you cared for fell by my hand. My second kill was going to be my beautiful sister in law, Sasha. I was going to have her hold your precious heir in her arms while I shot her and the baby at the same time. Lastly, I’m going to kill my brother, who isn’t my brother at all. I’ll enjoy that most of all. The only thing, when I got here, everyone was gone, but you, so I guess I’ll have to settle for killing you first, and then wait for the rest to return. Damn, it’s hot in here. Seriously, do you even have an air conditioning vent open in this room?”

  Emry stood up to check the air vent in the ceiling, and when he raised his hands above his head, he fell to his knees.

  “Wow, what is happening to me? I’m dizzy, and I can’t feel my arms.”

  “Yes, I know, I feel the same way.”

  “What do you mean? What have you done to me, Vanessa? I can’t feel my tongue.”

  Emry’s speech began to slur, and he was unable to stand back up. He tried several times to stand but couldn’t get his legs underneath him to hold him up. His eyes wouldn’t focus as he attempted to locate Vanessa on the bed. Emry aimed his gun toward where he thought the bed should be, but his vision was blurred, and he began to sweat profusely.

  “Where are you, Vanessa, I’m going to kill you. What have you poisoned me with?”

  “Emry, do you remember when you said that it took ten blood pressure pills and a sharp knife to encourage Trenton that you were going to kill him?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Well, Emry, I didn’t need a sharp knife, but I used way more than ten pills, more like about thirty, and my pain pills were in the wine too so that you won’t be in pain for long. It’s easier if you just relax like I’m doing and give in to it.”

  Emry continued to wave the gun in Vanessa’s direction, but he couldn’t focus on her. He stumbled toward the bed and fell down beside her. His arm was too numb to lift the gun anymore, and his tongue was so swollen he couldn’t speak. Emry’s breathing was labored as he tried to crawl toward Vanessa on the king-sized bed but was unable to get close enough to touch her.

  Vanessa began to pat Emry on the top of the head, saying, “There, there, Emry, just relax it will all be over soon. You and I will go together. I’m doing the world a favor to take you with me. You’ve become a burden to your family, and I can’t allow that any longer. Lockheed International will live on and flourish under the hand of Damon, the man I’m very proud to call my son. I just wish that you had turned out to be half the man that Damon is, your father would have been proud of you. I’m glad that Trenton didn’t live to see you the way you are right now, he would have been so disappointed in you. We can both sleep now,” Vanessa said as she felt Emry take his last labored breath. Vanessa then closed her eyes for the last time.

  Author Emma Shae

  Emma Shae lives on a small ranch in Southeast Texas. She is passionate about the outdoors. If she is not engrossed in her next novel, she loves horseback riding, fishing and bow hunting. Emma has two horses, three dogs, a fish, and a very independent cat.

  I hope you enjoy the escape! Have a great day!! Email me at reademmashae@gmail.com.

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  LITERARY WORKS

  BY EMMA SHAE

  The Deceit Series (4 Books)

  His DECEIT Book 1

  Her DECEIT Book 2

  The Ultimate DECEIT Book 3

  The Final DECEIT Book 4

  Be sure to watch for the next series from Emma Shae, “The Spice Collection” due out this year.

  DEDICATION

  I dedicate this series to all of the women that desire a little fantasy in their life. We should reach for the stars in life and settle for nothing less than the pot of go
ld that lies at the end of the rainbow.