This Is Where I Sleep

by Tiffany Patterson

  That reminder was like a slap in the face. It actually stung to think about that time.

  “Now you’re playing step mama to his kid with another woman. How is his wife by the way?”

  “She’s dead,” the deep voice that reverberated around the room stunned both of us. “Died a month after giving birth,” Liam offered.

  “Sorry for your loss,” Quincy spit out at Liam.

  Liam looked between me and Quincy. “Why, were you in the hospital?”

  I avoided Liam’s gaze and shot Quincy a look with narrowed eyes, silently letting him know I was going to kick his ass for this. “Nothing,” I said, waving off Liam’s concern.

  “Nothing?” Quincy’s angry voice boomed around the room. “That’s what we’re calling it now? Nothing? Now, she’s over here playing stepmother to your kid like she didn’t lo—”

  “Quincy!” I yelled, to stop him from saying anything else. If Liam was going to hear the rest, it should be from my mouth.

  Quincy glared at me but remained silent.

  I looked at Liam’s perplexed facial expression. “Can you give us some privacy?” I asked Quince.

  He remained staring at us for a few seconds before nodding and heading out the door.

  “What the hell is going on? Were you sick?” Liam asked, concerned.

  I let out a harsh breath. “No, I wasn’t sick. I was pregnant.”

  The look on Liam’s face told me a small gust of wind could have knocked him over. He obviously wasn’t expecting that. “You had a baby?” he whispered.

  I shook my head. “No,” I sighed. “The pregnancy was ectopic.”

  He scrunched his eyebrows in confusion.

  “It means the fetus started to grow in my fallopian tube instead of the uterus where it should have. The baby couldn’t survive there. I didn’t find out until I was nearly ten weeks and by then my fallopian tube had ruptured.” I paused knowing this was the most difficult part. “I didn’t know I was even pregnant until I began hemorrhaging and was in so much pain that I passed out in my apartment. Quincy was the one who found me and got me to the hospital. I told him not to tell the rest of the family. I had to have emergency surgery to remove the baby and save my ruptured fallopian tube.”

  Liam’s face was a mask of confusion, anger, and guilt. His eyes traveled from mine down to my stomach and back up again. “You were carrying my baby?” His voice was just above a whisper.

  “Yes, but…”

  “And you almost died because of it. Meanwhile, I went off and got fucking married.”

  The guilt and anger in his voice pulled at my heart strings. “Liam, it wasn’t that bad,” I lied, trying to console him. “Quincy was there for me.”

  “I should have been there!” His tone was sharp. “I should have been there.” He slapped his chest harshly for emphasis. “I thought I was protecting you by leaving, and I ended up hurting you more,” he said out loud, but it was obvious he was talking to himself.

  “Protecting me from what?” I questioned.

  He stopped, realizing he’d said that out loud. We still had never addressed the reason he left in the first place.

  “From shit you shouldn’t have to worry about. I’m so sorry.” He pulled me into his arms, stroking my back soothingly.

  I was nearly pushed to tears remembering those days in the hospital realizing I had been carrying Liam’s child and then lost it all in a matter of a few hours. Then finding out he was getting married while I was in the hospital.

  “It was after that you went to work for the CIA?” he asked, pulling back to stare down at me.

  I sighed and nodded. “I was being recruited heavily for months before then. I hadn’t made any decisions. Then when you and I happened, I thought,” I paused and shrugged. “Anyway, one night in the hospital I saw your engagement announcement on CNN. Three days later I was at The Farm.”

  “Fuck!” Li cursed, hearing how I ended up at the CIA’s infamous training camp. He stepped back, hands tightly fisted, chest heaving as he tried to reign in his emotions. He began pacing back and forth, and I gave him space to let everything sink in. I understand it’s a lot to take in.

  “Why aren’t you still with them?” he suddenly asked.

  I frowned in confusion. “What?”

  “You were with the Agency barely, what? Three or four years?”

  “Three and a half,” I confirmed.

  “What happened? Why did you leave?” He stopped directly in front of me.

  I didn’t feel like getting into all of that right now and thanks to a knock on the door I didn’t have to.

  Liam grunted at the interruption. “What?” he asked at the intruder.

  “There’s someone named Brian at the front gates. Says he had something important to share,” Quincy answered, “And I still haven’t fully explained why I’m here. It’s about this case.”

  I immediately perked up at his last words. “What is it?”

  “Jabari was able to get past the security passwords Larry had in place on the drive. You both should take a look at this,” he explained.

  “Let’s go. You should let Brian in. He’s been questioning Rodrigo and chasing down that John guy for the last few days,” I reminded Li. I moved closer to the exit and am stopped by Liam’s strong grip around my wrist.

  “This isn’t over. You will tell me everything and soon.” The command in his voice and the promise in his eyes actually turned me on. He didn’t give me a chance to respond before he was leading me out the door.

  I knew before this was all over that all of our secrets would be exposed.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Liam

  “We found him,” Brian said excitedly, as I opened the door to the den.

  My head was still spinning from finding out Coral was pregnant with my baby and that she nearly died as a result. I was distraught when Laura’s mother died, not because I loved her. But I did care for her as a person, and she was excited about being a mother. I had no idea what I would do if I had lost Coral. I’d felt like a shell of my former self for the last five years we were separated. If she had...I couldn’t even let myself finish that thought.

  “Liam, are you still with me?” Brian’s voice broke through my musings.

  “What did you find?” Coral’s feminine, yet strong voice asked before I could pull it together.

  I looked over at her and picked up on the fact that she was avoiding eye contact with me. Soon after Quincy arrived, I called Laura’s nanny to ask her to come watch Laura for the evening. I had a feeling this was going to be a long night just by the way Quincy was glaring at me since he first saw me. He and I had always had a friendly relationship, but I figured he was pissed at me for leaving Coral. I had no idea about the real reason. Shit, I was pissed as hell at myself, so I could understand where he was coming from. He’d always looked at Coral as a younger sister, although they only actually met after her father died and she and Stacey went to live with them. By then, Coral was already seventeen and a year from college.

  I turned back to everyone in the den to refocus on the matter at hand. I was anxious to get this fucking case over with and solved. I wanted to know who killed Larry and why. Most of all, I wanted Coral out of danger. I’d known for a while there was something about this case that was of particular interest to her.

  “Turned out, his name actually is John. John Walker,” Brian continued. “I spent a few days and made a few calls to break into Rodrigo’s phone. I traced the number Rodrigo said John called from back to a John Walker of Dallas, but currently lives in Austin.”

  Brian got my full attention when Austin was mentioned. I stared at Brian, and I knew what he was going to say before he said it.

  “He has ties to my father’s office,” I finished his statement for him.

  Brian nodded. “He works as a low-level administrator, but get this; his salary is about a hundred thousand a year. That’s a lot for a paper pusher, don’t you think?”

  “Sure
the hell is,” Coral said.

  “Do you have a picture of this John?” Quincy now asked.

  “I do,” Brian said pulling out a picture of the folder he’d been carrying.

  We all looked at the picture, and the guy did look familiar. I knew I’d seen him around my father’s office when I visited.

  “Yeah, it’s the same guy,” Quincy said.

  Three pairs of eyes stared at him perplexed.

  “Care to elaborate?” Coral requested.

  “Jabari was able to get into the drive. That’s the main reason I came. To deliver what he found. I printed it out also. On the drive was a picture of this same guy along with a lot of accounting records going years back. I took the time to go over the records to make sure what I found.” He stopped to pull out the picture and sure enough it was the same person. Then he pulled out page after page of financial data from Bennett Industries. All of these records, however, were from nearly two decades ago. Long before I took over as CEO.

  “What is this?” I asked, looking over the unfamiliar records.

  “These are the real financial records of your company. Turns out, during the late nineties during the oil crisis, your father made a deal with the devil.”

  “My father is the devil,” I interrupted Quincy.

  He simply nodded and continued. “You may be right about that. He got in with some unscrupulous men who ran guns, girls and drugs to bail his company out. Of course, they used shell companies to make it look as if everything was above board. Since then, your father was helping to fund that criminal enterprise. It looks like it’s been with the assistance of John here.”

  “Did you say drugs, guns, and girls?” Coral asked. Her voice was low and deadly.

  “Yup. The governor of Texas has been aiding in funding an international sex, gun and drug ring. Of course, that side of the world doesn’t know who he is. They all know him as the Ghost because he’s virtually invisible.”

  “Oh. My. God.” Coral gasped.

  ****

  Coral

  Holy shit! Was the only coherent thought my brain could form with the realization that Liam’s father was Ghost? The bastard who killed my team. But why? This didn’t make any sense.

  “What is it?” Liam’s strong voice pulled me out of my thoughts.

  I stared at him. “Your father tried to kill me.”

  “What?!” yelled Liam, Quincy and Brian all at once.

  I looked between the three of them. “You asked why I left the Agency,” I began. “Almost two years ago, I was on an assignment in Colombia. We were tracking an international terrorist known for running drugs, guns and girls into the U.S. We had no idea what he looked like. There was no picture of him. Not even a real name. My team gets a tip that someone high up in the guy’s network was staying in this little pueblo outside of Bogota. We set up a meet with the person who gave us the tip, but something was nagging at me. It didn’t feel right. I didn’t read any dishonesty from the guy who gave us the tip, but still it just wasn’t right. So, I set up another meet with a previous contact I trusted—well trusted as much as possible in that world. Anyway, I get ready for that meet and told Sheila and Don, my team, not to do anything until I got back. I told them not to make a move.” I paused, overwhelmed by the guilt.

  “What happened?” Liam’s sincere voice wrapped around me, blanketing me in security.

  “They didn’t listen. Sheila was young and had been recruited right out of undergrad. She was less than a year out of The Farm. She was smart, capable, and she had a great career ahead of her, but she was ambitious. Wanted to prove to me that she could handle the mission. Don was loyal. He’d never let anyone of us walk into danger alone, so when Sheila opted to keep the meet, he went with her. It was a setup. There was a bomb set to a timer in the bar where the meeting was. Sheila and Don never saw it coming.” I paused again.

  “You never told me any of this,” Quincy stated almost accusingly.

  I turned to him. “I never told anyone. After the bombing, I was put on desk duty while an investigation took place. It looked suspicious that my team was killed, and I made it out unscathed. I got that. But I fought hard to prove that I had nothing to do with it and was just as dead set on finding out who was behind it. I was cleared, but it still felt like someone above me was pulling strings. The assignments I was given felt riskier, little intel and not enough backup. I started to believe the bombing was an inside job, so I resigned. I’ve been investigating on my own ever since. A few months ago I was led to a guy who ran girls up through Mexico. He told me the name I was looking for was Ghost.” I saw Li’s eyes widen in shock. “For whatever reason this Ghost had it in for me. A month later, Jeremy winds up in Savannah saying an employee of yours was killed, but he left a message saying something about a Ghost being behind suspicious financial activity some years back in Bennett Industries.” I looked Liam in the eye. “I came for two reasons. One, you were in danger and two, I need to get the bastard who killed my team. Sheila and Don should still be here. Don had a wife and kids. They deserve justice.”

  “He fucking went through with it,” Liam’s said, his voice just above a whisper.

  My brows crinkled in confusion. “What?”

  Li remains silent for a few seconds.

  “I told you I didn’t leave because I wanted to. The night I left I got a call from my father. I never told him about us or that I was planning on proposing to you. Somehow he found out. He woke me in the middle of the night, telling me he wouldn’t allow this to happen. Of course, I told him to go fuck himself. I couldn’t care less about being kicked out of his will or even not being allowed to take over Bennett Industries. I would have given it all up for you.”

  His words sent a shiver down my spine.

  “He knew that, though. When his threatening to cut me off didn’t work, he made real threats. He threatened your life. Not just yours, but your family. He knew everything. Where you lived, where Stacey lived, Jabari, Quincy, your aunt and uncle. He even knew about Tasha. He recited all their addresses and said he had guys following them ready to do whatever at his word. I knew they weren’t idle threats, so I agreed. He’d been pressuring me for years to marry Michele and take over Bennett Industries as his sole heir. Her father had important political ties that helped him win the election, and he believed she was better for the image of a CEO than you,” he stated looking at me. “I left, cutting off all contact and married who he wanted me to, to keep you safe. I’ve spent the last five years trying to gather information on him to take him down. Larry was originally a forensic accountant. That’s why I hired him a year after I took over Bennett Industries. He died because of this.”

  “Did anyone else know why you hired him?” Quincy asked.

  “Only Jeremy and he wouldn’t tell anyone.”

  I knew Jeremy wouldn’t go against Liam. He owed Liam too much.

  “You have the proof that my father is the ringleader of all this? It needs to be tangible so I can take it to the right people to have that bastard locked up for good.”

  Quincy nodded, fanning out the papers on the table in the room. “All the evidence is here.”

  We spent the next hour poring over the financial records that it must have taken Larry years to track down and compile. We discovered the man Li’s father originally borrowed money from was the son of a crime family out of New York that originated down in Colombia. He lent the company almost twenty million dollars. With that exchange, Liam’s father began helping him clean the money from his criminal activities. Once the son died, it looked like Liam’s father took over and began running drugs, guns and worst of all, girls. He didn’t run for low-level criminals either. Records showed he had connections in very high offices around the country, including in the CIA. No wonder he was able to nearly kill me.

  “Your op in Bogota was getting close to discovering the truth,” Quincy said as we examined the records showing his Colombian connection. “It’s why he tried to take you out.”


  “No, not the only reason,” Liam interjected, looking down at me. “He told me he’d leave you alone if I did his bidding. Took over Bennett Industries while he ran for and became governor. I complied, but I’m sure he already knew I never intended to stick with that plan. I’ve been making moves to uproot him for years. I think he suspected as much.”

  “You two have been playing chess,” I said.

  Li nodded. “Trying to kill you was his final checkmate, or so he thought.”

  The look in Li’s eyes was deadly.

  “It’s time to pay my father a visit.”

  “I’m not staying here,” I informed him.

  “No one is. I don’t want you out of my sight.”

  “Wait,” I said turning to Quincy. “I need you to do me a huge favor.”

  “I’ll get Jabari to cover Stacey for protection and inform her and Andre of what’s going on,” he said knowing that my sister’s safety in all this would be at the forefront of my mind.

  “No, I can do that,” I countered.” I need you to go to Vermont for me.”

  “What the hell is in Vermont?”

  “Tasha. I don’t have time to explain. I’ll just say she’s a friend, a close friend and I won’t let anything happen to her. Li said his father knew about her so he could try to get to her too. Here’s her address,” I began writing down her Vermont address. “I can arrange for a private plane and car to take you to her.”

  He stared at me for a few seconds. Whatever he saw in my eyes must have let him know I was serious. He agreed and took the address, pulling out his phone to arrange the flight and car service.

  I needed to make a call to Tasha first. She didn’t take well to new people, and I knew she’d be frightened by Quincy’s brooding, burly self, approaching her. Li’s hand on my arms stopped me. He pulled me to the side and his hands gripped my waist, tightly. He put his forehead against mine. I could tell he was blaming himself for all this. The anguish on his face made me want to console him. I reached up and stroke his cheek.