Silence. Big Red’s expression morphed from shock to outright anger, then indifference which was close to her norm. Arrogance. None of this affected her on a moral level, only on a professional one.
“No? Doesn’t work for you?” He tapped his fingers on the document she brought in and pushed it back to her. “So, let me get this straight. My patients—correction, my former patients are in dire straits because you had their families prematurely rip them from the best care possible in order to personally destroy me. Now, you come crawling back and want me to secretly handle your business? Were you expecting me to bend over and oil up so you can screw me all over again?” Jai paused, but that didn’t keep him from picking up steam. “Do you know this whole thing could have been over with if my men had forced that DNA test while she was still pregnant? They didn’t want to jeopardize her health or the baby.”
“Or one of them could have been stalling for time before the truth came out,” Big Red suggested.
“And here we go,” he shot back. “Always looking for the negative slant to things. You went in and obtained a court order to shut me down. When you knew there was another way.”
Big Red glanced at Marilyn, as though wanting her to chime in on the situation. A shutter fell over Marilyn’s face. From the barely-hidden glee in her eyes, she’d been busy secretly “cheering” him on as he landed jabs at her superior’s expense. Team Maharaj all the way.
“Mr. Maharaj, all that aside,” Marilyn began in a calm tone. “The health of these patients should be of concern, regardless of whether—”
“They were my concern until she and Donald Amos decided otherwise.” His attention shifted back to Big Red. “I am not in the business of cleaning up your mistakes. Technically, I’m not in business at all. I’m in a real serious holding pattern. Which means I can’t teach you or anyone else a damn thing.”
“Not true.” Big Red gestured to the documents she had brought in. “Those put you back in operation immediately.”
“But under your jurisdiction, management and control?” He shook his head. “Nope, I’ll wait until we are officially cleared.”
Marilyn parted her lips to protest, but he held up a hand. “I’m not an unreasonable man,” he said, scanning the first three pages of the Motion that temporarily put a halt to some of the actions the Bureau had originally filed. “The patients who are still here, and haven’t had any of their regimen interrupted, can remain. The ones you’ve put elsewhere will need to stay exactly where they are.”
“That’s not fair,” Big Red whined, slamming a hand on his desk.
“Oh, but it is,” he countered giving her a look causing her to remove that hand. “You managed to scare those families into believing that the care their loved ones were receiving was not solid. They bought into your lies. The patients that are still here are from families who defied you and put in their own court order for them to stay here.”
The silence was antagonistic and Jai reminded himself that nothing had ever been achieved by losing his composure when it mattered. Khalil had often reminded him of the same thing in the days when he’d been a hot head. Don’t give up the advantage when it means winning if you can keep your eyes on your objective.
“See, what happens when you bring them back here and they meet their untimely demise is that now I’m open to lawsuits based on your actions. I’m not willing to take that hit from families who were all too willing to sacrifice their loved one’s care in that way.”
“What I’d like you to do is reconsider,” Big Red snarled.
He stood as the message flashed on his cell’s screen that said he was needed at the Castle right away. “Well, Big Red—that’s what the fellas call you. I have more important things to tend to.” He swept past them, opened the door to his office, then pointed to the empty corridor. “You know my terms. I expect this order to be revised to say full operation with no Bureau oversight. Until then, what I’d like for you to do is get the hell up out of my office. Pronto.”
CHAPTER 22
For the third time in as many days, the Knights had gathered in what had become their regular meeting place.
Hiram tapped the screen, placing an index finger on the digital numbers. “This day, right here. See how long he was in there.”
The nine other men in the room focused on the timeline. “See, the cameras were off in her room, but the ones in the hallway tell the story.”
“Right,” Falcon said, getting to his feet, then gesturing to the erratic movements of the man onscreen. “He’s pulling his zipper up there.”
“Putting his clothes back together like …” Ryan let his words taper off.
On the screen, Curtis slid up to Kevin and they exchanged a few words. Curtis stiffened and inched back. His body language was off.
Hiram looked at Kevin. “Do you remember what you asked him?”
“I think I asked him, if he was all right,” he replied, scratching his curls. “He looked a little strange. Well, stranger than usual, so I …”
A few ticks of time passed before he continued with, “He said he was feeling a little ill and just came from the bathroom down the hall.”
“Hold up,” Hiram said, running a hand across the design in his fresh-cut fade. “There’s no bathroom near that wing so he—”
“Oh, come on now. He wouldn’t,” Ryan said, his eyes glued to the screen.
Chris pushed back from the table, faced pulled into a scowl.
Almost in unison, everyone said various versions of, “He couldn’t.”
“Time and opportunity,” Hiram mused after they overcame their shock and most had their game faces back on. “He had both. We’ve clocked hours looking at every damn thing. He was in there longer than any of us. And he was the only one in Temple’s space with the door completely closed.
Each room at Chetan was created in the kind of space age design that used both solar panels for sustainable energy, even with power grid failures; aqua chambers to ensure mobility and that the patient’s limbs didn’t wane or become atrophied from lack of movement or use. State of the art sound system that filtered in an array of music choices and live performances. Everything was designed to keep stimulation focused and constant.
“We’re only alone with any female patient to check vitals,” Michael chimed in. “Even turning them every hour, requires two people, each and every time. That’s protocol. Everything else we’re assigned to do happens in other areas of the center. Open areas.”
“We’re all in agreement, then?” Jai said, and a chorus of consent followed. “We can turn this over to your lawyers and they can chart it, add it to the discovery before giving it to the prosecutor’s office.”
Hiram slid another file in front of Jai. “But the big issue is the nurses and the doctors. None of them caught on to the fact that Aunt Flo hadn’t made a visit?”
“Aunt Flo?” Jai glanced at the men around the table.
Kevin grimaced and crinkled his nose with amusement. “Come on, figure it out, doc.”
Ready to move on to more important issues, Jai shook his head.
Falcon lowered his voice and said, “What some women call that monthly thang.”
“Oh.” This time Jai was the one who grimaced and wanted to kick himself for not making the connection. “For a man who has three children, I don’t know why you’re always so vague about womanly parts and womanly actions. You always call it a thang.”
“Whew, look at the time,” Michael said, checking an imaginary watch as the others laughed. “But the issue is none of them caught the fact that her vitals or anything had changed and that her body had transformed.”
“Well, only a few of her vitals increased a little over time,” Ryan said, passing over another set of documents with detailed nurse’s logs. “But that wouldn’t tell us she was pregnant. And then a couple of months in Curtis had said he only wanted Laura Shawn, Brenda Barnes, Donna Fowler, and Stille Moore to handle her, so …”
Jai was disheartened tha
t the two women he’d hired straight out of nursing school and two doctors, Laura Shawn and Brenda Barnes, could have had a hand in covering up what happened to Temple.
Kelly rushed into the room, nearly tripping over the high threshold on her way inside. “DNA results are in.”
Every man at the table stood, almost like synchronized swimmers.
“None of the men here was a match to the child,” she announced, beaming.
“Tell us something we don’t already know,” Hiram said, his tone as sour as everyone’s expressions.
Kelly moved further into the room, scanning all the materials splayed across the table. “Then who do you think did it?”
Hiram gestured to the frozen image on the screen. “We have some idea that it might have been her fiancé.”
Her steps faltered and she gripped the edge of the table to find balance. “Wait … what?!”
“He calls himself that, but she wasn’t ever going to marry him,” Jai said, amazed at how defensive he sounded. The man had lied on so many levels, but so had Temple’s mother. Something was up between the two of them. He’d have Daron and Dro look further into Temple’s background to figure things out.
Kelly scanned the table, taking in the mounds of paperwork. “Then why would the mother make him power of attorney for her health care and property?”
“That’s something we definitely need to get into,” Chris said, “If he’s not just the run of the mill pervert, what was his angle??”
“And the mother’s?” she queried.
Jai glanced at the page of one file, where Hiram highlighted other major points. The fact that his right-hand man was spot on put warmth in Jai’s heart. These guys were a lot smarter than they gave themselves credit for.
The mother had only re-entered the picture when a missing persons report matched an age progression photo that had been put out by the Virginia police department each year. The Chicago police used it to locate a family member to make major decisions for Temple’s health care. A The judge had also given them control over all of Temple’s assets, property, and her life. He could only wonder what else they’d done while she was sleeping. He’d get Dro and Daron working on it from a different angle, maybe Shaz if something else needed to be done.
“What I’m wondering is why Jai didn’t know that the cameras weren’t still in Temple’s room,” Falcon said, propping is feet on the chair next to his.
Kelly’s ivory skin flushed with color. Her lips parted, then closed, then did the same thing again. “I’m the reason all of this happened.”
“No,” Hiram said glaring at Falcon. “Curtis Burnside is the reason this happened. He manipulated a lot of things to get what he wanted.”
“But I…” She shook her head and her eyes misted with tears. “I’m so sorry, I …”
“Kelly,” Jai began in a patient tone. “It is not your fault.”
“Ouch,” Falcon said and glared at Hiram who had evidently kicked him under the table.
“Now I see why his lawyer was pushing so hard for me to accept the settlement offer for that one million.” Jai gestured to the screen that still held Curtis Burnside’s image. He knew the truth would come out. That money would be gone or he would use it to leave the country to escape prosecution.”
Hiram looked over Jai’s shoulder, pointing the remote to change it to Sharon Liscell’s image. “But what does her mother get out of this?”
“I’m about to have some people get into that,” Jai said, following Kelly out the door.
* * *
When the two of them were out of earshot, Hiram closed the door and put his back against the wood. “Listen up, y’all.”
The Knight’s focus went to him. “That suit that was in Jai’s office when I stopped at Chetan to drop some paperwork off is on some bullshit,”
“What about him?” Ryan asked.
“I overheard some things I probably shouldn’t have, but that pasty-looking dude that’s been all over the news with Big Red, has been blackmailing Jai. He wants something but Jai’s not giving in.”
All gazes remained locked on Hiram.
“You know what he’s about?” Falcon asked, folding his hands across his midriff and settling into the chair.
“He wanted him to sacrifice one of us—when everything first broke in the news, even though there was no proof of anything.”
Hiram then went on to explain the conversations he overheard between Donald Amos and Jai, insisting that turning one of them over to the public as a way to make any further investigations go away. He’d been riding Jai for a while, even before Temple came along.
“Man, that’s deep,” Falcon said, adjusting his body in his chair. “I still can’t believe he wants us”—he gestured to the others who were wowed into silence —“to be part of that Castle deal?”
Hiram nodded.
“So, what did Jai say to that dude trying to nail his balls to the wall?”
“He told him to go straight to hell,” Hiram said, grinning. “He wasn’t sacrificing us to save himself.”
Michael banged his fist on the table, making everyone flinch. “Ride or die, man. Jaidev Maharaj is ride or die.”
“I see you all quiet over there,” Kevin chimed in, leaning forward so he could see around Chuck’s big frame. “What you thinking, Hiram?”
“Everybody’s got skeletons in their closet. You can’t do dirt without some of it getting back on you.” Hiram scanned the faces in the room. “I say we work with the Kings to do some research on old boy and the side-kick that’s doing his dirty work. Give Jai some ammo to get those people off his ass.”
Each of the Knights in the room nodded.
A slow smile spread across Hiram’s face and he rubbed both hands together. “Let’s do this.”
CHAPTER 23
Three months after Temple moved in, Vikkas and Milan’s wedding reception was in full swing. The Kings were all his best men, the Knights and their significant others milled about, connecting with people who were going to be an important part of their lives.
Vikkas had used one of three ballrooms within The Castle, so each of the guests had to be vetted before gaining admission to the property. The room had been decorated in a purple, teal, metallic gold theme. A delectable spread including Indian, Middle Eastern, and Soul Food cuisines catered to every palate. The entertainment was off the chain. But before nuptials were exchanged Dro played a masterful rendition of Missing You.
During the reception, Devesh and Reign Maharaj had brought the house down with some of their more popular duets.
Jai had left Temple and India with the queens of the court—Cameron, Milan, Skyler, and Zuri. India, and Devesh’s twins were soaking up all the attention. “Little charmers,” Jai whispered on his way to the buffet spread to grab a plate for Temple before Shaz polished off everything.
“I have it on good authority that one of these little bastards is Khalil’s son.”
Jai froze in his path. His attention went to the group nearest to the buffet table, and he locked gazes with the man who had voiced those words. He moved in, nearly towering over the six men who were dressed in formal East Indian attire.
“Exactly which bastard are you speaking of?” Jai asked, arrowing in on the man who once made an attempt to include Jai in a plot that would cause Khalil irreparable harm.
Two of the men politely excused themselves and another found a particular interest in the shine on his shoes. The rest were transfixed, waiting for whatever exchange would ensue.
“Well, I … I …”
“None of them are named ‘I’,” Jai spat. “Speak up. You were so confident a minute ago when you were trying to tarnish Khalil’s name. Either your good authority is no authority or you’re straight up lying.” Jai tilted his head, getting a read on the man’s panicked expression. “Which is it?”
Suddenly a hush fell over the groups of people closest to them. All eyes and attention shifted to Jai and the men in front of him. One by one, the Kin
gs left the area where they were situated close to the queens and made their way to where Jai stood. The Knights instantly took hold of the women who came with them, left where they were stationed, guided them to be near the queens, then claimed the spaces that the Kings had vacated.
The Kings fanned out in a protective barrier so no one could get close to Jai. Meanwhile, the Knights circled the women and Jai knew that if anything went down, they would handle the business in the best way possible.
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