by Cruz, Cara
“So she says,” Mike interrupted. “Any idea who it was? Within Breton?”
Chase shrugged. “I don’t. Which makes this scheme seem even weirder. I can understand how it’d work if I had a protégé I was grooming to take over, but I’ve only been in charge for two years. I’m just getting into my stride.”
Mike nodded. “I can’t think of anyone either.”
“It doesn’t mean the threat isn’t there anymore.”
Mike sat down. “Well we know about the setup.”
“Yeah. This one.”
“You think there are others?”
“If there aren’t now, there will be when it turns out that we don’t acquire Keton or BEK or Naylor.”
“So how do you want to proceed?”
Chapter 24
“You’re late,” Johnny growled.
At first Maria didn’t see him in the dim light of the bar. Then she spotted him, sitting in the booth by the door. The bar was deserted: it was one of the reasons she tried to avoid meeting him there.
“Sorry. Something came up. What’s up?”
He picked up his glass and shook it from side to side. The amber liquid inside sloshed around.
“Not gonna offer me a drink?” Maria asked. She set her jaw to try and stop her teeth from chattering.
She knew everything was still at stake. One wrong move and she was screwed.
He grunted at the bartender who was standing at the other end of the bar, cleaning glasses.
Just act normal, she reminded herself. “Bourbon, please,” she called to the bartender. “Neat.”
Johnny flashed his teeth in what looked like a smile. “Got something to tell me, sweetheart?”
Maria rolled her eyes. “I thought you had something to tell me. Why else would you call me out of work in the middle of the day? Are you trying to get me fired?”
She registered the shock on his face.
“Uh… no,” he said, looking wrong-footed. “No I didn’t. I heard something is all; something bad.”
“You’re gonna have to be more specific.”
He looked at her suspiciously. “You sure everything’s okay at Breton?”
She nodded and tried to look exasperated. “We met this morning, Johnny. Don’t you remember? What could’ve happened?”
He shook his head slowly, still scrutinizing her. “A lot can happen in a short space of time,” he said, cracking his knuckles.
“Cryptic,” she sneered. Her purse began to vibrate. She unzipped it and rummaged until she found her cell. “Shit, it’s him.”
“Answer it then,” he hissed. “For fuck’s sake.”
“Maria,” she said, in her clipped professional tone.
She listened, nodding regularly. “Okay. Fine. I’ll be back soon. Just popped out to get a coffee. Do I have time to go home and pack?”
She ended the call and shook her head. “Honestly, it’d only take me fifteen minutes to go home and grab a change of clothes. But no.” She glared at Johnny. “The sooner this is over, the better. I’m sick of this secretary shit.”
Johnny sneered. “This morning you were practically begging me to leave him alone.”
She shrugged. “I still don’t think it’s right. But dragging me to Florida again? Dressed like this?” She pulled at her angora sweater. “It’s bullshit.”
“Calm the fuck down,” Johnny growled. “And keep your ears open. Something important might come up, you hear me?”
She stood up to leave. “What’s going on with Janey?”
He cleared his throat. “Everything’s in place, like I told you. Just as soon as all of this goes down, we’ll put the screws on the boyfriend.”
Chapter 25
“He definitely knew I’d been fired,” Maria said, sitting down in one of the recliners on the jet.
“You’re sure?”
She nodded. “Yup. He reacted when I lectured him for calling me out of the office.”
Chase looked deep in thought. “So there’s at least one person in the company who’s working with them. Maybe two.”
“Maybe. Unless they’ve somehow got access to your phone or email. Did you tell anyone you’d fired me?”
He thought about it. “I called Mike as soon as you left the building. He called security to get your access rights revoked. That’s it.”
“So Mike and security.”
Chase shook his head. “No and no. You know it wasn’t Mike. He’s the straightest guy I know. They’re trying to frame him too, remember?”
“I know. I’m just trying to get it straight in my head. Is there some kind of security system that would have been updated to say I no longer had access? What about my personnel file?”
“I don’t know about security. It’s handled by an outside firm. And no, I hadn’t gotten around to contacting HR.”
Maria sighed and leaned back into the comfortable leather. Even though her body was teeming with adrenaline, she couldn’t help but feel sleepy in it. She pushed herself up and moved to the table. She couldn’t afford to relax right now.
Chapter 26
Maria padded to the kitchen to fill the coffee pot. She had given up on getting dressed and thrown on her sweats –she was so tired that a caffeine fix was needed before she did anything else. It had been two days since they returned from Florida. In that time, she’d heard nothing from Chase Breton. It was like he’d dropped off the face of the earth. True, it was the weekend. But she knew that wasn’t going to stop him working. She shook her head and pressed the switch. Of course there was no way he’d forgive her for what she’d done. Wouldn’t she have reacted the same if someone double-crossed her? She knew all this in her logical brain, but there was another part of her that couldn’t take the truth – the part of her that had fallen head-over-heels in love with Chase Breton.
Maria heard a creak and twisted around instantly, half expecting to find Johnny standing in the doorway. There was no one there. It was just the pipes in the old building creaking. Like they always did. She held her shaking hand to her chest as her heart rate gradually returned to normal.
While things hadn’t been intimate between her and Chase since he found out the truth, she still couldn’t believe he’d just disappeared like that. He’d been chatty and polite in the towncar when he dropped her home after their trip to Florida. Perfectly business-like, she realized. For those two days, she’d seen them as allies. Now, she knew, it had been more a case of keeping your enemies close.
She poured a cup of coffee and leaned against the kitchen bench. Did that mean that those twelve hour days in Florida had been nothing but theater? Who would take their enemy along and involve them in such a delicate discussion?
Her heart started to race again. This time, though, she couldn’t pinpoint what had rattled her.
She rushed back to her bedroom where she’d left her cell phone, telling herself she was being paranoid. It was 8am. She’d be at work by 9. He’d probably just been distracted by some urgent paperwork on another of the many deals he was working to close. Of course he was ignoring her phone calls: he’d just found out she was effectively a spy. They hadn’t actually agreed that she’d keep up the front of working at Breton for Johnny and his associates. It had just been implied. She froze. Someone was banging on the door.
“Police. Open up.”
Maria tiptoed to the door. They started knocking again before she’d had a chance to get to the door. She closed one eye and glanced through the peephole. Whoever was out there was holding their hand over it or doing something else to block it. She stepped backward and flattened herself against the wall.
Her mind raced with the possibilities. One thing was certain though: this wasn’t a social visit from one of her friends on the force.
“We know you’re in there,” the voice outside boomed.
Maria squeezed her eyes shut. If they broke the door down, she’d struggle to pay for the repairs. But if they weren’t police…
Maria swallowed and opened
the door a crack, knowing that the security chain would do little to hold back a determined intruder. She backed up to her place behind the door.
“Show me your badge.”
She heard shuffling noises from outside.
“And tell me what you’re doing here.”
A tanned hand slowly reached in through the gap between the door and the wall. She took a step closer and glanced at the badge it held.
“What do you want?”
“Open the door.”
With a sigh, she pushed the door forward slightly and removed the chain. They pushed the door open instantly.
“Maria de Reyes?” the cop in front said.
Maria nodded, looking around in astonishment. There were three other cops with him, all staring straight ahead.
One of the female cops stepped forward and spun her around.
“You’re under arrest—”
Maria struggled. “What? Why?”
“You know it’s an offense to resist arrest,” the officer snapped, cuffing her.
“I haven’t committed a crime,” she whispered, as it hit her. Oh yes she had. And admitting that to Chase Breton may just have been the biggest mistake in her life.
Chapter 27
Maria stirred. That sound. Getting closer. His helicopter? She wriggled around. Why was it so uncomfortable? Her eyes burst open. Seeing the source of the whirring noise, her heart plummeted. It wasn’t Chase goddamn Breton there to save her in his shiny toy. It was a damn industrial fan right above her head. She cracked her neck. No wonder she was uncomfortable - she was crammed onto a barely-there mattress in a police cell. She was surprised she’d slept at all.
She didn’t wear a watch and they’d confiscated her cell phone. She had no idea of the time. It was hours, she guessed, rather than days. She hoped it was. They should only take four or five hours to process her out for arraignment, but she wasn’t optimistic. So far, nothing about her arrest had been routine.
They’d been reluctant to tell her what she was being arrested for. Despite her repeated badgering on the drive from her apartment to the precinct. She still wasn’t fully sure. The female cop who’d cuffed her had muttered ‘conspiracy’. Maria’s follow-up questions had been completely ignored. They hadn’t even read her her rights. She knew that meant they didn’t need her statement. Because in their eyes at least, they already had enough to prosecute her.
She shook her head and stared up at the ceiling, wishing that the damn fan would shut the hell up. It was doing nothing to cut through the stifling still air in the cell. The corners of her mouth turned down. She hid her face even though there was no one else there to see – mercifully she was the only person in the cell despite there being four bunks. She wondered what he was doing now. The funny thing was, as angry as she was, she also missed him. Desperately. She longed to feel his skin on hers. She couldn’t get the image out of her mind of them at his beach house. Intertwined. She shook her head with a bitter laugh.
Without knowing what charges she faced, she had no idea how much time she was looking at. She’d been allowed three phone calls after they booked her. But no one had answered. She’d left messages for Johnny and her friend Aleesha. She’d just hung up when she heard Chase’s now painfully familiar voicemail message. She wasn’t even sure why she’d bothered to call him. She guessed it was because anything was better than the truth –he’d hung her out to dry. And deep down she knew she deserved it.
Chapter 28
Several hours later, Maria still hadn’t heard back from anyone. She was just reconciling herself to the idea of another night behind bars when her cell door opened. She glanced up hopefully. Her heart sunk. She didn’t know this one either.
“Stand up and put your hands behind your back,” he ordered.
She shrugged sadly. “What do you think I’m gonna do? If anything, I’m in the right.”
“How’d you figure that?”
“I don’t even know what I’m being charged with. You think it’s okay to keep me here for as long as you want?”
She couldn’t see his face, but judging from the long pained sigh he disagreed with her.
“You really think that’s cool?” she asked in disbelief.
He dragged her arms roughly and turned her toward the door. “I think if you do the crime…”
Maria shut up even though she had dozens of questions floating around in her brain. After all, if she didn’t know what she was being charged with, she didn’t know what they could use against her if she went to trial. She shivered. She’d been to plenty of trials, but the idea of being on the other side? It terrified her. On one side was the law and on the other was Johnny Macone. She wasn’t sure which one she feared most at that moment.
“Where are you taking me?”
“The court house.”
She relaxed slightly as he led her along the corridor. At least she was one step closer to finding out her fate.
The door opened. Maria turned around. She had no idea how long she’d been asleep for.
“Visitor.”
She was led down the hallway to a tiny meeting room. Her eyes widened when she saw who was inside.
“How the hell?”
Johnny smiled lazily after the cop had closed the door behind them. “This is your lawyer. Pete.”
Maria ignored the uneasy feeling in the pit of her stomach and sat down in the free plastic chair opposite Johnny and Pete. She looked the stranger up and down. What she could see of him didn’t fill her with confidence. His light brown suit was crumpled and his tie was stained with what looked like some sort of food sauce. She glanced at Johnny and raised his eyebrow.
He shrugged. “It was the only way I could get in to see you.”
“What about getting me outta here?”
Pete glanced at her uncertainly. “We’re working on that.”
She tried to hide her skepticism. Pete might be her only hope, for all she knew. “Great,” she said without enthusiasm. “Can you tell me what I’m charged with?”
He shook his head. “I came straight here. I thought you’d know.”
Maria rolled her eyes. “Who’s the damn lawyer?”
Johnny leaned over to intervene. “Kids. Please.” He glanced at Pete. “Can you leave us for a minute?”
Pete frowned. “You’re supposed to be my assistant. Why would I leave you alone with my client?”
Johnny shrugged. “Think of something. You need the men’s room.” He narrowed his eyes. “I don’t give a fuck.”
Pete stood up in a hurry sending his plastic chair clattering to the floor.
“Where did you find him?” Maria asked after Pete had banged on the room door and asked the guard outside for directions to the nearest bathroom. His lack of familiarity with the court house bothered her even more.
Johnny closed his eyes and shook his head. “He’s not a bad lawyer, as it happens.”
“Hopefully I won’t need to find out.”
Johnny leaned closer. “What the hell happened, Maria?”
“I don’t know,” she said through clenched teeth. “My guess is Breton found out somehow and put it all on me.”
“And how would he find out,” Johnny asked in a sweet, sugary voice.
Her eyes widened. “What the fuck are you saying?” she hissed.
“Nothing. Calm down.”
“How can I calm down?” she said, her voice cracking. “I’ve been locked up in this hellhole. I have no idea how long I’ve been here and no one will tell me why.”
He stared into her eyes like he was trying to decide whether to believe her. She didn’t care anymore.
“I’m trying to find out,” he said finally. “I only know what I’ve seen in the papers.”
“The papers?”
He nodded. “Yeah. And on TV. It’s all over the place this morning. Financial crime exposed in Breton Enterprises.”
“What the hell does that mean?”
“Breton knew about the plan and went alon
g with it. Josh Pritchett the COO and several of our other guys have been arrested too. It’s like you said,” he said, his eyes narrowing. “Somebody went to the cops. I wonder who it was.”
Maria leaned forward, trying her best to avoid touching her elbows on the worn plastic table. “I’ve been locked up for the best part of two days. Two days! Do you really think I’d bring this on myself?”
“Alright, alright. There’s no need to be defensive.”
“Defensive?” She stared into his eyes. “Of course I’m defensive. Johnny, get me the hell out of here. Now.”
“I’m not sure I can do that,” he said finally.
“What?”
“You heard me,” he said. He looked up into her eyes for the first time in a while. “I’m sorry, Maria. We’ve already lost a fortune on Pritchett’s scheme. I can’t afford to waste time on this right now. Maybe when the frenzy dies down.”
“Waste time?” she said with disbelief.
He nodded. “Well. You knew the risks before you got into this.”
She shrugged. “Yeah. I did.” She stared down at the grubby sleeve of the sweatshirt she’d been wearing since the morning they arrested her. “What about Janey?”
He stared at the door. “What about her?”
“We had a deal.”
“Yeah. And you didn’t deliver.”
“Yeah I did. I’m in custody because of our deal. I’ll probably lose my business because of our deal. I did everything you asked of me.”
He shrugged. “I guess that’s true.”
“You guess? You guess?” Maria said, standing up and leaning over the table. “I want her free in twenty four hours. And I want proof.”
The guard popped his head in the door and glanced at them both.
“Everything’s fine here officer,” Johnny smiled calmly.
The officer seemed satisfied, not even questioning why her actual attorney still hadn’t returned from the john. Maria found herself wondering how many of these cops were on Johnny’s payroll. The door closed again.
“Twenty four hours?” Johnny hissed. “Are you crazy?”