by Tia Siren
His hand came down onto my arm, and he whipped me around. His eyes connected with mine as he pulled my body to his, and for a split second, I saw fear rage behind his eyes. Something was plaguing Grant that he was afraid of, and I lifted my hand to cup his cheek. His eyes fluttered shut, nuzzling into the palm of my hand. For the first time since I’d met him, he was showing me his vulnerability.
Something had happened to him, and he couldn’t talk about it.
“What’s going on, Grant?” I asked. “What’s raging in that mind?”
“You’re going to hate me if I tell you,” he said.
I pulled my arm from his grasp and cupped both of his cheeks. I pulled his lips down to mine, tasting the wine and feeling the trembling he was trying to desperately keep at bay. Someone had hurt my Grant. Someone had done something to him, and if I had anything to do with it, they would pay.
“Try me,” I whispered.
He took my hand and led me back to the kitchen table. He sat me down in my seat before he picked up the folder, sitting down in the chair next to me as he handed it over.
“I figured out what’s going on with the company,” he said.
“Holy shit. You did? What the fuck’s going on?”
I opened the folder and saw the first few pages. Things were highlighted and circled, and my eyes fluttered over them as I pushed my plate out of the way. Numbers and calculations that didn’t match up, insane amounts of money taken out with insurance for a deal that was obviously set up to go south. I.P. addresses skimming money off the top of everyone’s budgets.
Holy shit, I bet it was Dylan. That fucking asshole was a creep of the highest order. It wouldn't surprise me one fucking bit if this damn I.P. address led straight to his fucking desk. He was a greedy motherfucker who took whatever he thought he was entitled to, and he would be the kind of person that would take money he thought he was owed.
I ran the calculations in my head and realized the numbers given to us with regard to the company acquisition were inflated by more than eighty percent. My eyes scanned the accounts that had been skimmed from dating back months. I saw the additions of the money in the margins and realized they matched up within one-hundred thousand dollars of the money the company would make if they bought out Tike Oils.
But that didn’t make sense, did it?
“It makes sense,” Grant said.
“Someone’s embezzling from the company and planning to replace it?” I asked.
“Yep,” he said.
I continued shuffling through the pages. I started coming across numbers and names I didn’t recognize. Names assigned to the I.P. addresses that were being tracked. They all had the same name, “J&Mtech.” I guessed those were probably the work computers assigned to everyone in the building.
But there was one address that didn’t have that name.
And the I.P. address matched the one I’d seen earlier as being the one skimming off the top.
“‘A.M.House’?” I asked.
So it wasn’t Dylan?
Slowly, the pieces began to fall into place. I threw the folder onto the table and stood up from my seat, feeling Grant rise slowly beside me. This couldn’t be right. Something was wrong with the information he’d been presented. Paul had mixed something up, or accounting didn’t get something right.
This shit was wrong somehow. It had to be.
“Crissy—”
“My father isn’t fucking stealing from his own damn company, Grant.”
“He is, Crissy. It’s him.”
“No, it’s not,” I said. “There’s a mistake. A fault in the chain. Someone’s trying to cover up their tracks, and they’re blaming my father. He would never do that to you. To the company he built with his own fucking hands alongside my dead mother!”
I knew I was shrieking. I knew tears were pouring down my face. I stumbled away from the kitchen table, and Grant tried to reach for me, but all I did was pull away from him. I flashed my eyes toward him, and I saw the concern tumbling behind them. I backed away, like I’d gotten too close to a fire that was about to sear me to the bone.
He didn’t bring me here to tell me he loved me.
He brought me here to accuse my father of being a thief.
“The thief’s I.P. address is always the same,” he said.
“Shut up.”
“They all point back to a laptop that had been smuggled into the building,” he said.
“Shut up, Grant.”
“The money matches exactly,” he said. “And the insurance policy? Taken out by your father, and it can only be paid out to your father. Not to accounting, like it needs to be.”
“Shut the fuck up!”
I’d just repaired things with my father. I’d heard for the first time that he was truly proud of the person I’d turned into. I was fucking a man who was about to accuse him of something that would send him to jail for years, just when I’d finally started to get him back.
My vision began to tunnel as I stumbled for my coat. I could hear Grant behind me, but I swung around and backed into the wall. I held my hand out as tears flooded down my cheeks. My chest was heaving and my mind was racing.
All signs pointed to my father embezzling.
But I knew that wasn’t him.
“But he…was going to replace it,” I said.
“Then cash in once the deal went south with the insurance claim,” Grant said.
“Something’s wrong,” I whispered. “He...he wouldn’t.”
The wine bubbled up in my throat. I felt Grant’s eyes on me, and for the first time, I didn’t want his stare. I didn’t want his attention or his love or his affections.
I wanted him gone.
I wanted to be alone.
I opened the door and stepped out onto the porch. His hand came back down on my wrist, but I wrenched away from him. I fell down the steps, scraping myself on the cement below, and I heard Grant scramble down just before I got to my feet.
“Let…me…go!” I screamed.
“Crissy, you’re bleeding. Let me clean you up.”
“Stay the fuck away from me,” I said.
“Crissy.”
“Shut up, Grant!”
“Miss Marks!”
“You don’t get to call me that anymore!”
I slammed myself into my car, threw it into reverse, and sped away. I was infuriated. My father couldn’t have done this. There was no way. Not without a good reason. I was pissed, having to choose between siding with the man I loved and siding with my father, who I’d just gotten back. Tears clouded my vision as I raced home, my car bobbing and weaving between the lanes. I wasn’t sure how I got back in one piece, but when I barreled through the front door, I heard my dad and Mel arguing.
“But you promised, Alex!”
“Sweetheart, we just have to wait a little longer,” he said. “Then you can have whatever size you want.”
“You promised me a bigger boat last year,” she said, pouting.
“And you’ll get it, honey. I promise. Remember how I promised you the night I proposed? A bigger ring than I’d gotten you and a bigger boat than I had.”
“You always do this,” she fumed. “You always tell me all the things I want to hear before never going through with them. Alex Marks, you’re a fucking liar!”
“We just need to wait until I get my annual bonus,” he said. “That entire check is allocated to the boat. I swear to you, darling. It’ll be paid outright, and the keys will be in your hand the next day.”
“They better be,” Mel said. “Otherwise, why the hell did I marry you?”
I sat on the steps as they continued to fight. I listened from my perch as Mel bled my father for everything he was worth, and there was an inkling of doubt that swirled around in my mind. Could Grant have been right? Could my father actually be stealing from the company? It was hard to digest, hard to swallow. It was hard to imagine my father not being able to financially fend for himself.
But as I listened to Mel pry th
e credit card from my father’s wallet and storm from the house, I heard the sound of his defeated sigh as my phone began to vibrate in my hand.
Somewhere in the back of my mind, I knew Grant was right.
Chapter 37
Grant
I couldn’t focus on anything pertaining to work. All I could focus on was last night. Things didn’t go well at all with Crissy, and to top it all off, I was pretty sure she had ended things last night between us. The words weren’t explicit, but what she said suggested she no longer wanted to engage in our games. I couldn’t blame her. I tried to make the dinner perfect and have all the information at her disposal because I knew she wouldn’t be able to separate herself emotionally from what was happening.
Hell, I’d been in the business world for three fucking decades, and I was still having a hard time separating myself from this.
I called her twice last night before I finally gave up. My heart ached for her, but I knew what I had to do. I knew cornering her father and addressing this head-on would solidify that she wasn’t mine anymore, but I could no longer allow her father to steal from me and rob this company blind. He’d already stolen close to one million dollars, and he was about to commit the closest thing he could to insurance fraud.
I had to figure out what the fuck was going on in his mind.
Crissy was sitting at her desk, but she wouldn’t look up at me. Instead of having her headset on, she had her earbuds in, meaning I’d have to walk out there if I needed her. She was angry. I got that, but this was still a professional environment. She was still my personal assistant, and I would still need to ask her for things every now and again.
But right now, I needed to call Alex.
I picked up the phone and dialed his office, asking him if he could come see me. He told me he’d be there in a few minutes, and I took the time to set all the papers out on my desk. I ordered them and laid them out so he could plainly see them. Then I stood and buttoned my suit coat. This was going to be a difficult morning, and if it panned out the way I thought, I would lose both my best friend and the woman I’d fallen in love with.
And there was nothing I could do about it.
“Hey there, Grant,” he said as he walked in. “What’s up?”
“Come here a second. I need you to take a look at a few things.”
He came over, and his eyes started scanning the papers. I looked up and saw I had Crissy’s attention, the earbuds now discarded as she tried to get her headset on. She pressed the intercom button, ringing out a dial tone into the room, but I shut her off completely. The look on her face grew from confusion to panic, and my heart sank to my toes.
I wanted to throw my arms around her and tell her it was going to be all right, but I couldn’t. So, I controlled the situation the only way I knew I could.
“Keep your voice down,” I said. “Your daughter doesn’t need to hear any of this.”
“What the fuck is all this?” he asked.
“Don’t play stupid with me, Alex. It’s all plain and clear. You’ve been caught, both with the skimming and with the insurance claim on the company acquisition. What the hell were you thinking?”
“What the hell was I thinking?” he asked. “Grant, you’re screwing my fucking daughter.”
“Excuse me?” I asked. “Most of these transactions were made well before Crissy came to work here.”
“I followed the two of you down to New Orleans,” he said. “I saw you two cuddling up to one another, wrapping your hands around her on the fucking balcony. What kind of sick man are you?”
“I’m going to ask you one more time before I have your job and escort you out in handcuffs. Why the fuck are you stealing from this company? A company you built with your own two hands?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “How could you fucking touch my damn daughter with your two fucking hands?”
“Did you throw Crissy in my path to distract me?” I asked.
“What?”
“Your daughter’s beautiful,” I said. “We all know this. She was a hellion when she came here, and you knew if I took her on as a mentor, she’d be a distraction. Did you lure her here in an attempt to sway my attention elsewhere?”
“I’d never fucking do that with my own daughter, you monster,” he said.
“Then what’s going on? I know you, Alex. You not only skimmed this money, but you had plans to pay it back—with the income we’d make in the first month on the acquisition and merger. It’s all here in the paperwork. Take a deep breath and look before you say something I can no longer unhear.”
His eyes were raging, and I could tell Crissy was on the edge of her seat. She was standing at her desk, hunched over like she was working, but I knew what she was doing. She was poising herself to go after her father. To run after him and make sure he was all right. She was a wonderful woman and a fabulous daughter, and I’d run Alex into the ground if he used her as a pawn in all this.
I’d have his fucking head over it.
“Shit,” he breathed.
“Alex, what’s going on? I have proof, but it’s also proof that can go away.”
That caught his attention, and he panned his tear-lined eyes to me. I realized then just how tired he looked. How drained and worn down his eyes were. How dark the bags underneath them were. How many wrinkles had deepened on his face. My best friend was struggling. So much so that he was robbing his own company and trying to make bad business deals so he could make even more.
“Are you in trouble, Alex?” I asked.
“No.”
“Are you sick? Is Mel all right?”
“No,” he said.
“What was that ‘no’ for?” I asked.
Raking his hands through his hair, he turned his back to me. His eyes connected with Crissy’s, and I saw her react. She stood to her feet and looked her father straight in the eye before she came around her desk. I had my eyes locked on her, wondering if she would burst into the room and defend him at any moment.
It was what I expected her to do.
But instead, she twirled her finger, just like I’d done to her so many times.
At that moment, I realized the strength she possessed as a woman, and my heart soared at having been able to have her in my life.
“No, I didn’t put Crissy in your path to distract you,” he began. “But things with Mel aren’t all right.”
“Is she sick, Alex?” I asked.
“No. Fuck, nothing like that,” he said. “She just…”
“Alex, fucking talk to me. Let me help. Let me in. I’ve known you for years. We run this fucking company together, hand in hand. What is so fucking bad that you can’t just tell me? That you’d risk life in jail for?”
“She won’t stop spending my damn money, Grant!” he said, his shoulders slumping.
Tears poured from my friend’s eyes as he flopped down into a chair. His face crinkled, and my eyes widened. I wasn’t sure I’d heard him right.
He had risked all this because Mel couldn’t stop spending money?
I sat down in my chair as Alex openly wept in my office. Crissy pressed her hand to the window, her soul reaching out for her father while she silently begged me for answers. I wanted to wrap this up so I could tell her. I wanted to take her in my arms and tell her it was going to be all right. I wanted to tell her how much I loved her and how proud I was of her ability to emotionally separate herself from all this.
But I had to pull shit out of Alex first.
“I’m two months away from declaring bankruptcy, Grant,” he said, shaking his head. “We’ll lose the cars, the house. My daughters won’t have anywhere to live. We won’t fucking be able to rent a six-hundred-dollar apartment somewhere, let alone live the way she wants to.”
“What is she buying?” I asked. “What could she possibly want?”
“First, the engagement ring I bought her wasn’t big enough, so we upgraded. Then there was the gigantic wedding and the month-long, fully-loaded honeymoon. T
hen I promised her a massive boat one night while I was drunk, but I had to sell the boat we had in order to afford the down payment. Then it was the pink Mercedes convertible and the renovations to the house. The extravagant vacations she went on without me because I couldn’t afford to take the time off work. She’s bleeding me dry, and no matter how many times we fight about it, she just won’t fucking stop.”
“So you started taking from the company in hopes that…?”
“That I could get her to eventually stop. So I could keep a roof over our heads and get the bills paid. Food on the table and shit. Hell, at this point, my own damn daughter’s got more spending money than I do. I literally cannot afford my own wife anymore.”
“So you thought you could steal from the company if you eventually had a way to repay it,” I said.
“Just to pay the bills, Grant. And keep her from fucking leaving. I can’t do this without her. She’s my life. Had you not fucking swooped in on your white horse and taken my company from me, I wouldn’t even be in this situation, you greedy bastard. And now you’ve got your paws on my fucking daughter. Don’t think I’ve left that behind.”
“Alex, your company would’ve gone under had it not been for me. My money and my expertise and my ability to take on debt grew this company so you had money to embezzle in the first place. If you needed money, all you had to do was ask.”
“Oh, like you would’ve just loaned me fucking four hundred thousand dollars,” he said.
“I would’ve. In a heartbeat, considering the financial issues you’re hitting. We’re not talking about repossessing a car, Alex. We’re talking about you losing your fucking house.”
“You think I don’t know that?” he spat. “You think I don’t know the bullshit web I’ve weaved for myself? You don’t think I’m aware of the bed I’ve made?”
“Then take responsibility for it,” I said.
“Then it’s about damn time you took responsibility for your own actions,” he said. “I could have the board throw you out of your fucking post in this company if word got out you were screwing the former owner’s daughter.”
“It doesn’t matter anyway, Alex,” I said. “I have to fire you. This is serious, and because of the people it took to dig into all this, I’m not the only one who knows. It’ll leak eventually if I keep you on staff, and the revelation will take this entire company down with it.”