Chapter Thirty
“What are we watching?”
Reed had his unwelcome partner park up the street from a mail center. “I managed to acquire a credit card number from Sasha. It was sent here.”
Rick peered out the window. “What makes you think she’s ever coming back?”
“She might not, but until she uses the card, it’s all I have to go on.”
“How often have you been sitting here?”
“Whenever I wasn’t with Lori. And when I was, I had a colleague helping out.”
“I thought you said you didn’t like partners.”
“Colleague, not a partner.”
“How sure are you that she works for Petrov?”
The question made his head itch. “She knew of Petrov . . . and she knew of the person who hired me.”
“So she’s good at what she does.”
“Yes.”
“How soon will we hear from your contacts with the fingerprints?” Reed told them about the wineglass and cell phone.
“Takes a day to run through the database. The fact she had the card sent here points in the direction that she might be local.”
“That was my guess, too.”
Rick looked at the military-style watch on his arm, the kind that screamed waterproof, had a compass, and due to the size of the thing could probably be eaten as an MRE.
“I take it you’re not the patient sort.”
“I don’t like sitting when I could be doing.” He reached for the handle on the door.
“What are you doing?”
Rick popped the trunk, put something in his pocket, and winked as he walked past the car and into the storefront mail spot.
Twenty minutes later, he waltzed out of the building, tucked behind the steering wheel, and turned the engine over.
“Where are we going?”
“Food. I’m hungry.”
“What did you do?”
Rick did a U-turn in the middle of the street and drove back the way they’d come. He removed his cell phone from his pocket and opened a screen.
Reed couldn’t help but laugh. “You managed to put in a camera in only twenty minutes?”
“No, I did it in ten, but I needed to open a mailbox, and that took a few more.”
“You guys are good.”
“We like our toys,” Rick told him.
“Who else can see this?”
“Headquarters.”
“You sound like you’re in the CIA.”
Rick cringed. “No, thank you. I can’t stand paperwork. Private security offers us the opportunity to work without red tape.”
“How many people do you provide private security for?”
Rick snickered. “Why? Looking for a new job?”
Reed stared out the window as the world sped by and didn’t answer the question.
Late, hungover, and really happy she wasn’t due in court, Lori inched into her office with dark sunglasses covering her bloodshot eyes.
She sat in her pool of self-pity and bathed in alcohol and carbohydrates for twenty-four straight hours. Now she was determined to push the man who had all but taken over her life for months over the edge and let him go.
“Coffee,” she told Liana as she walked by the reception desk. “Nothing but emergency calls today. Reschedule my meetings. Tell them I’m ill.”
“Wow, you look like crap.”
“It’s a good thing I like you,” she said as she walked away.
It took over an hour and two cups of coffee before Lori could read one e-mail and make sense of it. She and Avery had taken the man-bashing train long and hard, while Sam had gotten off by seven in the evening to get to work on the problem. Lori would have felt guilty for pushing the problem off for an entire day if not for Sam’s continued support of her plight. We’ve all been there. Take a day or two, then put on those big girl panties and let’s get to work.
“Lori?” her secretary quietly called her from the door. “Sam is on the line. Should I have her call back?”
The blinking button on the phone caught her eye. “I got it.”
“Good morning,” Lori answered.
“How is that headache?”
“Befitting the occasion, I’m afraid.”
“Lots of water.”
It hurt to smile. “You didn’t call to give me hangover tips.”
“Right. I hope you freed up your day.”
“I have.”
“Good. Let’s start pulling files. I need you tell me what the time frame was between acquisitions of our payees to when they saw and signed the contracts.”
Lori wrote a note. “Why?”
“It’s been brought to my attention that if we had our brides and grooms signing contracts within a week or less of seeing the contracts, the agreements may come into question, since you represented both parties.”
“I didn’t always represent both parties.”
“Then those cases don’t apply. Just pull the ones where you were the only legal counsel.”
Lori saw the connection and possible problem through the fog in her brain. “Since when did you become a paralegal?”
“Someone brought this to my attention.”
Lori didn’t even ask. “Let me know if that someone needs a job. I’ll get on this. Have you spoken with Shannon?”
“Carter has called Paul and is arranging a meeting.” Carter was the preceding governor of California before Paul took office. His marriage to Eliza, Sam’s right hand in Alliance before she became first lady of the state, was how Paul learned of Alliance in the first place.
“Fine, you speak with Paul, I’m calling Shannon.”
“Talk soon.”
Lori left a message on Shannon’s cell and let her secretary know to patch the call through when she returned it.
For the next three hours, Lori pulled files and placed them in three boxes. At risk, a week or more, and second representation.
Reed was prepared to disappear for a while to find Sasha. With the intervention of Neil and Rick, that didn’t pan out. Researching anything online or making calls while in his apartment, however, was out of the question. There was no way in hell Rick and his people didn’t help themselves to placing bugs in his space. And until the threat against Lori was over, he was fine with it. He deserved the invasion of his privacy. He was equally sure his Jeep was on the radar. But that didn’t stop him from finding the bugs and learning their capabilities.
When his phone rang at six in the morning, four hours after he’d gone to bed, he was surprised they’d given him that much time to sleep.
Only it wasn’t the Rick and Neil team that called.
“You’re an asshole.” It was Avery.
He rubbed his eyes and sat up in bed. “I know.”
“You should be castrated and strung up naked in the town square where mounds of fire ants can feed off you for months.”
“Oh, wow, you’ve given this some thought.” And now the image was stuck in his head like an earworm.
“You broke her heart.”
That image hurt more.
“I know.”
Avery paused.
“We’re plotting your demise.”
He needed coffee. “A slow and painful one, from the sound of it.”
“A deserving one.”
She said nothing for a moment.
“You know what really bites, Reed?”
No, but I’m sure you’re going to tell me. “What?”
“We liked you. We all really liked you.”
He needed Jack Daniel’s in his coffee. He heard his mother’s voice in his head. If you’re sorry, say it, mean it, own it, and do something about it!
“I am sorry.”
“Really?” She didn’t sound convinced.
“More than you know.”
“Then prove it!”
She hung up without hearing his reply.
“I will.”
“How close are you?” Ruslan made each word sound like a command with the thickness of his accent.
“I’ve engaged. I will have what you need by the end of the week.”
“Irrevocable evidence, my dear. Not gossip or speculation.”
“I’m working on it. All my bait is sitting in wait until someone bites. And they will bite.”
Ruslan looked out over the cold, gray skies of London. “These are not people you have the opportunity to frame twice.”
“I understand that.”
“Until the end of the week.”
He disconnected the call as the clouds opened up and gave in to the rain. “Patience,” he told himself. He’d come this far, he wasn’t about to pounce without the guarantee his plan was moving forward.
“What do we have?” Sam sat across from Lori with stacks of files.
“Let’s start with the core players.”
Sam turned one of the files around. “What am I looking at?”
“Avery and Bernie. Our first contact with Avery was six months before Bernie showed up. We wrote up the prenuptial, presented it to Avery, made a couple of adjustments. No second attorney was brought in. Avery signed it two weeks after the final draft.”
“And they took two months to plan the wedding.”
“Right. So there isn’t any loophole for their agreement to be voided. Now, here is Shannon and Paul.” Lori pulled another file out, this one thicker. “No second attorney, and the agreement was signed within five days of presenting it to Shannon.”
“That’s because Shannon’s family ran in the same circles as Paul. It wasn’t a stretch that they could have known each other and fallen in love.”
“Doesn’t matter. This could be a sticky one,” Lori said. “If Shannon wanted to dispute the agreement, say she didn’t have time to properly go over it before signing it . . .”
“Shannon wouldn’t do that.”
“No, I don’t think so either,” Lori said. “But if she did, we would have a problem. Especially now that there is no safety net for litigation if a case like this was thrown into court.”
Sam took that in and looked down at the third file. “Trina and Fedor.”
“Yes. Not only were we the only representation, the agreement was signed within three days, and their marriage took place within two weeks.”
“Sticky.”
“Considering the payer is dead and can’t deny or confirm anything if someone brought this to court. This could end up in court for years if Ruslan or Alice’s surviving relatives attempt to void Alice’s will based on a fraudulent marriage between Trina and Fedor.” Lori’s blood chilled.
Sam’s lips pushed together. “What are all these?”
Lori attempted a grin. “Starting with your marriage to Blake . . . here are all the files of players we don’t need to worry about. Although you and Blake were married three days after the contract was signed, you had separate attorneys.”
Sam offered half a smile. “So these are good.”
“Yep. And in this pile are the cases with only me on file as representation, where the contracts were signed eight days or longer from when they were presented.”
“All good?”
“Yep.”
Sam laid her hand over a dozen other folders. “And these?”
“At risk. Easily rectified if we were to have them re-sign or make a small change to their current contract. So, after going through the files, I have some good news and the bad news.”
“I’m listening.”
“The good news is, Alliance doesn’t have to take the fall.”
“I don’t see how that’s possible,” Sam said.
Lori pointed to her chest. “I do. I’m the one that will be brought before the bar. An investigation will shut down my practice—”
“Absolutely not.”
“We don’t want Alliance blown open.”
“We will lock it down tight.”
Lori waved a hand at the files. “Every one of those cases are public record.”
Sam picked her file out of the pile. “The only thing public about this one was my wedding.” She grabbed several others. “All of these are happy marriages. As for the rest, we tackle the current cases first. Have them re-sign.”
“And the others?” Lori asked.
“Nothing. Don’t act guilty of anything . . . we’re not. Nothing here was illegal.”
“Lawyers are brought up on ethics. We seldom break the law.” And that was where Lori was screwed.
“We know Petrov is after Trina . . . that is the case we need to focus on and do our best to make sure no one ever finds out the truth behind Fedor and Trina’s marriage. Carter is having lunch with Paul today.”
“And Shannon made it clear she had no intention of making any further claim to Paul.” Lori started to pace.
“It’s only right I take the fall if it comes to—”
“Sit down, Lori. No one is going to fall.”
Lori was leading with emotion, while Sam was deducing from the facts. In the back of her head, all she could think of was how none of this would have been brought up had she not gotten so close to Reed and said too much.