Samara purposefully parked the car several blocks from the Kingdom Corp building. She recognized the look in Beckett’s dark eyes—if he had a chance, he’d try to keep her out of this the same way Frank had commanded her to sit in the car. She’d listened to Frank because that situation was clearly beyond her skill set. This wasn’t.
She shut off the car and turned to him. “Ready?”
“Let’s go.”
She watched him closely as he climbed to his feet, but all evidence that he hadn’t been at full health an hour ago was gone. He didn’t shake or lean, and his pupils were normal. Beckett caught her looking and gave a grim smile. “Do I pass inspection?”
She wanted to say no. To tell him that he definitely needed a shower and a change of clothes and to take a vacation that would get him the hell out of Houston for a while. Samara didn’t say any of it. Every distraction she could offer was just that—a distraction. A Band-Aid on a problem that wasn’t going to go away without a direct confrontation. Even then, she didn’t see how he could combat Lydia’s entrenched position.
“Samara.” Beckett crossed to her in two large steps and pulled her into his arms. “I have it under control. I promise.”
He’d said something to that effect before and ended up drugged and almost murdered. She closed her eyes and leaned her forehead against his chest. This was it. Either she trusted him or she didn’t. “Let’s do this.”
He took her hand, maintaining contact as they turned and started for Kingdom Corp. Samara thought she was ready to face down Lydia, to see justice. But her emotions tangled through her in an indecipherable mess. Rage and sorrow and something akin to hope. She trusted Beckett. She trusted his plan. There was no other option.
What happens if we fail?
She didn’t know, and that scared her most of all.
Security met them at the door. Samara guided Beckett to a stop and lifted her chin. “Max. Jacob. Nice seeing you.”
The guards exchanged a look. Max cleared his throat. “I’m sorry, Ms. Mallick, but we’re under strict instructions to make sure you don’t trespass on the property.”
Damn you, Lydia. “I’m here to speak to Ms. King.”
Another loaded look between them. “We’re going to have to ask you to leave the premises. Immediately.”
“For fuck’s sake, Max, I know your kids’ birthdays. And Jacob, who was it that made sure you were taken care of when you hurt your ankle falling down the stairs?”
Jacob wouldn’t meet her gaze. “With all due respect, Ms. Mallick, you aren’t with the company anymore.”
And that was all that mattered to them. Years of learning details about the various employees to create a better working space in Kingdom Corp and it was all shit the second she stepped out of line. So much waste. Her throat threatened to close and she swallowed hard. “I would think ten years of employment would grant me a single meeting.”
Max lowered his voice. “If you try to make a scene, we’ll be forced to call the police.”
Beckett finally spoke. “That’s a great idea. Why don’t you ring my aunt and let her know that Beckett and Samara are here and we’d be delighted to speak to the authorities about what she’s spent the last week up to—specifically my father.” He sounded charming and totally reasonable, and the two guards didn’t seem to know how to deal with it. They’d prepared for a specific scenario—Samara trying to bully her way back into the building. They hadn’t planned on Beckett being reasonable. Smart man.
He pointed at the deep purple chairs situated near the doors. “Why don’t we wait there while you call up to her? I promise we won’t try to bum rush you.”
Max finally nodded. “Please don’t move from the couch.” He didn’t have any weapons on him aside from a pair of handcuffs, but Samara had little doubt that he’d use them as he deemed necessary.
Since getting wrestled to the floor and cuffed in the middle of the lobby wasn’t on her to-do list today, she let Beckett guide her to the couch. “What if she turns us away?”
“She won’t.”
She could do with some of his confidence right around then. Samara’s knee got to bouncing and she couldn’t force it still. So many things could go wrong. Why hadn’t she thought of those things while they were driving in here and parking? Lydia could refuse to see them. She could have them arrested for trespassing. She could have had them followed while they chased Walter down. If Samara and Frank could follow Walter and Beckett, there was no reason someone couldn’t have been following them.
Round and round her thoughts went, circling until she had to fight to keep from jumping to her feet and yelling for Beckett to run, to get as far from this poisonous place as he could before it seeped into him, too.
“Breathe.” He shifted closer, his thigh pressing the length of hers. His words were barely more than a whisper, designed not to carry beyond the two of them. Not even to the camera currently pointed at them. “Just breathe, Samara. You’re safe.”
She was no safer than he was.
Lydia was hardly the mob, but if she wanted to, she could have them smuggled out of here so she could follow through on her plan to remove Beckett—permanently.
“I have everything under control.” He covered her bouncing knee with his hand. “Trust me.”
“I do trust you. It’s her I don’t trust.” How quickly things had turned around. A week ago, she’d been a confident businesswoman who knew her place in the world and embraced it without reservation. She knew there was an ugly underside to her job, but she’d never thought it was this ugly. Questionable—and maybe a little illegal—activities were a far cry from murder.
Jacob walked to them, looking like he’d eaten something sour. “I’ll take you up.”
Beckett squeezed her knee and rose. He gave her a reassuring look that did nothing to calm the fears inside her clamoring that something terrible was about to happen. She kept her back straight and her chin lifted and tried to keep her fear off her face. It was all she was capable of at that point. Trust Beckett. Trust that he knows what he’s doing.
“Not too late for you to turn back,” he murmured.
And leave him to face this alone? “No. I’m going up.”
“Okay.”
Then they stepped into the elevator and it was too late to change her mind.
Beckett could feel little shakes working their way through Samara’s body, but she kept her eyes pinned on the back of the guard in front of them. He’d hedged his bets as best he could going into this confrontation, but despite his reassurances, he didn’t know beyond a shadow of a doubt that things would play out like he’d planned.
The elevator doors opened and they followed the security guard into the hallway. It didn’t look any different from the last time Beckett had been there, but it felt different. Menacing. Cold. Filled with the promise of violence.
The guard—Jacob—stepped aside and positioned himself with his back to the wall next to Lydia’s office door. “Go ahead.” He didn’t have a weapon on him, but he had the feel of a solider protecting his commanding officer.
Beckett touched the small of Samara’s back and they walked through the door together. Lydia sat behind her desk, looking every inch a queen in her white pantsuit, flanked on either side by Journey and Anderson. Journey looked like she hadn’t slept in days, and he had a moment of regret that he might be the cause of it with all the government-contract bullshit. On the other side, Anderson was her polar opposite, from his blue eyes and dark hair right down to how well rested and alert he looked. His suit was perfectly unwrinkled, and if he’d been on a plane that day, there was no evidence of it.
He came.
No time for relief—not yet. He had to play this exactly right.
Beckett shut the door behind them. He had no intention of sitting or getting comfortable. The only advantage he had was driving this dialogue from the first moment. He strode to the desk and leaned on its surface with his fists, imposing himself into her space. “Next time you want someone dead, Lydia, you should send someone more capable than Walter Trissel. It may have worked for my father, but as you can see, I’m still among the living.”
Anderson’s eyes widened in recognition, the only outward reaction any of the three Kings had. Lydia sighed. “Wonderful, Beckett.” She clapped mockingly. “Very dramatic. Now, if you’re done wasting my time—”
“Let me tell you how this is going to go.” He leaned down, lowering his voice and getting in her face a little. “I’m going to offer you the same deal I gave Walter. You leave Houston, Texas, the country, and you don’t come back. You sign away Kingdom Corp to your children, release Thistledown Villa back to me, and take a small stipend to live off. And you never come back, Lydia.”
No emotion showed on her face, not even a flicker. “I’m sure you’re going to enlighten me on why I’m supposedly doing these things.”
“Because if you don’t, I’m taking this to the media.” He took out his phone and pressed the button to start the recording. He never took his eyes from her face as Walter named her, as he admitted to putting Nathaniel behind the wheel that night…Beckett fast-forwarded to where Walter outlined his plan to kill Beckett. He hit the button to stop it, leaving strained silence in its wake.
She tapped a red nail on her polished desk. “Ravings of a madman. It will never hold up in court.”
“It doesn’t have to. I’m not taking you to court, Aunt.” He spoke softly, almost gently. “I’m going to release it publicly and let things fall where they will. This might not be enough for a criminal conviction, but it’s more than enough to turn the public against you and create a scandal the likes of which you’ve never seen. You know as well as I do that scandals make business partners nervous. How long before your shareholders start abandoning Kingdom Corp in waves? You’ll lose key employees like rats from a sinking ship. Your contracts won’t be renewed. You’ll be left in this empty building, lamenting about the days when you were almost competition for Morningstar Enterprise.”
Something akin to panic took root in her hazel eyes. “You’re bluffing. You would never do that to your cousins.”
Beckett leaned back and crossed his arms over his chest. “Anderson. Journey. You and your other two siblings are more than welcome to jobs at Morningstar. I can offer you comparable shares and salary matching what you’ve got now, in addition to the promise that any children you have will continue to hold positions within the company—as they should have before our family split.”
Journey’s jaw dropped, but Anderson just looked contemplative. Lydia shoved to her feet. “Don’t you dare.”
Beckett kept going. “If you’d come after my company legitimately, then we wouldn’t be having this conversation. But you resorted to murder, and just kept digging yourself deeper from there. You want your legacy to live on in Kingdom Corp? Then sign it over to your children and leave. Or stay and watch everything you’ve sacrificed for come down brick by brick.” He paused. “Like you wanted to do to me and Morningstar.”
She went pale. “Why even offer me a choice at all?”
“I’m not you. I won’t sink to your level.” And I know you’ll live the rest of your life in misery because you’ve been cut off from the only things that matter to you—your legacy and your children. Exile was crueler than death, crueler than grinding her company to dust. Lydia had proven herself more than capable of starting from scratch. If Kingdom Corp went under, she’d find a way forward. The only route to justice lay in the one he’d just spelled out for her. “Choose, Lydia. This is the only time I’m going to make this offer.”
He saw the exact moment she realized she had no recourse. He’d already emailed a copy of the recording to himself and Frank, so destroying his phone wouldn’t do anything. She could fight a criminal charge, but not a conviction of public opinion. She couldn’t even play on his honorable streak, because he’d offered his cousins a convenient way out.
“You bastard.”
“Not according to my mother.”
She curled her top lip. “That bitch—”
“That’s enough.” This from Samara where she’d stood as silent witness. She moved forward with eyes only for Lydia. “You’re outmaneuvered and you know it. Take his offer gracefully or don’t do it at all. I won’t stand here while you insult his dead mother. You’re better than that, Lydia.” She shook her head. “Or at least I thought you were. I thought you were better than a lot of things. Apparently I was wrong.”
Anderson stepped forward, putting himself in front of his mother. “She’ll take the offer.”
“But, I—”
“Stop speaking, Mother. You’ve done enough damage.” He turned those cold eyes on Beckett and then Samara. “I’ll have the paperwork drawn up today and she’ll be on a flight out Monday.”
“She’ll be on a flight out tomorrow,” Beckett corrected. “This offer expires in twenty-four hours. If Lydia is still within Houston limits at that point of time, I’m releasing the tape.”
“Consider it done.”
He ignored Lydia’s sputtering. Through all this, she’d become something larger than life, looming over his every move. Anticipating. Now, standing here in the pale light of her office, she was just a bitter and angry woman. Beckett took two steps back and gave her one last look. “You should have been happy with what you had.”
“Morningstar was never supposed to be his, and it sure as hell was never supposed to be yours.”
This is what thirty years of spite looks like.
He shook his head. “Have a nice life, Lydia. If you ever set foot in this city again, I’ll personally see you and everything you’ve ever touched burned to ash.” Beckett turned and, after letting Samara precede him, walked through the door.
Journey stared at the closed door, barely able to process the turn of events. Distantly, she was aware of her mother cursing, the legendary calm cracked beyond repair, but all she could focus on was how at peace Samara and Beckett had looked. There were no ghosts riding them, fear wasn’t making this choice for them. He’d faced down one of the scariest people Journey knew without flinching, and he’d walked out with a solid win.
I could learn a thing or two from Beckett King.
“This is unforgivable.”
She moved to the chair on the other side of the desk and sank into it, her legs not quite steady. Truth be told, they hadn’t been steady since Anderson arrived a few hours ago bringing warnings that Beckett was up to something. Bringing warnings to Journey. Not to their mother.
He stood against Lydia’s wrath, a solid pillar of stone, the one person who grounded their entire family no matter what the world tried to throw at them. Lydia moved as if to sweep everything off her desk, and Anderson caught her wrist. “That’s enough, Mother.”
Her expression went slack for the space of a breath, and then rearranged into rage. “You’re just going to roll over and let him do this. You’re going to sentence me to exile.”
“You did this.” He released her hand but didn’t move back. “You went after him clumsily and now you’re paying the price.” Anderson shook his head. “Now it’s up to me to clean up your mess. Again.”
Lydia sneered. “You’re not even attempting to pretend you’re unhappy about this turn of events. You’ve wanted me out of the way for years.”
Journey could almost see her mother working her way down the manipulation checklist. Hurt, check. Guilt, check. Anger, check. Journey would have cracked before now, but Anderson stood strong against the waves of emotion. “Sit down.”
“I will not.” Lydia turned on her heel and strode out of the office.
Anderson sighed and grabbed his phone. “Hey Jacob, I’m going to need you to guide my mother to the room on this floor…Yes, that one. Thank you.”
As if on cue, a screech sounded from farther down the hall. Journey twisted to look at him. “You just ordered our mother restrained.”
“If left to her own devices, she’d grab the first gun she came across and go hunt down Beckett to finish the job she ordered Walter Trissel to do.” Anderson checked his phone and nodded to himself. “She’s secure.” He turned those blue eyes, so like their father’s, on her. “How are you holding up?”
This was the brother she knew, not the cold bastard who’d stood there and dealt with Beckett. Journey gave him a wobbly smile. “About as well as can be expected.”
He walked over and crouched down next to her chair. “I’ll see us through this, Jo. I promise.”
Just like he’d promised so many things in the past. For the first time since her father called and her mother fired her best friend, Journey managed something resembling a smile. “I know you will.” She let the expression drop—it was too much effort to maintain. “You’re really going to do what he wants.”
“Yes.” He gave her a tight smile. “We should probably send our cousin a gift basket this Christmas for doing us the favor of removing our mother.”
Journey shook her head, because there was nothing to say to that. Dysfunctional parent-child relationships dominated the King family, and their branch was no exception. “What happens now?”
“Now, Jo…Now, we prepare for what comes next.”