Page 61 of Winning Bid

“I want to prove him wrong and make him eat crow. The problem is, I don't know how to do that. He thinks he has solid, incontrovertible evidence against you. And it is hard to convince Elliott West of anything that he doesn't want to believe.”

I shrug. “That makes this easy then.”

“What's that?”

“All we have to do is break into the office and steal evidence that I didn't know what was going on.”

He laughs for a moment. But then he sees my serious face. “Please tell me you're joking.”

“I am not in a joking mood.”

“June, we have somehow managed to get over on the law a lot. We have broken … at this point, I've lost track of how many laws. Breaking into your office is not going to be easy, and there's going to be a lot of evidence that we broke in. Key logs, witnesses and that’s to say nothing of video footage. I'm not sure how you plan to get around that. But I don't really want to go to jail over something that mundane, do you?”

“Obviously not. But after working for Andre for a few months, there are certain things that I know. For one, he doesn't have cameras on his floors in the building. He prefers to be able to come and go as he wants and not let anybody know. So that's not really much of an issue. Key logs could be a problem. But I can also lie and say that I forgot something that I needed to grab. So shouldn't be that much of an issue. Witnesses? At this time of night, we're probably talking about cleaning staff and only the most dedicated lawyers and paralegals who might still be in the building?—"

“Wait, you're talking about going there now?”

I nod. “What better time to clear my name with your father than now?”

His eyes go wide, and his mouth opens and closes a few times, like a fish. “You're serious?”

“I don't want your father to have any excuses to hate me any more than he already does. He's back to giving you ultimatums about us, and I don't plan to let that stand, do you?”

Anderson takes a breath while staring at the ground. “No. But there has to be another way.”

“What other way? Either we find evidence and rub his nose in it. Or he makes life incredibly difficult for both of us. Those are the choices in front of us right now. Neither is good. But short of leaving the country, there is nothing else we can do.” I rest my hands on his chest and look up at him. “And to be honest, as much as I love the idea of leaving the country and never coming back, I also relish the idea of making Elliott West eat his words. If I go to prison, I would love to have that memory for the rest of my life.”

He smiles down at me. “That shouldn't be as hot as it sounds, but. It is.”

I giggle and pull him down for a kiss. Strange to think of how things started with us. In school, he had been the bane of my existence. Now, I can't get enough of the feel of his mouth on me. Our fleeting kiss turns into a full makeout session. His hand snakes into my trench coat, cupping my breast to elicit a moan out of me. Regretfully, I push him back.

“As much as I like where you're headed with that, we have things to do, and we are in a public place with, I'm sure, plenty of cameras.”

He grins with the devil in his eyes. “Are you sure you're not punishing me a little bit too?”

“How so?”

“Getting me going like that and then telling me to stop.”

I roll my eyes at him. “Come on, we have an office building to break into.”

As I start to walk around the car, he has my hand still. And he hasn't taken a step. “What evidence?”

“What are you talking about?”

“You said you want to break into the office building and get evidence that you didn't know anything. But what evidence would that even be?”

I smile. “See, I'm more clever than you think. I've spent weeks on this project for Andre. Don't you think that if I had seen your father's name attached to any of the companies, it would have been a red flag for me?”

“So you truly had no idea.”

“None. I imagine a lot of your father's involvement has shell corporations between him and the actual companies.”

He huffs a laugh. “That's not possible. He's on their boards. Board members have to be listed publicly, right?”

It sucks, but he has a point. “Then the only reason that I haven't seen him on their board member listings is he's using a pseudonym.”

“Is that even possible? I don't do tax law.”

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