Page 126 of Desolation

“I’m not going to tell her to lie.”

He sighs. “Can you please just do this? Jackson and Mark were just going to carry you out. I am asking.”

“Whatever,” I say, not caring how immature it sounds.

I head over to the couch and stare out the window. I sit for hours not caring about sleep. I watch the sun begin to set when Mark walks over and tells me to eat. I ignore him. My head, a tornado of thoughts. My life falling apart in my hands.

“She’s awake,” Jackson says.

I stand in the doorway of the room and I know she can’t see me. I’m shrouded by the team of Cole Security and their extra large frames.

But I can hear everything. And every word she speaks makes me feel more weak.

She says at the New Year’s Gala, Michael’s brother came to her and said it was best she not look into anything. He said I wasn’t capable of figuring anything out but he knew Rebecca was smarter than most gave her credit for.

She kept that conversation a secret from me for six months. When more money appeared in the account, she reached out to Michael’s brother again but he told her nothing. She began to research the companies, dig into their past.

She found out that some were tied to Waters & Smith Investments in the past but couldn’t find anything more. A week ago a man named Kilian Bancroft approached her, said he was the stepson of Alistair Smith. He said he knew what was going on. That his stepfather was involved with a terrorist group and that the money was to be used to purchase weapons.

He promised her a cut of the money if she transferred all the funds to another offshore account. He met her that night at the hotel to complete the transfer and give her proof as to who owned Duthmoor Holdings, both Michael’s father and Alistair Smith. But when they went to do the transfer all the money was gone.

She said he left before he could answer questions. She only met with him for less than two minutes. She had no idea she was in the hotel room of a senator until he walked in. He knocked her unconscious and the next thing she remembers is being dragged into an abandoned building.

Michael Sr. was there along with the guy she was having an on and off fling with. Michael Sr. shot her and left her to bleed out when she wouldn’t give him answers on what happened to the money.

She didn’t know anything about the pictures that were found in the hotel room. The FBI believes the man that met her there hoped she would find them. And it turns out her fling was none other than Dylan Weber. And I bet my own money he was the one who withdrew the money using her login credentials.

I clench my fists as she talks. I wish she would have told me she had been investigating this. I would have made sure she was safe like I was.

And I still don’t know if my husband had a hand in all of this.

“Mariela,” Jackson says, grabbing my shoulder. “Mark is going to take you home.”

“What about Rebecca?”

“You can talk to her later.”

As Mark pulls me away, I make eye contact with her and she mouths,I’m sorry. I look at Landon but he ignores me.

* * *

“Mrs. Waters, we don’t need you to get a lot out of him. We just need you to get him to talk about his relationship with Waters & Smith.”

I look up at the agent taping a wire to me. “It’s his grandfather’s company. What am I supposed to get out of him?”

The agent steps back before she speaks. “He wasn’t supposed to be handling affairs with the company once he took a seat in the Senate. We have no proof that he was there the night Rebecca was shot. No proof that he had anything to do with the laundering of money or aiding and abetting of terrorists. His father and brother aren’t talking. We need to see if you can break him.”

“He barely talks to me as it is.”

“Just try. This is the one chance we have of taking him down.” She looks at her watch before speaking. “And this could help with your divorce.”

“I am getting a divorce from him regardless of what he says.”

She nods at me. “They just told me he parked in the garage. We’ll be upstairs.”

I watch her walk out of the kitchen. I take a seat at the kitchen island, waiting for Michael to walk in the house.

He practically runs to me when he sees me and it leaves me in shock. “Mariela,” he holds my face like a lover. “I’m so happy you are okay. I flew back as soon as I heard.”

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