Page 91 of Into the Light

“No. Are you?” I huffed an exasperated breath.

“No.”

“Good. Now, let’s take this pain and turn it into something else.”

“I agree.” His fingers caressed my cheeks as he brought my face to his, our noses touching.

“Together,” I whispered, hovering over his mouth.

“Together.” He kissed me in a way that was consuming. In the way he always kissed me.

Moments later, Walsh came in, and Rain and I sat in the two chairs we’d pulled up next to the desk. Walsh dropped the manila envelope onto the large wooden desk in front of us before retreating to the back of the room, giving us the space we needed.

“You do it,” I encouraged Rain. “You’ll know more about what’s inside of this than I’ll understand.”

“Are you sure?” Rain asked.

“Yes.”

His fingers hovered over the clasp of the envelope before he opened it. As he pulled out the papers, there was a loud gasp.

Chapter thirty-two

There were hundreds of photos, bank receipts, and transcriptions of what looked like phone calls in this envelope. All of which incriminated Mr. Ortiz. I quickly opened each paper detailing exactly how badly Mr. Ortiz fucked up.

Every. Single. One.

I inhaled deeply as I took the first one out and read it over. It was a bank statement that detailed Mr. Ortiz was skimming from the Cartel by quite a large percentage off of his large properties. He managed most of the legitimate businesses in America so they could funnel their drugs and launder their guns.

What Mr. Ortiz was doing was also taking a percentage of what they were laundering and keeping it for himself. If Ash had access to these, then others must’ve been close to figuring out what he was doing, too.

I pulled out one of the photos and was shocked at what I saw.

“Holy shit.” Ember peered over my shoulder to see the same thing I was looking at. “Didn’t they get married recently?”

“Yeah.”

“What is the date on this?” she asked.

“A month before Ash passed away.” I held the photo, and it was Mr. Ortiz walking out of a strip club next to the same person fucking him in the back of his vehicle.

“I am so sorry—”

“I’m not.” I chuckled, which was highly inappropriate, but I didn’t give a fuck, to be honest. “My mom has always had this happen to her. She picks the wrong fucking men all the time, and she stopped listening to me a long time ago.”

Frankly, my mom and I never had a relationship.

“You never talk about her.”

“There isn’t much to talk about.” My mom stopped raising me a long time ago. I relied on Ash to get through the day most of the time, especially when I was younger and he would help me get the basic necessities I needed to eat, sleep, and shower. My mom stopped parenting when she lost my dad, but honestly, who knows how much she did before that.

“You can always talk to me—”

“Ember, seriously. I am fine.” It was the truth. Looking at these pictures of my stepfather cheating on my mom should have ignited some pain and hurt within me, but nothing happened. I felt absolutely nothing about it. He was a bad fucking man and not in the villain-gets-the-girl-bookish sort of way. No, he was a horrible human.

She squeezed my arm before I opened a few more bank statements.

“Walsh?” I said, turning around to where I knew he was still standing. “Can you come here and help me go through these?”

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