Page 80 of Silos and Sabotage

“Also, I’d really like to know what kind of consulting your husband’s ex-wife does for Radcliffe Industries.”

“What?” She gave him a blank look. “She’s a professional jet setter. A perennial vacationer who hasn’t worked a day since their divorce.”

“Not according to this.” He slid a few printouts across his desk toward her. It was possible Blain had been skimming through both the accounting and consulting firm without his sister’s knowledge. However, that didn’t seem likely, considering her short-lived marriage to Raleigh Bolander or her lavish lifestyle following it.

Avery scanned the printouts and paled. “None of this feels right.”

He couldn’t have agreed more. “Did you know that Cora and Blain are siblings?”

“Oh, Gage!” Avery straightened in her seat, looking stricken. “I think we’ve been coming at this all wrong.”

“I do, too.” It made him sick just thinking about it.

“What if it was about more than preventing the merger between two competing companies? What if it was about revenge against both companies?” She ticked the reasons off on her fingers. “Revenge against the Bolanders for firing Blain and Cora’s father. Revenge against us for failing to subsequently hire their father due to our non-compete clause.”

“Which they felt directly or indirectly led to his suicide,” Gage concluded bleakly.

“It was outright war on us. On both of our families!” She grew even paler. “All the lies and ugliness. All the backstabbing and sabotage. What if it was meticulously designed to enhance our biases and stir our distrust of each other? And while we were busy pointing fingers and flying accusations back and forth across the street that divides our respective land, we missed the fact that we were being played by a master manipulator. I’ve been shot at. Mick was stabbed to death. And now the attempt on Raleigh’s life. Who’s next?”

They stared at each other for a moment.

“Ella,” she keened, looking ready to faint. “If our latest theory is correct, we haven’t taken her out of the crosshairs after all.”

”It’s time we take what we know to the police.” Gage was still relatively new to the world of private investigating, but surely they’d uncovered enough evidence now to bring Blain and Cora in for questioning.

Though Avery nodded in agreement, she looked distraught. “This is going to break my father’s heart.”

He sent a warning text to Johnny at the animal rescue sanctuary to put him on high alert, since Ella was volunteering there again today. Then he called Gil to give him the skinny of what he’d uncovered.

His boss appeared in his doorway only moments later. “The sheriff is on his way.”

There was only one detail left that Gage still couldn’t make sense of. “We still don’t know what Billy Bob Bolander’s connection is to all of this.”

“I can venture a guess.” Avery’s lips twisted bitterly. “According to Raleigh, Billy Bob squandered his trust money on drugs and hard living shortly after he was disinherited. He would’ve needed money to maintain his addictions, which would’ve made him an easy target for unconscionable scoundrels like Blain and Cora.”

* * *

Two hours later

Blain Stratten’sears picked up on the distant whine of a police siren. It grew louder by the second, which meant they were headed toward the home office of Radcliffe Industries.

Took you losers long enough.

He reached inside Walker Radcliffe’s lower left desk drawer and pulled out the change of clothing he’d stowed there. It was the old set of coveralls he’d worn when he first came to work for Radcliffe Industries. He swiftly changed out of his suit and stuffed it into the desk drawer where his coveralls had been.

The sight of the vacuum sealed bag at the bottom of the drawer made him grow still. It contained the bloodstained bodysuit he’d worn to do his darkest deeds. He considered taking it with him, but quickly discarded the idea. After he finished bringing the Bolanders and Radcliffes to their knees, he wanted the world to know that he was the one who’d done it. Maybe they’d write a book about his exploits. Or produce a movie…

He patted the pockets of his coveralls to ensure that the driver’s license and passport he’d paid good money for on the black market were still tucked inside. They were. Not only did they give him a whole new identity, they matched the name he’d placed on his overseas accounts. For the past thirty years, he’d steadily deposited the money he’d skimmed from Walker Radcliffe into them.

I’m a rich man now.

Years of patient planning were finally about to pay off. And thanks to the poison he’d stirred into his boss’s food and beverages over the past year and a half, Walker was about to be a dead man.

Serves you right for what you did to my family!

Because of the explosives he’d planted in the silos standing closest to the Bolander mansion, Creston and Raleigh Bolander were also about to be dead men, along with the latest addition to their inner circle, Avery Radcliffe. Or Avery Bolander. He wasn’t sure if she’d taken the scoundrel’s last name or not when she’d married him. All that really mattered was that she met her new husband and father-in-law like clockwork for dinner nearly every night. Which meant she, too, would soon be dead.

Everything is going according to plan.

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