Page 12 of Unleash Hades
“I’ll take a look at the contents as soon as I can,” Gavin’s eyes scanned the room again to see if there were eavesdroppers. Determining that there were none, he leaned towards me. “Can you give me an idea of what tipped off your suspicions?”
I couldn’t say that I had nursed quiet suspicions for over a decade.
My husband thought I was too dumb to know how to read the signs. I could tell when stocks weren’t flourishing. I read the reports that said the value of my shares -ourshares - in Laurent Media crashed to the ground.
Then, all of a sudden, they would rise again. The downward trajectory of the little line would suddenly tilt up,fast.A full recovery like our sick company got a shot of penicillin.
It happened again and again, as Richard, CEO, made disastrous decisions. One right after the other.
“How rich do you think I am?” I asked Gavin.
His bushy brows knitted together, and he flinched at the rude question. He looked at my clothes, then shrugged. “I mean…”
I dressed casually, all things considered. I shopped at the Paramus Mall and not with private shoppers because I found the expensive luxury quite… distasteful.
“I don’t mean me, as a person. I mean… me and Richard, as a unit. How rich do you think we are?”
“Gates, Bezos, Baas…” he said with a small chuckle. “Thatkind of rich.”
“Let them eat cake type of rich?” I said, leaning toward him, and bringing my voice down.
“No doubt,” he said, all humor in his green eyes.
“Have you seen some of the choices Richard has made as CEO?”
Gavin almost blushed. It had been an unwritten rule to not discuss Richard’s disastrous ideas.
He had given in to the need for money when condoms, dating sites and alcohol companies came knocking. It turned out that no one wanted their hard-hitting news interspersed with bouncing tits.
After a story about the ill-treatment of gays in Iran was broken up by sexist “be a real man” beer commercials, we became a bit of a meme.
“I have,” Gavin said with a nod.
“Shouldn’t we be struggling more than we are?”
“Well, Richard probably has some other accounts. Investments, the like.”
“We do!” I nodded because I had looked into that. It had been my first thought.
I would have let it go, had it not been for the sinking feeling in my stomach and my general hatred of my husband.
“It doesn’t even come close with the rise in our net worth.”
“Rich people are never transparent about their finances,” Gavin shrugged. “It’s how you guys avoid the IRS.”
“Yes, but this is different,” I said. “I have access to all our accounts and there is a continuous stream of income - a suspiciously large one - that I can’t explain. It has no source, no explanation…”
“I’m thrilled to always be in the pursuit of truth and justice,” Gavin said, with a smirk. “But you know, sweetheart, that if you do this, you and your boys will lose out too.” He pursed his lips. “There’s not much I wouldn’t tolerate to make life good for my boy. Are you sure you’d want them to lose out on this?”
I had thought about it hard. Would I stay in bed with the Devil to make my boys happy?That had been her choice, and it had killed her.
“From where I sit,” Gavin said, “Richard Davenport is a peculiar, but loving, husband and father. I know you don’t like him, but…”
He let the rest of his sentence hang in the air.
I understood his point. Why be the one to rock the boat when things were going so well? But he didn’t know. He didn’t see the blood swirling into the drain. He didn’t see the children waiting for a mum who would never come home.
“As a mum, I want my boys to know that it’s important tobegood anddogood,” I said the words I had told another little one years ago. A little girl who was grown but occupied my every movement in small ways. “We’ll land on our feet, either way, my boys and I.”
