Page 14 of Furever Loyal
“No, it’s not, but it’s not a game either. It wasn’tbank error in my favor, collect ten million dollars.Understand?”
“I guess.”
He nodded. “Now, are you coming with me or not?”
7
She stared at the door.
Gowithhim? To do what? What did he want her to do? For that matter, what washegoingto do?
“Shit.” She got up and hurried after him, grabbing her jacket from the coat rack next to her door. The Queen had charged her with working with him, and she wasn’t about to let him go on her own.
“So, youarecoming,” he said, holding the elevator door as she hurried inside, well aware that this was quite possibly the stupidest thing she’d ever done.
She was about to go get into a car with someone who hated her, and who was very likely trying to sabotage his own company. He was basically an enemy of her client, a client that had told her to work with him if she wanted to keep her job.
It was like being caught between a rock and a hard place. Haley didn’twantto go, but she wasn’t about to let him head off on his own. That would give him far too much freedom to come up with whatever sort of evidence he wanted. No, Haley had to go.
If therewasproof to be found, evidence of any kind, she needed to make sure it was handled properly. If he was innocent and it showed that, she needed to verify it. But if they found something that proved himguilty, she needed to be there to ensure he didn’t destroy it, not until she could tell the Queen.
“Why bring me along?” she asked, getting into the SUV he indicated. There was no way in hell they were takinghercar.
“Isn’t the answer to that a little obvious?” Kincaid’s attention was on the road as he guided them out of the parking lot and headed for the south end of town.
“I’m not really in the habit of asking questions that have obvious answers,” she said tartly. “Not on purpose.”
Kincaid’s shoulders slumped just a little. “I want a witness around. At all times.”
“Why?” This wasn’t going the way she’d expected.
What did you expect?
Haley thought it over and realized she didn’t have the slightest clue what she’d been expecting him to say. Maybe that he’d made the offer without thinking she would accept? That perhaps he’d assumed she would be tied to her desk and unwilling to go for a drive?
Probably because that would have been the smart thing to do.
“I know you might find this hard to believe,” Kincaid said, speaking slowly like he was rehearsing the words before saying them out loud. “But I actually, really do love, uh, working there. It’s the best job I’ve ever had. I’m not particularly keen on losing it, considering that I didn’t do anything wrong. Especially not stealing ten million dollars. I’m out here to prove that, and right now, nobody is going to believe my word. But someone who hates me, who found the evidence in the first place? If they say I’m innocent, well…”
“I don’t hate you,” she said automatically, but even as the words filled the cabin, she had to wonder if they were true. Not too long ago, her thoughts had been filled with an awful lot of mean things, most of them having to do with Kincaid.
“I’m not lying to you,” he replied, staring straight ahead. “I’d appreciate the same courtesy.”
Haley fell quiet, unused to being called out so bluntly. It was just another thing about him that aggravated her. He knew exactly the right way to push her buttons to get her fired up in an instant. Almost as if he didn’t have to try. It was infuriating and made her dislike him even more.
There wasn’t much to say back to that, so she fell silent, wondering what they were going to find once they got to their destination.
The prevailing answer she came up with was: not much. It was not like the business—especiallyif it was a front for Canis—was just going to let them waltz in and see their financial statements and the authorization for whoever had transferred the money into his account. Expecting that was…ridiculous, truthfully.
“Why did you agree to come with me?”
Kincaid’s voice pulled her out of her thoughts, and she had to ask him to repeat himself.
“That’s easy,” she said without hesitation. “To ensure you don’t destroy any of the incriminating evidence in your quest to prove yourself innocent.”
Because of her earlier anger toward him, the words came out sharper than they might otherwise have. She saw the hurt on his face from knowing she believed him capable of such a thing. It was there and gone quickly, hidden behind the hard mask he wore much of the time, but she’d seen it.
Haley wasn’t about to be fooled by it though. There was every chance he was just acting, that the entire thing was a charade, and she couldn’t take that chance. Kincaid was involved in something, she just wasn’t sure what. There was no way that even if hewasframed, he had been chosen at random. No, there was a lot more to this story that she didn’t know.
