Page 46 of At First Flight
“Yes, hello. What did you find?”
“Loads. This family has so many skeletons in their closets that they could open their own haunted house.”
I dash into my office and close the door, not wanting Lila to hear my conversation. Over the past week, I’ve learned that she doesn’t like people snooping in her business. Too bad for her, I always protect those I care about.
“More than what we already know?” The Hoolihans have a very public and sordid history in politics.
“The newspapers haven’t even scratched the surface. It seems they have some heavy hitters in their back pocket keeping their reputation intact.”
“What does this asshole want with Lila?”
My feet squeak against the hardwood floors that cover the outskirts of the room as I pace, the center only covered in adainty cream, pink, and blue floral rug. I’d rather wear away the wood than the pretty accessory.
As Mike goes on about homicides, missing wives and mistresses, and one fatherly figure with a disgustingly peculiar taste for the underage, I catch myself grasping the back of my office chair. My stomach roils at the thought of Lila being caught up in their mess. She’s so…innocent. So good.
“Do you know what they wanted with my Lila?”
“Yours?” he asks, catching the slip of my tongue.
"My employee… and wife one day. Hopefully."
The words come out quieter than I intend, but they slip out anyway, calm and certain. I hear Mike chuckle.
“That so?” he asks, not bothering to hide the amused disbelief in his voice.
I shrug even though he can’t see, running a hand over the back of my neck, but my lips tip up just slightly. “Yeah. That’s so.”
Thinking about that day at the airport eases the clenching in my stomach. There’d been something about her, something more than just the chaos, the running mascara, or the wild way she filled up the space beside me like a storm I didn’t know I’d been waiting for. Even then, before I knew her name or the weight she was carrying on her shoulders, I’d had this abstract, unshakable sense that she would change everything.
The more time I spend with her, the more I watch her with the kids, listen to her laughter drifting down the hallway, or find one of her mugs left on the counter like she’s always been here, the more I understand the profound truth behind that gut feeling.
She hasn’t just changed my life. She’s become the best part of it.
And if she’ll let me, if she’ll take one look at all my flaws and still say yes, I plan to marry her one day.
Not because I need to save her. But because somewhere along the way, she started saving me.
“Does she know this?”
“She’s in denial.”
Mike’s chortle echoes through the phone until a coughing fit takes over. It’s a minute before he finally replies.
“I don’t know the full details yet. I’m working on it. But it appears the marriage wasn’t going to be for love. He is on his fourth at this point. Prescott’s wives all mysteriously disappear.”
“And no one has gone looking for them? I’ve never even heard about the other three. And what about the current one?”
“The current wife wants to be a first lady someday, so she’s become a bit of a socialite in her own right. Seems she’s a bit harder to get rid of. She was aware of Lila’s existence, thinking it was nothing more than a fling for Prescott.”
“But why Lila? Why the pomp and circumstance around their wedding? It wasn’t a well-kept secret in their circle. What does she have that they want?”
“Her research. Lila’s the patent holder for at least a dozen items regarding her recent research on food allergies, all funded under a lab they sponsor. They want the rights to all of it even though her contract states otherwise. We’re talking about life-changing research, Dean.”
“But what do they want with it?”
“They don’t want the patents. They want them to disappear. Pharmaceuticals only make money when someone has to stay on meds for life. And what easier way than to convince someone of that than to become their power of attorney?”
“So what you’re saying is they were going to get rid of the current wife, and he was going to marry Lila? Then…God, I don’t want to think about it…and harm her in some way so that he becomes power of attorney, then takes over the patents himself. Then he pretty much allows any pharmaceutical companies to nullify the patent.”
