“You guessed right.” He points at the invitation. “Use what I gave you wisely, and you might get what you so desire.”
Impossible.
If I set my desires free, they would put golden chains on Diana and place her in a prison of my creation. A prison she will never escape.
The life sentence is a high price to pay for my obsession that grows every single day, piece by piece, destroying my calm nature.
“I’ll attend the engagement. I do business with the Scotts and Kings, so I wouldn’t disrespect them.” Hilarious since my cousins almost ruined their daughters. Never affected our business relationships, though, which shows how Lachlan Scott and Zachary King never mix personal and business matters. Unless you directly try to harm their families. The patriarchs have zero patience for that. “I don’t mind introducing Diana to the family.”
Better my family than the bunch of fools I previously mentioned. Besides, my wife has been sitting in her wing for days, refusing to even venture downstairs to eat breakfast and dinner with me. So getting her outside would be a nice change of scenery.
“Great.” He gets up and puts his splayed palm on the folder. “I made some calls regarding the Jones case that you requested. Her mother’s death was a tragic accident, but I think she had some help from her lover.” I still at this. “The autopsy showed that she died ten minutes after he arrived on the scene, per my estimate. So while he didn’t kill her with his bare hands, he might as well have because he watched her bleed to death.”
“He hated her that much.”
Rafael hisses through his teeth. “I’d have to use our underworld connection to confirm some details. There is a possibility she knew too much, and he wanted her out of the picture once he broke it off with her. Her love for him was very unhealthy, and she wouldn’t have stopped otherwise.”
“Lachlan?”
He nods. “The Dark Protégés have some information about what happened seventeen years ago. It’s the reason I never wanted Jones in the room during the marriage ceremony and why he has no idea about the contract and prenup details. We don’t want him throwing a fit and feeding the tabloids, which are hungry for gossip. As long as he has no evidence to support his claims, it’s his word against ours, and right now, his word doesn’t mean much.”
I add all the pieces in my head and reveal my own theory. “Diana’s mother wasn’t just an escort.”
When she got with Jones, he was on top of his game, and for him to still visit the woman who brought so much trouble to him… there had to be a reason behind it.
“No. They met during a party hosted by your father.”
Throwing away the invitation, I snatch the folder and look through it, my insides growing cold at the information greeting me there. “He did business with my father?”
“Not the kind that you think. He partied with the willing participants and was never allowed into the real hideous stuff.” His words just add to the fury brewing in me. “Either way, I’d keep him as far away from Diana as possible. This family cannot be trusted.”
We both know about my father and what some of his business dealings entailed. For Jones to be allowed in any close vicinity to my father, he must have known other things about him.
And that alone makes him guilty by association, and he deserves to be locked up.
The water drips in the distance as coldness greets me when I open the basement door, turning on the flashlight and slowly going down the stairs.
To my knowledge, our family never used the basement, built like a tunnel by my great-great-grandfather, since youhad to walk at least 15 minutes to reach it, then take around 100 stairs down. The man wanted protection from any natural forces or wars, although one might die before he goes through all that.
After my mother’s death, staying home made no sense to me, so I mostly lived in my penthouse, but Matilda calling me about strange things occurring in the house raised my hackles. It was combined with the huge tax write-offs and my father’s newfound love for travel.
His strange behavior could mean various things, and I still felt obligated to my staff, who got their salaries from me. Rafael’s father protected all my assets and trust funds in his will. I don’t have to rely on my father to get access to my finances, as Conrad would have given me nothing and stripped me of my legacy otherwise.
Adjusting the flashlight better in my grip, I frown at the sight of the keypad lock on the basement door, showing it has been used recently.
Why else would a basement require such savvy technology to enter?
And the password has to be correct, or the alarm will go off. I have a similar lock in my apartment, so after pondering on it for a few moments, I punch in my mother’s date of death. The lock clicks and opens up.
Conrad always said it was his favorite date.
Fucker.
Try as I might, I would never understand how my mother could have loved this piece of shit so much that she signed off all her inheritance to him.
The bitter, rotten smells reach my nostrils as I step down farther, triggering a gagging reflex, but I push it back and freeze when whimpers fill the space, barely audible, yet desperation reeks from them.
Speeding up my pace, I quickly run down and swallow hard at the countless cages spread all along the basement with young girls locked inside them.
