“Este,” Beau calls from the pool deck. “Come on!”
Over the lake a crack of lightning splits through the sky as thunder rumbles, and I know we’re out of time to find out what Simon’s doing in Winter Park.
The storm is here.
Chapter 31
“Simon killed Gemma,” I say to Beau once we’re back inside the quiet of our house. I’m pacing, circling the doors that lead out to the pool deck. “We have to go tell Ardell. Someone has to arrest him.”
Beau snaps the lock on the sliding doors. “No one’s going to do anything in the middle of a hurricane. We have to be strategic.”
I almost stomp my foot, the frustration fizzing out of me faster than I can regulate. “Beau, Simon’s not waiting. He told me at the Ritz that he has—”
Beau’s head whips toward me. “I want to talk about how you ended up at his hotel.”
The look on his face cuts me to the quick. He thinks I betrayed him. After all these years, he still can’t understand why I’d show Simon an ounce of loyalty.
Outside, the storm picks up. Rain falls in a gauzy curtain, blurring the view outside.
“He’s been texting me, saying we need to talk.”
“Texting you? You went?” Beau looks torn between which betrayal hurts more—the Simon texts that went unmentioned or our meeting at a hotel—but the pain is etched in the frown lines of his face.
“It wasn’t like that. He’s going to frame you for this murder, Beau,” I say, waving my hands like the walls of our own house could close in on us both at any minute. “He can’t pin this hack thing on you, so he’s going to take you down some other way.”
“Why would Simon kill Gemma?”
“Why else would Simon be in Winter Park?”
“I told you, for years he’s been looking for proof that I was behind the Redwood hack. I don’t think he can let go of the fact that he lost—not just the company, but you.”
Of course. Redwood wasn’t the only thing Simon lost. He lost me.
God forbid Simon Avery ever be deprived of a possession.
Maybe it should feel satisfying, to hear that Simon might regret having let go of me so easily. But the suggestion only serves as fuel for the dread coursing through me. Simon doesn’t like to lose.
“If that’s true, he’s never going to let this go. What if hefindsproof?” I voice the fear caught in my ribs.
“He can’t.” Beau shakes his head, his voice dropping into something warm. “He never will.”
“How can you be certain?”
He rubs at his jaw, looking me over as if appraising what else he can do to absolve himself. “Because I didn’t hack Redwood. And I didn’t plan the Redwood data breach. But I let it happen. That’s why Simon’s never been able to find anything.”
“What does that mean, Beau?”
“The day of the Redwood meeting, the Wi-Fi password to the guest network…” He takes a long breath, the anguish behind his eyes making it clear that this is theonepiece of the story he wishes wasn’t true. Not the hack. Maybe not even the part where I find out about his role in the hack. But the part where I learn aboutmyrole in it. The part where I handed him a scrap of paper and made it possible for him to walk straight into the Redwood network like it was his living room and start spotting weaknesses.
“Wait.” I put a hand up between us as the air leaves my lungs. “The passwordIgave you?”
“You didn’t do anything wrong. But Redwood’s security was—‘negligent’ is the first word that comes to mind. I mean, you saw the lawsuits.”
I had. Most of the Redwood team had moved on in theircareers. Even James had started his own agency. But not Simon’s chief technology officer or his head of network security. They had both been unemployable since the class-action lawsuit showed they had left critical loopholes open in their system.
But they weren’t the ones who scheduled the meeting between Beau and Simon.
“That’s why I never told you,” he says. “After that meeting, I didn’t make it a secret, telling mentors and friends how vulnerable the system was. What he was building. I didn’t plan the breach, Este. But I wanted it to happen.”
