Page 188 of Matteo

She was protecting herself.

“I needed a shield.”

Elizabeth lets out a short, sharp breath. “And you chose me? Thanks so much, Alex. I thought you were a great guy. I thought I'd found a friend in you. Seems like my intuition really let me down.”

That last part is a shot at me, and I deserve it. I deserve all the hate she wants to throw at me. But I want her to hear me out. I need her to know that I own my mistakes, and I hate myself for not believing her.

“It wasn't personal,” Alex says, “but I needed to deflect suspicion. I didn't intend any serious harm, and I thought I'd covered my tracks well but you saw what no one else had. You were dangerous, and you'd expose me soon enough. I had to point the suspicion back at you.

This man betrayed me, then used Elizabeth as collateral. I've been completely blindsided, and now I'm doubting everything I know, and everyone I trust.

Except for the woman who trusted me, and let me in. The woman I stand to lose. I wipe a hand over my face and glare at Alex. “You crossed a fucking line.”

“I crossed a line the moment your father signed that order,” he fires back.

I shake my head, struggling to process everything. “So your plan was to destabilize the company instead? What were you hoping to achieve?”

Alex shrugs. “I-I didn't have a plan. I just wanted Knight Enterprises to feel some pain. The same pain my niece feels every day.”

His voice catches.

“She was finally responding to treatment. The infusions were helping. She had more energy. She was going to school more often. She wasn't spending every other week in a hospital bed.”

For the first time, some of the anger drains out of him, leaving behind something rawer.

“She has a severe autoimmune disease. Her own body attacks itself. The treatment was expensive, but it was working. Then the funding disappeared.”

He shakes his head. “Do you know what it's like watching a fourteen-year-old girl smile because she thinks she's getting better? Then having to explain why she can't have the treatment anymore?”

Nobody says anything.

“I wanted your father to know that decisions have consequences. To feel the pressure. To be at risk of losing something important.”

His eyes settle on me.

“You think you'd sit back and take it quietly if you were in my shoes?”

I sting at the thought. What if I were in his shoes--if I had a niece, or a child, and they suffered just like Alex's niece had.

I'd want revenge. I'd want to make the fucker who did this feel some serious pain.

Alex doing this for personal reasons makes it even harder to punish him. Throughout my life I've seen that actions have consequences. Still, diverting suspicion to Elizabeth is a low blow, and something she never deserved.

“What about the people caught in the middle, like Elizabeth?” I ask, nodding in her direction. Her expression is hard. Lips hard set into a line. Eyes cold and unforgiving.

“Collateral damage.”

His reply breaks something in me. “You asshole.”

“Your father does shit like this every day.”

“That doesn’t make you any different.”

His expression sobers, as if he's suddenly realized something profound. “No,” he says. “It doesn’t.”

“I'm sorry for your niece, and it's awful what happened, but you could have done this differently.” Elizabeth’s tone is soft, not cutting. “You could have taken it public. There were other ways.”

“And watch it get buried and spun into something else?” Alex shakes his head. “No. This way was better. This way he felt it directly. Enough to get you, an external consultant to come in and take a look.”