by CR Robertson
“Zee?” A hand waved in front of my face, followed by Ash’s face. “You okay?”
“Yeah.” I cleared my throat. “Just lost in thought for a moment.”
Every one of us had watched what happened last night. A clean-up crew arrived not long afterward and removed all trace of the scene. Unfortunately, they couldn’t do the same with my memories. I was finally beginning to see why Jordan had established his own cleaning crews and security firm away from the Council. He obviously hadn’t trusted them for years.
Everything was ready for this morning. We were taking Uncle Lucas’ helicopter directly to Cassandra’s family home. After watching our late-night video, I was taking no chances. We were in and out of that house as quickly as possible. Then he was taking her to Tuscany to be locked away in his fortress with his own personal army.
We’d all heard Megan’s temper tantrum this morning when Jordan told her she was taking a holiday away. The silence that followed it was ominous. Jordan cared for Megan, but there was no way that he would tolerate that behaviour from anyone. She was probably tied up with a butt plug up her ass while she considered her actions.
He currently sat sipping a cup of coffee while reading through reports on his phone.
Cassandra was pale and quiet, her hair tied back in a severe bun at the base of her neck. Her morning sickness had been bad the past few days, which was one of the reasons we’d delayed the trip until after breakfast. She picked her crumpet into shreds on her plate in the pretence of eating.
“The doctor said the sickness is low blood sugar. You need to eat.” She jumped when I spoke and then looked guiltily at her plate.
“I…” Her lips pursed.
I should never have told her last night, but I’d been emotional and ready to crawl out of my skin.
Jordan glanced up from his phone. “You both need to pull yourself together,” he snapped. “If they sense any weakness in us at all, they’ll send their hounds to pursue us. When you walk out of here, it is with your heads high and smiles on your faces.”
Cassandra glared at him. “We were murdered in our bed last night.”
He set his phone and sighed. “Technically, you were murdered in your bed and he hung himself in the bathroom.” Her gasp made me shoot him a look that would make most men quake. “My point being, that you show them that you don’t give a fuck and move on. Whoever that was is waiting for a reaction this morning, either from us or the Council. We don’t give it to them.”
“I’m not as hard as you,” Cassandra replied in a low tone.
“You are,” Jordan replied. “We both watched our parents be murdered and survived. Now I’m telling you to hold your head up and walk out there as the wife of Xavier Bartholomew.”
Jordan had said what I couldn’t because I didn’t want to hurt Cassandra. Our lives had been carefully choreographed so no one saw our real feelings. No matter what happened, the world saw three playboy billionaires who didn’t have a care.
Cassandra turned her huge eyes to me. I lifted her hand and kissed her wrist. “They can’t see they upset us in any way. We need to pretend that we don’t know about last night.”
“But—”
I shook my head to stop her. “This isn’t the first time a decoy has been killed. They knew the risks when they took the assignment.”
They should have had all the additional locks on but were too busy having sex in a bed I told them not to use. They would have been safe and the internal metal shutter would have given them time to get to the saferoom and activate the alarm.
If it was possible, Cassandra became paler before she bolted from the table, her hand covering her mouth.
“Did you have to tell her?” Jordan snapped.
“Give him a break,” Ash retaliated. “He watched himself and his wife being slaughtered last night. It shook all of us up about the decisions we’ve made.”
I wasn’t just tired, my soul was weary. “Just leave it, Jay. I never intended to tell her, but Cassandra has a way of knowing when I’m upset. She takes a burden from my soul and makes it easier to breathe.”
Pushing my plate to one side, I then slowly pushed myself to my feet to go in search of my wife. She sat on the floor of the bathroom behind the concealed door in the hallway, her head resting on her knees.
“Are we going to blame my penis on your sickness?” I queried, sliding down the wall to sit beside her. Blaming my penis on everything bad was something that normally amused her.
She leaned her head on my shoulder. “He is the villain in this story with his nefarious plans for world domination.”
“Do you need anything?”
“No, I just couldn’t face eating this morning. Maybe it was all the popcorn last night.”
“Or maybe it was because I didn’t keep my stupid mouth shut.” If I could go back in time, I should have just crawled into bed beside her and left her to sleep.
Her hand slipped through my arm to hold onto it. “We’re a partnership, Zee. That means we talk to each other. Secrets have a tendency to come out in the end. What’s the difference between now and six months’ time?”
“Six months from now, you’d have your hands full looking after our baby. Right now, you have lots of time to sit and worry.”
“Smartass.” She chuckled.
“You did ask.”
We sat side by side until her body relaxed. “How many decoys in the past?”
Of course she would pick up on that. “A few over the years. Our children will be safe, Cas. Why do you think I ensured this place was finished in record time? The security here would put Buckingham Palace to shame.”
“I want our children to have a life, not an existence.”
“I’m working on it, baby. We need to hit the road soon. You ready?”
I didn’t want to take her back to where Malcolm assaulted her, but my hands were tied. She was right, we needed her there in case anything else came up that she could explain.
“Yeah, just let me change into something more comfortable since helicopters are bumpy.”
She arrived to meet us in the conservatory about ten minutes later, her black clothes making her look paler. She wore no make-up which made her appear young and vulnerable. Instinctively, she moved into my arms when I opened them, her head resting under my chin.
“We are in and out in as little time as possible,” Uncle Lucas said. “Everyone understand?”
My phone pinged, followed by Ash’s. Both of us shot each other a look before grabbing our phones. “Fuck! We’ve just been summoned by our fathers,” I said. “Should we put it off?”
“No,” Uncle Lucas replied. “If it gives us more information, then you should go.”
Several hours later in London, Dad and Matteus sat across the table from Ash, Jordan, and me. They stared at the random pieces of paper from the safety deposit box minus those we’d found the hidden messages on. Uncle Lucas had had duplicate books created with important details removed from them, so that it looked like we were giving them something.
All we were giving them was the run-around.
My stomach churned as I watched the glee on their faces as they pawed over what they thought was the contents of the safety deposit box that Cassandra’s parents died for. Little did they know that the real information was in her family home for years and years. A fire would have destroyed it forever if only they’d thought to take a can of petrol and a match. Malcolm had searched the house, but hadn’t known what he was looking for. Frank Jenkins had been smart to teach his daughter his secrets as a game in her youth.
My father taught me the business world and how to avoid the sexual touch of his wives. They’d claimed not to know that Frank was dead, but their reactions showed their true knowledge. The Council hadn’t looked for him because he’d been taken care of, all his linage gone in one fatal accident. I was starting to understand why he was trying to get rid of Cassandra from my life with the offer of ten million pounds. She looked like her mother, and it
wouldn’t take long before questions started to be asked.
“You were right to bring this information to us,” Dad said, his finger skimming down the information in the small red diary. Uncle Lucas had explained that the dates related to significant world events that had been orchestrated by the higher-ranking men on the Council. Twelve ancient families who held the power over life or death, their symbol the hanged man from the tarot, which was the major arcana card number twelve. In the past, I believed our actions to be noble because that card was the one that depicted ultimate surrender and sacrifice. I’d seen us in the role of protectors.
Now, I felt used and dirty.
Used by the people I had trusted. Dirty because I had carried out their wishes.
“Any idea what it all means?” Jordan asked, his face set in the perfect expression of confusion.
Dad glanced up at him. “It’s hard to say after all this time. Frank kept meticulous records, but I can barely remember what was happening at that time. My wife was ill, and I was hauling my business empire onto its feet. Xavier was only a child at the time.”
“Dad?” Ash queried.
“Some of the references stir vague memories, but I would need to cross reference them with my journals.” Matteus had always kept huge leather-bound journals with his own strange shorthand in them. Ash and I used to sit flicking through them when we were young, trying to work out what all his lines and squiggles meant.
After Cassandra fell asleep last night, I lay for hours running this over and over in my head. “Is this why you wanted Cassandra out of my life, Dad?” I asked in a deceptively low tone. Right now, I was barely holding my shit together, and wanted to reach across the table and drag him over by the throat.
He leaned back in his seat, his gaze locked on me. “Her being alive paints a target on you, Xavier. You are my only son and heir, and I wanted to protect you. Frank disappeared under a huge black cloud of conspiracy and a massive amount of cash and assets going missing. We believed him to be living a new life somewhere in a sunny location.”
“His being dead refutes that theory,” I pointed out. “It also means that someone else took the cash.”
“Or maybe he already had it in a secret bank account ready to use?” Matteus interjected. “His brother has now turned up at the same time as his daughter. I tend not to believe in coincidences.”
“I don’t believe in Santa Claus, but he crept into my house every year and left presents,” I quipped.
Dad laughed. “You believed in him at the time.”
“My point is that if he didn’t have the money, where is it?” I stopped for a dramatic pause. “Do we have a mole on the Council? Because right now I don’t know what to think after finding out that Malcolm was a sick pervert with his own supply of personal slaves.”
Jordan slipped into his role of head of security. “I’ll start pulling files. Do we know when these assets went missing? There should be a trace even after this amount of time.”
Dad waved his hand. “We drew a line over it a long time ago.”
That was total bullshit. The Council didn’t draw a line under anything. In fact, it tended to sit and fester until the situation turned toxic. Then someone like Jordan had to step in and sort it out.
If money was involved, they would have chased it until the last penny was found.
There was something rotten here that smelt like a ten-day-old corpse that had been decomposing.
“How come no one ever came looking for Frank and the money?” I asked, my gaze trained on my father. I was the only one in this room who knew about the diamond mine deeds and the photographs from the past in my safe.
On cue, his nervous tick started under his right eye that told me he was devising a lie. The majority of people had a tell. Uncle Lucas had beaten our tells out of us until they no longer existed. He took three feral boys and turned us into warriors. We tended to keep our mouths shut and our eyes open in the Council, watching everything and cataloguing it.
“He’d disappeared. I believe the security person before Jordan looked into it but there was no trace of him, no passport activation. The entire family just vanished with the money.”
Jordan looked up from typing on his phone. “Anyone worth their salt would have gone to the house and tore it apart to find something, anything to go on. The accident was well documented, including the descriptions of the victims. It wouldn’t have taken much to join the dots together and discover that the two people were one and the same. Did anyone speak to Clive Brown?”
“Who?” Matteus tried to look casual.
“Frank’s business partner,” Jordan elaborated. “He took control of his entire business after he disappeared. He was also the one who found the car on the night of the accident, and took Cassandra to the hospital.”
There was no way that Dad and Matteus didn’t know who he was. It would have been the first place a Council member would have visited if they didn’t already know that the person involved was dead and no longer of concern to them.
Matteus gave that polished smile. “All those details are of no concern to my position on the Council.”
In other words, I’m too important to bother myself with the dirty work.
“Can we keep these to look over them for a few days?” Dad asked and the way Matteus gave him a sharp look told me he’d kicked him under the table. Dad knew the three of us weren’t stupid considering how many issues we’d resolved for them over the years.
The only thing original in that box was the blank pieces of paper. Everything else had been carefully forged by Uncle Lucas. His penmanship was impeccable, and he’d spent a lifetime perfecting his ability to copy documents.
“Yeah, that’s why I came to you, Dad. We have no idea what’s going on, especially since that Dante guy turned up at Michael’s funeral. He’s Cas’ uncle who was supposed to be dead.”
Dad spun to stare at Matteus, who was diligently studying something from the box. “You didn’t tell me Dante was at the funeral.”
Matteus produced the polished smile again. “I remember little from that black day.”
For some reason, Matteus didn’t want Dad to know that Dante had been at his house. “Cas said her dad told her that her uncle was dead, then he turned up at Michael’s funeral. What the hell is going on, Dad?” I deliberately excluded Matteus from the question,
“I’ve no idea, Xavier, but if you leave this paperwork with me, I’ll try and get answers for you.”
I nodded and agreed, watching the men flicking through the useless information in front of them. Pushing myself to my feet, I then stopped and held onto the side of the table.
“Dad?” He glanced up. “Cassandra is my wife and she’s carrying my child, your first grandchild. I love you, but I will take any threat against her as an act of war. I’ve already eliminated several hazards because of her father’s ridiculous will, please ensure I don’t have to do the same to someone I know.”
He studied me for several seconds. “You have my word, Xavier. I will protect her and my grandchild.”
It was the closest I was going to get to what I wanted, so I left with my friends since we’d come to an understanding. A weight lifted from my shoulders, because I knew that once my dad gave his word, he wouldn’t renege on it. I was his only child and no matter what, he’d moved heaven and earth to protect me in the past. We were family, and in this crazy, fucked up world, that was everything.
Ash had been quiet throughout our meeting, his expression contemplative. His pain sat heavily on my shoulders because I’d been the one to cause it with Michael’s death. He rarely showed any emotion, but when provoked, his temper was hotter than the depths of hell. If Lucrezia got under his skin, he would destroy everything in his path to reach her. She just hadn’t worked out what pressed that self-destruct button yet.
Jordan’s phone pinged again when we were outside. In the middle of this mess, I was beginning to see that he’d been operating at several levels at once for years,
creating his own kingdom far from the reach of the Council.
“We’ve got an old media system to read the cassettes and tapes. We can collect it while we’re in town,” Jordan said, his fingers skimming over the screen to reply to whoever was contacting him.
“Thoughts?” I asked as we got back into my favourite Jaguar. I’d left it in London as it was recognisable, but since we were meeting with Dad and Matteus I brought it along for the trip.
“They’re both full of shit,” Jordan quipped.
Ash rubbed the back of his neck. “I used to trust Dad explicitly. What disturbs me is that he can look into my eyes and lie to me.” He sighed. “I’ve just had enough of the whole damn thing. Do you know he’s taken my silence on the matter to mean consent and organised a wife for me?”
“What the fuck?” I nearly swerved into the oncoming traffic when I spun around to look at Ash in the back seat. “Dylan’s daughter Nicole?”
“Apparently she’s lovely and her sisters have been very fertile.”
“I hope you told him to fuck off?” Jordan snapped. “What century are we in again?”
Ash shook his head and trailed his fingers through his hair. “My life has always been mapped out for me. This is just another part of that bullshit.”
We lapsed into silence, Jordan and I shooting each other a disbelieving look. Something needed to be done with Ash and fast before he was married to a woman he didn’t know and didn’t care about. Cassandra was just waiting for the word to activate Operation Lovebug since she liked my cousin Lucrezia.
Jordan’s contact was waiting for us in an old carpark, handing him a black holdall before saluting and returning to his car.
“You okay?” I asked.
Ash rubbed his eyes with the palms of his hands while we waited for Jordan. His face was tight, and he looked ready to kill someone or have a breakdown. “I’m so sick of all this shit. From looking at most of the files from the safety deposit boxes, they’re financial in nature, so the next part of this puzzle will involve me trawling through old files until I find a match. I’ve no idea how long this will take. Unless either of you two want to help.”
