by Cherry Adair
Rand tried to gauge the older man’s reaction as he said, “Dakota flew in from Seattle because we had a situation at the wedding.”
Paul removed his glasses, folding the earpieces before placing them squarely on top of his open book. He met Rand’s eyes with no expression. Dakota had gone from Paul’s most promising young chemist to the woman who’d framed him for murder, without any noticeable transition.
“My trial starts in days.” His father folded his well-manicured, slightly arthritic hands on the table. “Is she here to help me this time, or is she going to fucking lie to keep herself pure and blameless?”
“She’s standing right here, why don’t you ask her yourself?” Rand suggested.
“Someone is demonstrating DL6-94’s potential to prospective buyers.” Dakota skipped the social niceties and got right to the point. “We believe someone intends to manufacture Rapture and flood the market with it.”
“Flood the market?” Paul raised a brow. “Surely no one would flood the market. If, as you say, someone has their hands on a formula that the authorities believe was destroyed, one would think that they—whoever they may be—wouldn’t be stupid enough to make the product that readily available. Not a good business model. That would drive down the price.” He glanced at Rand. “How was the wedding?”
“Eventful, and not in a good way.” He watched his father’s face carefully to gauge his response. He sat down, because he didn’t want to. He’d rather be outside in the fresh air. He wanted to be driving back to the small hotel and making love to Dakota. Hell, he wanted to be anywhere other than where he was. He’d taught himself in his mid-twenties that he wasn’t the fuckup loser Paul insisted he was. But whenever he was near the son of a bitch, Rand felt diminished. Which in turn pissed him off. He was excellent at what he did, had been well respected in Hollywood, where his stunts had won him awards and the respect of his peers. Had a thriving, successful security business—
“Someone dosed the guests with Rapture,” he said, cutting to the chase.
Paul’s eyebrows rose, and it was like looking at himself in thirty years. Cold clenched his gut. Everything Rand despised in Paul was a character trait he himself carried. If and when he recognized a trigger, Rand did everything in his power to eradicate it.
“Impossible,” the older man told him unequivocally, mouth twisting in derision as he put his glasses back on, adjusting the earpiece before saying, “The formula was destroyed years ago.”
Rand gave Paul a cool look. “Apparently not.”
His father’s mouth tightened, and he waved a dismissive hand. He still wore the wedding band Rand’s mother had put on his finger thirty-six years before. The light from the window on the opposite wall shone on the lenses of his glasses, obliterating the expression in his eyes. Rand didn’t need to see it to know what it was.
“As usual, you don’t know what you’re talking about. You don’t have the knowledge to differentiate between one drug and another, son. That would take an expert, and that isn’t you.” Rand had skipped the college education his mother wanted for him and left rainy Seattle and his father to go to Los Angeles at seventeen. He never regretted it.
“We’re waiting for the toxicology reports to come back,” Dakota informed him, not willing to play cat and mouse at his discretion. “We’ll know then which team’s formula is being used.”
“You were the only person at Rydell who knew the ingredients of every one of those formulas. Rand has no further to look for his guilty party than the whore he’s fucking.” The insult was delivered without heat, his tone as level and even as if he’d just asked whether she’d like to sit down.
“Watch your goddamned mouth,” Rand snarled at the same time Dakota leaned forward, her pale eyes glittering, although she didn’t leap across the table.
“Whoever is responsible is stealing your thunder, Paul. Someone is riding your glory, profiting from your invention, causing chaos. You know the consequences of this drug getting loose on the streets. Millions of people are going to die if we don’t stop it.”
“We ?” He cast out an all-encompassing hand, probably to indicate where he was. There was no we. It was her and Rand. Then he took off in an unexpected direction. “I didn’t need six teams working on my formula. I had motive to produce the safest, most effective antidepressant on the market. It was redundant to have that many people working on the same thing.”
She frowned. “You complained about the delays at the time. You said the more people working on it, the faster we’d get it to market. You pushed so hard.”
“Too many cooks …” He sniffed, brushing an invisible speck of lint from his sleeve.
“Be that as it may, someone on one of the teams managed to get the formula out of the lab before everything was destroyed. We have to find that person, Paul, you know that. The consequences if we fail are astronomical. No matter how you feel about me personally, please help us figure out who could’ve done this. Please.”
A small spark of interest flared in his eyes, then just as quickly disappeared. “You knew the individuals on each team far better than most. Who do you think?”
“I have no idea. Everyone worked in such small, tight groups, without sharing their progress—”
“You were quality control. You knew what was ordered by each team, how much was used, and their procedures. You tell me. What was the one ingredient we all used after the fifth trial failed?”
She frowned. “You mean the mastic? That was only a flavor enhancer.” On her version of the formula. She gave him a curious frown. “Did your control group use it to do something more?” It was such an expensive and difficult ingredient to procure that several of the teams working on the formula just omitted it from their versions.
Paul didn’t bother to answer. He didn’t fidget or glance around, just watched her steadily from eyes unnervingly like Rand’s. He changed gears again; it was disconcerting, and perhaps that was his intent. “Since it looks as though I’ll be right here for the rest of my natural life, it begs the question: why should I give a flying fuck who does what on the outside?”
“You really are a piece of work, aren’t you? Don’t you bear any responsibility for any of this? Rapture was your baby from the start. Now you’re disavowing your involvement? Awkward, when you’re in prison for murder with your drug as the murder weapon.”
His gaze locked on hers, piercing and ice cold. “Whether I do or not, next week the courts will decide if I’m responsible for premeditated murder, or if my Catherine’s death was a terrible accident.”
Catherine must’ve left millions when she died. That seemed like strong enough motivation to Dakota. Kill his wife, pin the murder on her, and walk away a rich, rich man. It seemed so obvious to her that she never had been able to figure out why it hadn’t been obvious to his son.
THIRTEEN
So, you fucked up protecting these rich and famous friends of yours.” Paul changed the subject on a dime. “Drop some names, so I can brag to my new friends.”
His mild tone was edged with annoyance. Rand had heard it all his life, and he knew Dakota recognized it too. In the lab, Paul didn’t do mad. He did intimidation. He was a master at making a tech, or a son, feel like an insignificant worm for even the slightest mistake or miscalculation.
Rand held his temper in check. Paul knew all his buttons and used them ruthlessly. He gave his father a succinct summary of what had transpired at the wedding, following it with the scene in Barcelona.
His father leaned forward over his arms, folded on the table. “Interesting.”
“That’s the best you can do?”
“Well, it’s not as though I can go out and take blood samples and ask questions myself. Get your girlfriend to do it. But have her labs verified.”
“You were singing her praises as brilliant and bold when you were at Rydell Pharma together.”
“A lapse in judgment on my part. She was stealing from the company the whole time, selling Rydell formulas
before the patents went through. They didn’t fire her ass for nothing, did they? That’s why she’s diabolical. Pretty girls get away with a lot more than their less attractive sisters.”
“Had any interesting visitors?” Dakota asked sweetly. “Heard anything from your friends in Seattle? What about the families of the other team members? How are they doing, do you know? Maybe one of them got their hands on the formula before the fire. The team was so small—”
Rand murmured a warning, “Dakota,” under his breath. T minus five … four … three … two … one. Cue the explosion.
Paul swiped the book off the table with one impatient sweep of his arm. “What the fuck is this? Twenty Questions? I see my fucking lawyers, and I don’t bend down for the soap. That’s who I see in here day after day after day. Nobody gives a flying fuck that I’m stuck in here. Visitors? Fan mail from goddamned Seattle? Are you kidding me?”
The legs of Paul’s chair screeched across the cement as he jumped to his feet. His face was flushed, his eyes glittering as if he had a fever. Flash temper. Rand stayed where he was.
His career was the only thing he could thank his father for. Paul’s fingers mimicked Dakota’s, curled over the chair back. “Who do you think has the fucking formula?” he exclaimed hotly. “She’s sitting right next to you!” Removing the black-rimmed glasses, he cleaned the lenses on the bottom of his sweatshirt before looking at her, his expression inscrutable as he jabbed a finger in her direction. “She was quality control for the whole program. She knew every damn thing about that drug.”
Dakota’s eyes glittered with temper. “For God’s sake, Paul—”
“I’ve told you this until I’m blue in the face. She saw the potential, and got rid of the competition. All the competition. Me. The rest of the team. The possibility that DL6-94 could’ve gone on to future approval by the FDA so it could help people like your mother. Dakota took all of those opportunities away.
“Once that drug was registered, she’d’ve missed her window of opportunity. She’ll put Rapture on the streets and unleash a genie she’ll never put back in the bottle. She’s a sly, grasping, deceitful bitch. Watch your back.”
“You’re giving her a hell of a lot more credit than she deserves,” Rand said dulcetly. “Didn’t Rydell insist the formula be destroyed?” His father was delusional. Dangerously, chillingly delusional. Rand knew he had to get Dakota out of there before this situation escalated any further. A muscle twitched in his jaw as he got to his feet.
“Because she falsified—”
“Bullshit. Dakota’s not the issue.”
“Then who is?”
“Finding whoever’s manufacturing this shit, and shutting them down.”
“Good luck with that. Wherever you go, she’s going to stick to you like glue. She’s not helping you, you fucking moron!” He slammed his fist on the table so it rattled. “She’s watching your every move to see what you know. Fuck her, shuck her, and go back home. Dr. North’s a dangerous woman. You should know, she fucked us both over.”
The door slammed open, and one of the guards stood in the doorway. “Che sta succedendo qui dentro? Non gridate. Fate silenzio!”
DAKOTA FELT SICK TO her stomach. Paul wasn’t giving an inch. He was going to keep insisting she was to blame no matter what. She cast a glance at Rand’s set expression. She couldn’t tell if he still believed Paul, or if he was seeing his father unravel as he tried to shore up his lies.
“Get me the lab work, give me something to do while I’m stuck in here,” Paul urged Rand, ignoring the blustering guard, who retreated and closed the door behind him when they didn’t acknowledge him. “I’ll know if it’s DL6-94 or something else.”
“I’ve seen the prelim, the lab work,” Dakota told him coldly. “And I’ll confirm which version of DL6-94 is being used. Save us time, and do the right thing. Do you know who has the formula, Paul?”
“I’ll let you know when I’ve taken a loo—”
Rand rose and shoved his chair back under the table. “It’s more important right now that you work closely with your lawyers.”
“They don’t know what the fuck they’re doing!” Paul’s hair-trigger temper erupted and he flung the metal chair aside with a force that caused it to clatter into another table. “I’ve given them—told them—every detail!” Each word became more forceful, more furious as his temper boiled over in lava mode.
“They insist there’s more. There is no more. Dr. North gave me medication for your mother. She assured me it was the Phase Three sample, assured me what she gave me was well within safety levels in one-microgram doses.” Rand stepped out of range as spittle flew. “I gave it to your sainted mother.”
“That’s absolute bullshit, and you know it!” Dakota said. No sudden moves, no show of her inner anger. “You could just as easily say you accidentally gave your wife the wrong dosage. That changed so often in trials that a mistake would be easy to explain away.”
Paul righted his chair and brought it back to the table. He gave her a steady look as he sat down. “But you did give it to me, my dear. Mailed it to me from Seattle yourself. My lawyers have the proof.”
Dakota’s cheeks grew hot with anger. He was a puppeteer, yanking her string. Knowing exactly which way to pull for maximum effect. “Then someone set me up,” she said, voice flat.
“Don’t shout,” he told her mildly, when she’d done no such thing. “We’ll have the guards in here again telling us we have to break this lovely visit short.” He picked up his chair, sat down, and lay an arm across the back of the chair beside his, looking relaxed and unaffected by anything she was saying. There was no sign that he’d lost his temper at all. It was chilling. “Convenient that you’re here in Italy for the start of the trial. I’ll let my lawyers know you’ll be available to testify.”
Her jaw ached from gritting her teeth. “I’ll tell them the truth. Just like I did last time.”
His small smile chilled her to her marrow. “You were fired for stealing and lying. I wonder whom the jury will believe when they see the surveillance video? A picture is worth a thousand words, you know. I wonder exactly what the penalty is for perjury in Italy?”
There was a dull roar in her ears. His tone barely changed, but the hair on her body felt as though she’d just gone through a surge of electricity. “What surveillance video?” Her lips felt numb as every fight-or-flight response urged her to run, not walk, away. Horror thrummed through her system, making her skin tight and itchy.
His small, cold smile disappeared. “We have a date-stamped tape of you going into the lab and appropriating the files only hours before the explosion.”
The day she’d been fired. And those files had been found a year later on her iPad. Proof and more proof. All of it planted. “Impossible.”
“Everything is possible, Doctor. A good thing for you to remember.”
THEY DIDN’T SPEAK FOR the fifteen minutes it took Rand to drive back to the hotel. She preceded him into the room. He slammed the door behind them, making her flinch. “There was a damned good reason I didn’t want you to go near him. You baited him,” Rand accused, dark eyes flashing fire. His mouth was a tight, grim line. He didn’t approach her, just stood on the other side of the large bed situated in the middle of the room.
She didn’t need Rand’s anger on top of her encounter with his father. Her mind was spinning, trying to assimilate all that Paul had told her. She tried to regulate her breathing, but her chest hurt too much to draw a proper breath. Fear was a cold, hard lump making her body shake. “I baited him? You must be kidding me! I have a right to face my accuser!”
“From a safe distance.”
“There were guards everywhere.”
“He can do a number on you without lifting a finger.”
“I’m perfectly aware of that.”
The enormity of her predicament overwhelmed her, and she couldn’t handle Rand’s anger right now. “I had to talk to him myself.” Still shaken, her heart racing a
nd her nerves stretched to the breaking point, she wanted time and space to process everything that just happened. Rand losing his temper was overkill, and likely to tip her temper over the edge.
“There was a reason why I didn’t want you to go with me. I think that’s pretty damn obvious. You being there achieved nothing.”
That was so unjust, so unfair, so damned Rand, that she lost it. “Here’s a thought. Did it ever cross your mind, even a flicker, that Catherine’s death was no accident? That in fact your father killed her on purpose? That he brought her here to Italy, away from her friends, away from you, to do exactly what he did?”
He rounded the bed, his face filled with fury. She took a defensive step back, coming against the door. “Who the hell do you think you are?” The deadly edge to his words flayed her, as intended.
To hell with him. To hell with all of them. She glared at him, her cheeks hot with reciprocated anger. “I know what I’m not. A money-grabbing, dishonest whore. Isn’t that what you called me when you told me to go to hell?” Those words yelled at her two years before when he’d called to break up with her still stung. Still wounded. The son of a bitch.
Her blood pressure throbbed behind her eyeballs. “I’ll tell you who I know I am.” Taking an aggressive step forward, she slapped a hand on his chest. “I’m Dakota North, I have a super-cool sixth sense that brought us this damned far. I’m a daughter to parents who think an A is for low achievers. I’m a freak. I’m a friend who’s there when my friends need me, and I accept help from them when I need it. I’m a good if not great cook, and I’m claustrophobic. That’s who I am.”
He stuck his hands in his pockets, clearly in an effort to keep them off her neck, and snapped, “Thanks for the résumé.”
“I’m not done.” She gave him another shove. “I pay my taxes on time, I haven’t had a lover since you told me to take a hike, and I sold my condo to pay my medical bills. I’ll say this for the last damned time: I did not give Paul drugs—either approved or declined by the FDA. No. Drugs. Not even an aspirin. Whatever he did, he did it on his own. Which is why I’m not in prison and he is! Did I leave anything out?”
