by Julia Harlow
“There! That’s the computer the video came from!”
Ty knew without question that all of the techies in IT had incredible capabilities, but Corey was head and shoulders above the best of them.
His buddy went on, “Whoever the sneaky douche is, he tried to cover his tracks, throwing up all sorts of roadblocks, but I was able to uncover the source.”
“Yeah? Well who the fuck sent it?” Ty slammed his palm down on the desk.
Corey finally glanced over his shoulder. “I can give you the IP address right now, but you’ll have to wait a minute while I track the name associated with that address. The cocksucker really used a lot of obstacles to keep anyone from finding him.”
Ty knew his blood pressure had to be off the charts. His face felt hot, and he was sweating through his shirt, even though he knew it would be a long time before he smelled as ripe as Corey here, because he, at least, was familiar with the benefits of regular hygiene.
Corey grinned at the computer screen. “Here’s the devious jack-off. His name is . . . Logan Chou.”
At hearing the name, Ty fought two overwhelming and simultaneous urges. One was to punch his fist through the wall of the IT department; the other was to re-arrange Logan Chou’s face. Before he left IT, he asked Corey to give him a minute alone to watch the video. After Corey left, Ty took no pleasure in seeing Isabel’s incomparable naked body, water streaming over every voluptuous curve. Instead, he leaned close to the screen, studying details of the room to see if they held any clues as to the location. Unfortunately, they didn’t. So his next move was to find Logan Chou.
As he strode toward Chou’s desk, the idea that Isabel could have actually been with that low-life loser flitted through his thought processes like a mosquito darting toward a bug zapper. The memory of the night he’d phoned her when she was out with her Baycrest team came back to him. She’d been trying to dodge Chou’s drooling advances with obvious disgust. Besides, from what he’d seen on the video, there was no proof whatsoever that she’d been involved with Chou. He was nowhere in sight.
The only thing he knew for certain was that Chou was a perverted scumbag who’d taken obscene advantage of a precious young woman and grossly, criminally, violated her privacy. As he rounded the corner toward Chou’s desk, he struggled to steady his rapid breathing. He needed to calm himself down enough to weigh the pros and cons of taking the legal system route versus kicking the degenerate’s ass all the way down California Avenue.
He felt a sharp stab of disappointment when he discovered Chou’s desk deserted. After a quick call to personnel, Ty discovered that the spineless prick had called in sick. “He’s sick alright,” Ty cursed under his breath.
He made his way back to IT and convinced Corey to dig up Chou’s home address.
Oblivious to the noise of conversations, cell phones ringing, fingers tapping on keyboards, and all the associated activity of the bustling business surrounding him, Ty strode toward the elevator and rode it down to the ground floor. He rushed out of the Triple Five Building toward his car. Anger and disgust fueling him, his long stride ate up the pavement and he made it to his car in mere minutes. Unfortunately, the huge frame of Conrad, arms crossed tight over his chest, blocked the door to his Mercedes-Benz.
“Can’t talk now, Conrad,” he snapped.
The big man, leaning against the car door, crossed his ankles. His forehead wrinkled in an intimidating frown, a clear signal that he wasn’t moving anytime soon.
Ty frowned right back at him and exhaled in exasperation. “Out of my way.”
“I know where you’re going.”
“Don’t care. Move out of my way, now, or your ass is fired.”
Conrad had the gall to grin. “I’ve got orders from a higher power. Your lovely betrothed sent me. She got more than one call from her friends at Soter.com, knows exactly what you’re planning to do, and told me to stop you. For some weird reason, she doesn’t think her future plans should include visiting you in prison.”
Ty’s muscles were rigid with pent-up rage, and his face was crimson with fury. He shouted, “Get in, then! But know this: he’s mine. No one touches him but me.”
The tension in the car was so thick it crackled like loose ceiling plaster as they sped to Logan Chou’s address. When they reached his house in record time, the tires squealed to a stop, and Ty vaulted from the car. Conrad followed close behind, shaking his head, his dark ponytail swishing from side to side.
With the flat of his palm, Ty banged on the wood paneled door. No one answered. Next, he pounded his fists until they throbbed, shouting, “Open up, Chou. I know you’re in there.”
Standing next to him, Conrad yawned. “Oh, yeah, he’s sure to open the door now.”
“Stay out of this.” Ty continued to pound his fists on the door. Still no answer.
“Hey boss, ever consider that he might escape out the back door rather than face you?”
Ty immediately stopped banging on the door and turned toward Conrad. “Shit! Get around to the back, quick!”
Conrad flew around the back of the house and caught hold of a handful of gray hoodie just as Chou fled out the back door.
“Get your fucking hands off me!” Chou struggled like the proverbial ninety-pound weakling up against the two-hundred-pound muscle-bound weight lifter. He attempted to kick and punch Conrad, but his flailing arms and legs were too short to make contact with the six-foot-four-inch behemoth. Realizing he was no match for Conrad, he finally gave up.
The leather soles of Ty’s boots slapped the stone pathway as he rounded the corner. At the sight of Conrad dangling the punk by his hoodie, Ty quickly glanced around and seethed, “Bring him in the house. I don’t want any witnesses.”
Logan squealed like a stuffed piglet. “I’m calling the police!”
Twisting the front of Logan’s hoodie with one hand, Ty spat out through gritted teeth, “Go right ahead and call, you fucking degenerate. We’ll tell them how you violated a young woman’s privacy by videotaping her taking a shower without her knowledge and sent it to all of your company’s computers. We’re talking about multiple criminal offenses, jack-off.”
Once inside the kitchen, Ty pushed Logan up against a wall and administered a lightning-fast precision punch to his gut. Logan grabbed his middle and made gasping sounds, all the air apparently knocked out of him.
“Don’t be such a pussy. I barely touched you.” Ty drew his fist back and landed another body punch followed by an upper cut to the chin. Logan’s head whipped back. He’d raised his forearm to protect his face, but a second too late.
“Here’s how it’s going to be. You tell me exactly how you got that video, and I’ll leave your nose where it is. If you don’t, well, let’s just say you won’t recognize yourself in the mirror.”
With one hand grasping his abdomen and the other cradling his chin, Logan stared down at the floor, sucking in air. “It’s like I said, Isabel and I are lovers. We have been for a while.”
Ty unleashed a series of jabs and punches that dropped Logan to the floor. “You lying son of a bitch! The truth, right now, or I won’t be responsible for what happens next!”
Writhing in obvious pain, his eyes filled with desperation, Logan gave Conrad a pleading glance as if he might come to his rescue. Conrad shook his head. “Sorry, punk. I want the truth too. Just tell us what really happened, and maybe we’ll leave you alone.”
He moaned and curled into the fetal position on the floor, but offered no information. Ty drew back his boot, ready to kick him in the ribs.
“Wait!” Logan struggled to sit up and then leaned against the white painted bead-board wall. He gingerly opened his mouth, attempting to move his jaw from side to side. “Ah, fuck, I think you busted my jaw!”
Ty growled. “Something’s going to be busted if you don’t start talking right now.”
The little shit had the nerve to narrow his eyes accusingly at Ty. “Isabel called me the night you’d upset her. She wanted some
place to go where you wouldn’t find her. So this was all your fault in the first place.” He swiped at the trickle coming from the corner of his mouth with his fingers, his eyes widening in horror when he saw the bright red blood.
“What the fuck are you talking about? I never upset . . .” Right then Ty recalled the night Isabel had gotten the anonymous note saying that he’d arranged for her job at Soter.com. He could tell how distressed she was, and he’d driven straight to the loft, asking her to stay until he got there. Even Ellen hadn’t known where Isabel had gone. Something Chou just said niggled at the edge of his brain, just out of his grasp, like an important piece of paper the wind whips away every time you reach for it.
Logan winced and wiped more blood from the side of his mouth, this time with the sleeve of his shirt. “So I offered her and her dog a safe haven for the night. She had her own room and a bathroom down the hall. I made coffee for her the next morning and woke her when it was time for work. She said she wasn’t feeling well, so I went on to Soter myself.”
With his hands planted on his lean hips, Ty scowled down at Chou, suspecting something major was missing from the yarn he’d spun. “Uh huh, so you’ve been in love, or maybe more accurately, lust, with Isabel for some time. Have I got that right?”
Logan glowered up at him with his dark eyes. “I love her. And I’m far better for her than you’ll ever be. I’ll still be there for her when you’ve moved on to the next hot babe.”
Ty’s brows slammed together as he inched closer to tower over Logan. “You don’t know anything about us, and it’s none of your fucking business. You’re a pathetic loser. She rejected you that night you were drunk and came onto her at the bar.
“And because you knew she wasn’t interested in you, you decided to plant hidden video cameras in between the time she called and when she arrived at your house that night. You are one sick fuck. I’ll bet you’ve been jacking off while you watched the video. You make me want to vomit.” Ty took a step back, shaking his head in utter disgust.
Right then, the irritating thought in the back of his mind, like a splinter embedded in the tip of his finger and throbbing, materialized. He was ready to start punching Chou all over again. But Ty knew that the little prick wasn’t worth the effort. Instead, he leaned his shoulder against the refrigerator door.
“You are the one who wrote that anonymous note to Isabel and dropped it at the loft, aren’t you? You must have broken another slew of laws digging up the information. Only a handful of people knew about Isabel being hired by Soter.com. Whose computer did you hack into? Gloria Parnell’s? Her computer would have been the most convenient for you to access.”
Logan wiped his mouth again with the back of his hand. “I’ve known Isabel much longer than you have. You don’t deserve her. She’s mine. She just needs a little more time to realize it.”
Ty crossed his arms over his chest, snorting in disgust. “Oh, yeah, she wants someone who deceived her, a sleazy coward who sent her an anonymous note and then posted naked videos of her to all her work colleagues. You are one delusional excuse for a human being.” He rubbed his forehead back and forth with his fingers and continued. “You’ve already lost your job at Soter.com. They know it was you who sent the video from their server.
“Even though you belong in prison, if you don’t want Isabel to press charges for the countless crimes you’ve committed against her, you need to leave San Francisco. Let’s say in the next twenty-four hours.”
Ty glared down at Logan still slumped on the kitchen floor, with barely contained anger. “I’m watching you, Chou. You ever go near Isabel again and I swear I’ll kill you.”
Chapter 30
Ty closed his eyes and took several deep breaths, striving to calm himself from the rage he felt at what Chou had done to Isabel. He tossed the keys to Conrad, who drove them back to the Triple Five Building where Conrad had left his own car. After dropping him off, Ty moved to the driver’s side and slouched down in the Mercedes, his forehead propped on his arms against the steering wheel.
How many horrible things had happened to Isabel in the short time since he’d met her? First, the diabolical Willard Daniels had come within an inch of murdering her. And then the delusional Chou seriously damaged her reputation at Soter.com with his malicious libel, not even considering the laws he’d broken, and was convinced by some bizarre fantasy that she was his.
Maybe he should take her away from all this. Far, far away where she’d be safe from all these lunatics. One thing was certain: he’d never let anything happen to her from this moment on. She was too good, too precious, and too honorable for anything else to happen to her. Ever. He’d hire dozens of bodyguards to protect her if that’s what it took.
His head jerked up at the sound of his cell phone buzzing. He leaned on one hip to retrieve the phone from his pocket and answered immediately when he realized it was Isabel. “Are you all right, sweetheart?”
“I’m fine, Ty. But I need you with me, not off fighting my battles. Where are you?”
“On my way to you, my love. I’ll be there in a few minutes.” The incident with Chou had left him feeling both drained and agitated, but the mere sound of Isabel’s voice instantly re-energized and soothed him, the way he always felt when she cuddled him in her arms.
~*~
Isabel was waiting at the elevator door when it opened and Ty emerged. She hurled herself into his arms, almost knocking him down, and held him as if she’d never let him go.
“Why did you go after Logan? How would I ever survive without you if you’d been arrested for assault and battery . . . or worse?” These last words were forced out in between sobs.
After Ty had moved them into the foyer, he leaned back to gaze down at her. With the pads of his thumbs, he gently wiped away her tears. That’s when she noticed the cuts on his knuckles.
“Oh, Ty, look at your hands! Let’s get them cleaned up and bandaged.” She almost dragged him to the bathroom where she directed him to sit on the side of the enormous bathtub.
Before she could tend to him, though, she grabbed a tissue to wipe away fresh tears and blow her nose. After a deep sigh, she held Ty’s head between her hands and met his eyes. “You have to promise me that you’ll never do anything like that again. Ever!”
His arms wrapped around her waist and pulled her to him until she was sitting on his lap. He nuzzled her neck, inhaling her delicious peaches and vanilla scent.
“You know what, my love?” He grinned. “All this concern about my welfare is really turning me on.”
She frowned. “Ty, be serious! Never again!”
He nibbled at her full bottom lip. “Oh, I am being serious. What do you say we go start on that family we both want? Right now.”
Epilogue
Isabel whispered soft nothings to the sleeping bundle in her arms, eight-week-old Thomas Charles Griffin, named after both her father and Ty’s. Still a little reddish around the edges, he would soon enough have that soft baby glow. A shock of dark hair covering his beautiful head signaled he might take after the coloring of his brunette mother rather than his dark blond father.
One thing was certain: with a birth weight of almost ten pounds and length of twenty-five inches, he was a big baby. Both parents could share credit for their firstborn’s impressive size. She placed a gentle kiss on Tommy’s downy head and breathed in his sweet baby scent.
Gazing for a moment out at the blue-green ocean, Isabel stretched her legs on the cushioned chaise lounge. The sound of the rhythmically lapping waves might easily have lulled her to sleep, but she was too excited to nap along with her precious son.
Early tomorrow, family and friends would be arriving at Otter Cove. She and Ty had planned every detail for the upcoming celebrations, including arranging for temporary help for the next two weeks, but Isabel still wanted to be involved and add her personal touches.
Ty’s parents, Thomas and Katherine, were flying in from France. They’d be the first to arrive. She’d gon
e over the aspects of the guest room where they’d be staying, one with an impeccable ocean view. Current issues of Architectural Digest, Wine Enthusiast, and Saveur were already on the night tables along with a carafe of filtered water and a vase of pale lime hydrangeas.
Clarissa would be arriving next. Ty and Isabel were on a mission to convince her to move to San Francisco and start her own business there. Ty had already researched the best location for her to open a party-planning company. With his impressive network of connections, plus the fact that San Francisco was a huge party town, he could guarantee her a steady flow of business. He’d also offered to help her write a business plan.
What they didn’t tell her was that they’d been doing some serious matchmaking and had several serious prospects for her. Ty behaved like a father with a teenaged daughter going on her first date as he vetted each one. Clarissa planned to stay with them for three weeks to help Isabel and get to know her grandson. Unbeknownst to her, she’d also be going on half a dozen dates, at the very least.
Victoria, Richard, and Jamie, and the former Baycrest team minus Logan Chou, along with Ellen, Andrew, and Conrad were all arriving tomorrow afternoon. Isabel had no idea where Logan had disappeared to, but she had her suspicions that Ty knew exactly where he was.
They were having two separate celebrations: the first to share in the joy of the birth of Thomas Charles; the second was an engagement party for Andrew and Ellen.
Isabel had spun around and around, whooping and hollering in exuberance, when Ellen had called her with the news that she’d finally accepted Andrew’s proposal of marriage. Both of them had shed tears of joy during the phone call.
But then Ellen had become so quiet Isabel couldn’t figure out what was going on. Her voice was strained when she began to speak. “You know neither of my parents ever loved me. Valerie could barely tolerate my presence. I never could figure out why. Willard was a cold-hearted bastard incapable of love. I think that’s why I resisted getting close to Andrew for so long. I’ve always felt that I was unlovable.”
