by Claire Adams
We had him where we wanted him. So far, Carlos had to feel like he had the upper hand. His plan was working. Rose had come to me with the papers; Del had been afraid to talk to me because she thought I was a criminal. Now, it was just a matter of figuring out how to get the solid proof of what he was doing.
If we were going to catch him red handed, there couldn’t be a question about his motive. I wasn’t about to do all this work just to have him tell the police that he really did find that legal document and I really owed Rose the money. We needed the proof that he’d broken into the online system with Dating the Rich, the proof he had frozen my accounts, and the proof he’d been breaking into my house looking for something.
“So how are we going to get the proof we need?” I asked everyone when I arrived back at Dick’s.
“I think you need to use Del and Rose,” Josh said.
“Hell, no! Why would I use them?”
“He trusts Rose and he thinks Del is angry with you and believes you are a criminal. You can use those relationships to get him to confess.”
“I don’t see how? And, I’m not putting the two most important women in my life in danger.”
“They are already in danger, Brandon,” Billy said flatly. “Rose has the man in her home, and Carlos knows how much Del means to you. He went after your relationship with Del because he knew it would hurt the most. Don’t fool yourself – she’s already in danger.”
His words hit me like ice water as the realization of what he was saying washed over me. I’d left Del at her house without any security. What if Carlos found out we were getting close to figuring everything out? He certainly was going to use Del to force my hand, I just knew it.
“I’ve got to go find Del.”
“No, we need to make a plan. You can use her to contact Carlos and say she has more information. She’s your best asset in possibly taking him down.”
“I won’t put her in danger!”
“Let’s call her and talk about it calmly. She’s an adult. Let her decide for herself if she’d like to be involved or not. You want to catch this guy, don’t you? You don’t want him running off with all your money?”
“Of course, I want to catch him.”
“Then, call Delilah and let’s figure this out.”
Chapter 21
Delilah
“I’m helping, that’s all there is to it. I’ll be right down.”
Brandon didn’t sound all that happy to be asking for my help in dealing with Carlos, but I was more than happy to have something to do that was useful. I felt horrible about my role in giving Carlos and his brother access to Brandon’s credit card information. This was my opportunity to fix things, or at least help out a little.
When I thought about Antonio and the pure size of his arms, I knew he and Carlos were capable of hurting me, Brandon, and anyone else. I liked the plan the guys had come up with and was pretty confident it was going to work. The biggest thing was that we needed to make sure Carlos didn’t get a whiff of what we were doing. If he got spooked, then he was going to freak out and none of us knew how that would turn out.
I arrived at the lawyer’s office and found it filled with everyone who was involved. Brandon took the time to introduce us all and I got to meet Rose face to face again, but this time things were a lot different.
“And, this is Rose; you two met the other day. Rose, this is my girlfriend, Delilah,” Brandon introduced me.
Instead of simply being his friend, I had now been introduced as his girlfriend. It felt like the right introduction, and I couldn’t wait for this mess to be figured out so we could get back to our boring dating life. I wasn’t meant for all this excitement. The danger and adrenaline had me literally shaking as I sat at the table with everyone and we went over the plan.
“It’s nice to have everyone here. I did call the Los Angeles Police to see if we could involve them, but it doesn’t look like we will be getting their help very quickly – apparently they are very under staffed and this isn’t a murder. So for the time being, it’s just this rowdy group,” Billy said. “I’ve worked with Brandon and we have given a basic timetable of what’s going to happen and who needs to do each task. Let’s look it over and see where there are holes and what areas we might need to change.”
“Thank you all for your help. I know this is scary and dangerous, and I want you to know how much I appreciate you all sticking in here with me,” Brandon said sincerely.
We spent the whole morning going through the plan over and over. The guys didn’t seem to trust that Rose and I knew our parts, but we did. I even found myself rolling my eyes with Rose when they asked if we needed them to go over our parts one more time.
“We got it, guys!” she snapped at them. “Now, I need to get home before Carlos gets suspicious. I’ll be ready tomorrow when it’s my time. I promise.”
“I’ve got my part, too. I’ll call Carlos right at nine in the morning from my office. This is going to work. We got our parts,” I said as I grabbed Rose by the hand. “You men just make sure and get what you need so it can all be over.”
By the next morning, I was sitting at my desk and going over the plan again and again in my head. As much as I’d tried to be confident in front of the guys, I was still really nervous and wasn’t sure I was going to be able to pull it off.
I liked to act, I had loved it in high school and college, but it was much scarier when the acting could result in you being murdered. Okay, maybe that was a little dramatic, but with Carlos and Antonio’s history, we were rightfully a little worried.
“What’s wrong with you this morning?” Mattie asked as she hung up with a customer. “You look like shit.”
“Wow, I love you, too.”
“Seriously, are you sick? Maybe you should go home; I don’t want you getting me sick. You know I’m going out with that Josh guy at the end of the week. He was really funny and he’s not at all like Markus.”
“I’m not sick.”
Though, I really did feel pretty sick. The stress of thinking about what I needed to do and worrying about it all was really taking a toll on me. I couldn’t wait until my part of the whole thing was over. Only a few more minutes, and I’d be able to make my call. My job would be over and the next person would take over in our plan.
“You know, I think I stayed with Markus because I didn’t think there were other good guys out there. How weird is that? I actually thought he was a good guy, but after talking to Josh, I can see what a really good guy is and I just can’t believe I thought like that,” Mattie rambled on as I pretended to listen.
“You were so right about Markus. He was only in it for himself. He didn’t care about me and he certainly wasn’t going to stop flirting with women for me. I feel like I was blind and now I can see. I know that’s really a cheesy line, but I actually feel like that.”
“Oh, that’s good. I’m glad you two are going out. I’m feeling all right; I’ll tough it out for a bit. I just didn’t sleep very well. I’m just going to try and get this work done before I decide if I’m going to head home early. I might need to get a little sleep.”
The truth was I hadn’t slept well since Saturday when I had Brandon at my house. The last couple of days, I’d been up worried that someone was going to break in and hurt Connor and me. Brandon had hired a security company to patrol my house and installed an alarm, but it just made me more nervous because I thought someone was breaking in at every noise that happened outside.
I watched the clock closely and when it hit nine, I hurried off to one of the empty conference rooms and called Carlos. My hand was shaking as I held the card he had given me in my hand and tried to remember everything I was supposed to tell him. This was it: it was my time to shine. I felt ready to give it my all and knew what I was going to say.
Once I finished telling Carlos my part of things, he was going to go to Rose and try to convince her he found a new legal paper. Or something like that; I wasn’t positive on the rest of the p
lan, only on what I was supposed to do.
“Hello, this is Delilah Hunter. You asked me about Brandon Baker the other day,” I said as I tried to control the fear in my voice.
My hands continued to shake, and I felt like I couldn’t get a full breath in as the nerves took a hold of me. I was really glad I could talk to Carlos on the phone and didn’t have to be right in front of him. It would have been impossible to convince him what I was saying was the truth if he could see just how nervous I was.
“Oh, yes. How can I help you?”
“Um, I remembered something about the stocks he was buying. I was watching the news and saw that TM Entertainment just went public. Brandon was buying a lot of shares of that; I think he might even own the company.”
“Oh, really? Well, that is totally illegal if he was doing that before the company went public. I’m going to come down to your office, so we can talk about it.”
“No, it’s okay. That’s all I know.”
I didn’t want Carlos coming to my office. The whole reason I’d agreed to help out was because I could do it over the phone instead of having to see him in person. He sounded very dangerous, and I certainly didn’t want to be in a room alone with him. I couldn’t let him come to my office.
“I’ll be there shortly and you can tell me what you know. I prefer to do my investigations and questioning in person. It’s easier to tell if someone is telling me the truth.”
Carlos hung up, and I started to freak out. We hadn’t planned on him coming to my office. I was simply supposed to make him think there was more money out there and that Brandon might have actually been committing fraud.
I felt my chest compress as I tried to catch my breath and couldn’t get my lungs to fill up. Carlos was going to come to my work, and he would see that I was lying to him. He’d hurt me for sure, or he’d have his brother hurt me. My head felt light and I thought I might pass out from the lack of oxygen.
My hands shook as I dialed Brandon’s number. It felt like I couldn’t break as the panic rushed through me and I sat down to try and focus myself. My fingers continued to tremble and the room felt smaller and smaller as I waited for him to answer the phone.
“He… um…he says he’s coming here,” I said as tears took over and the adrenaline made my whole body shake.
I didn’t want to cry. I really was trying to be brave, but the emotion of the whole situation had taken over and I couldn’t control myself. This wasn’t how things were supposed to have happened. I had controlled my fear to make the phone call, but there was no way I could keep my fear in check with Carlos standing right in front of me. I was doomed and I knew it.
“I’ve got you on speaker here,” Brandon said and I could hear everyone in the background. “What do you guys think?”
“He probably just wants to see what else she knows, but we should have someone there to keep an eye on her,” Billy said. “Guys like him think they know what they are doing, but he doesn’t. She should be able to tell him the same story, and he’ll take it and run with it.”
“What happened with getting the police evolved?” Dick asked.
“I’ve got a buddy who’s on the force; he’s working on it,” Billy added. “I think he’ll get someone on the case, it is just going to take him some time.
“Okay, Delilah, listen to me. You keep him out in the main area. You tell him exactly what we talked about and that it’s all you know. I’m going to send a security guard over to keep observe. When is Carlos coming?”
“He said he’s coming right over.”
“Okay, just a second. I’m going to make a call,” Brandon said and I heard him dial someone else on a cell phone. “Joseph? Hey, this is Brandon. Yeah, I need that private security we talked about. Can you send someone over to the Dating the Rich office right away? Great, I’ll tell her to expect you. Thanks again, brother.”
My heart raced as I looked out the conference room in fear that Carlos would already be there. If he knew we were trying to set him up, there was nothing I could do to stay safe. This whole thing was so dangerous and I had agreed to put myself right in the middle of it all.
“What’s going on?” I said as I tried to calm myself.
“Remember the head of the security company that was at my house the night we came home from the theater?”
“Yes. Well, I think so.”
I did remember the security guard. I remembered him and Brandon going into the house while I stayed outside waiting for them. It had only been a few days before, but it seemed like it had been weeks, or even months since that night.
“His name is Joseph Rigs and he’s coming to you right now. Put him in a cubicle and let him pretend to work there so he is right by you when Carlos arrives. Okay?”
“Um, yes.”
“Call me when Carlos leaves.”
“Okay, but what if something happens?”
“Delilah, listen to me,” Brandon said calmly. “Nothing is going to happen. Just tell him the same thing you said over the phone. He just wants to see your eyes when you say it. Use your acting skills.”
“Okay, I’m going to go now. I’ll call you when it’s over.”
I had barely been able to hide my nervousness as I talked to Carlos over the phone. How on earth was I going to hide it when he was there in person? I closed my eyes and took a couple deep breaths as I tried to calm down.
This had to go off without a hitch. The whole rest of the plan only worked if I was able to convince Carlos that Brandon was actually doing illegal trading. If Carlos thought he could use the illegal trading as leverage, he would go after even more money. The guys would be able to tape him as he blackmailed Brandon, and hopefully, we’d be able to get that information to the police to use against Carlos.
Everything in the plan worked together, so I had to do my part.
“You’ve got this, Del. You’re a kick-ass actress. You survived losing your husband. You can deal with this,” I said as I felt my body calming.
“Del, someone is out here for you,” Mattie said as she peeked into the conference room. “He says his name is Joseph Rigs.”
“Oh, yeah! Yes. Okay, I’m coming. Can he sit in your desk for a minute?”
“What? Why?”
“Just trust me. Okay? I need him to sit there.”
“Fine by me. Have him do some of my work while he’s there, too.”
I quickly met with Joseph and got him sitting in Mattie’s spot. He had on a collared shirt and slacks and looked a little more dressed up than the others around us, but it would have to do for the time being.
“Thanks for coming. You can sit here. That’s my desk there. Last time when Carlos came, they just brought him straight up. I think that will happen again.”
“Sounds good. I’m ready. I won’t let anything happen to you.”
“Thank you.”
I closed my eyes and tried to keep myself calm as I waited for Carlos to arrive. My thoughts went to Connor and how I had pretended to be calm after my husband’s death. I had used my acting skills back then and I’d use them again now.
When Spencer passed away, it felt like I wouldn’t be able to move, let alone actually take care of my child. Yet I found the strength. I fought to be there for my son and to give him a stable life that wasn’t filled with fear. It hadn’t been easy, and this wasn’t going to be easy, either.
I was terrified. My stomach churned with the unknown of what was going to happen when Carlos arrived, but I was going to be strong. I was going to do my part to make sure this man was caught.
It was only ten minutes before Carlos was there standing right behind me. Somehow he had managed to get into the building and onto my floor without the supervision of Robert or anyone else.
“Miss Hunter,” he said, and I turned around calmly.
“Oh, hello. Like I said on the phone, that’s all I know. You really didn’t need to come down.”
“Could we go somewhere private and talk?”
I glanced
at Joseph, who shook his head no. Although, I already knew I couldn’t go anywhere alone with Carlos. That would be way too dangerous.
“We can talk here. What else do you need?” I asked as I smiled at him.
I let my fingers play with my hair and tried my best to flirt through my eyes. Men were fairly predictable creatures and soon, Carlos was sitting on my desk with his leg touching mine.
“Honey, you said that Mr. Baker purchased stock for a company that just went public. How do you know this?”
“Oh, yeah. Okay, so I was naked. You know, after we had been together,” I said with a huge cheesy smile. “And, he was at his computer. I saw the name of the company on the screen and he was buying a lot of stock. I’m sorry I forgot to tell you earlier, but when I saw the news story, I totally remembered.”
“Okay, I appreciate your help.”
“Oh, you’re so sweet. You know, I can’t believe I fell for such a liar. I should have found a nice, strong man like yourself,” I said as I placed my hand on his bicep. “Wow, you really work out.”
“Yeah, I do. I’m going to take care of something. Maybe I could call you when this is all over?”
“Yes, I’d like that.”
Carlos leaned in, and I felt his hand squeeze my thigh. His lips were only inches away from my ear and his breath made my whole body sick.
“I’d like to have a hot night in bed with you.”
It took every last bit of my energy not to vomit as I tried to stay still. I managed a sweet smile as he walked away. I waited until he had entered the elevator before I started to shake.
“You did good,” Joseph said. “He bought it.”
“I think I’m going to throw up.”
Chapter 22
Brandon
“Rose, are you ready?” I said as I got her on the phone. “Delilah told him the story. He’s going to come to you soon, I think.”
