Night After Night (13 page)

“What are you doing here, at the radio station?” she asked. She knew he’d handled the donation payment over the phone, so it wasn’t as though he needed to show up in person.

His smile encompassed a wealth of male arrogance, which only made him look hotter. Sexier. “I knew I was going to win the auction, so I wanted to be here when you left so we could discuss the details of our date.”

She bit her bottom lip to keep from grinning, because she didn’t want him to think she was amused by his gigantic ego, which she was. “You are so full of yourself. What if someone kept outbidding you?”

“Not possible.”

With those two words he told her that he’d been prepared to drop far more cash for a date with her, if necessary. As for the details of their date…“Well, your ten-grand donation bought yourself an evening in my company, so we need to decide on a day and time that works with your schedule.”

“How about right now?”

Was he serious? “It’s two in the afternoon on a Monday.”

He arched a dark brow. “I’d like to think that ten thousand dollars would buy me a few extra hours of your time.”

Oh, he was good. Or bad, as the case might be. “So, you want the afternoon
and
evening?”

“Sounds fair to me.” He pushed away from his BMW, straightening to his full height so that she had to tip her head back to look at his face. “Unless you have other plans today?”

“No plans. But don’t you have a nightclub to run?”

He shook his head, causing soft strands of his hair to brush across his forehead, giving him a boyish look when he was anything but. “Taboo is closed on Monday and Tuesday nights.”

How convenient was that? She hadn’t anticipated going out with Noah so soon and would have appreciated the extra time to mentally and emotionally prepare herself to spend so many hours with him. “I’m not exactly dressed for a date,” she said, the excuse sounding lame even to her own ears.

To her surprise, he reached out and grabbed her hand, the heat of his touch making her stomach do the kind of somersaults she hadn’t felt since their first face-to-face encounter in high school. “You’re dressed perfectly for what I have in mind for the first part of our date.”

“First part?” she asked curiously.

“Yep, it’s a two-part date.” His thumb caressed the back of her hand, and the gold in his brown eyes all but mesmerized her. “And you’re perfectly dressed for the second part, too.”

She released a soft sigh. When things were like this between them, friendly and civilized, the lack of hostility made it so easy for her to do anything he asked. As long as he kept his promise to leave their history where it belonged—in the past—and she was trusting him to do just that.

Deciding to make the best of the situation, she gave Noah a genuine smile. “Okay, I’m all yours.” As soon as the words left her mouth, she realized how brazen her reply sounded.

And, of course, being a guy, Noah immediately jumped on the chance to acknowledge the double entendre. “I like the way that sounds.”

His deep, wicked chuckle made her shiver and her cheeks grow warm.

He tugged her closer and lowered his head to speak into her ear. “One more request. Can we ditch your bodyguard?” Noah asked hopefully, nodding his head toward where Simon was waiting patiently for her by the Town Car. “I promise to keep you safe and protected the entire time you’re with me.” He gave the hand he was still holding a gentle squeeze.

Oddly enough, she believed him and trusted him. There was a time when he’d been her knight in shining armor, her defender against the unpleasant memories shadowing her youth, and her sanctuary when her own mother had treated her only daughter like she wished Jessica had never been born. Unfortunately, he hadn’t been around to save her from what happened on the worst day of her life.

She didn’t blame him for that, but those events had forever changed the course of her future…one in which Noah Young no longer had a place.

“Yeah, we can ditch Simon,” she told Noah.

And for tonight she, too, was going to put the past aside and enjoy her time with the only man she’d ever loved.

By four o’clock Monday afternoon, Zoe was ready to call it a day—at least at the office. She still had plenty of work to do relating to the boutique and getting her flagship store ready to open within the next month, but most of the remaining tasks she could handle from home on her computer or by phone. Between her and Brittany—Zoe’s trusted assistant who’d been with ZR Designs for the past year—they’d accomplished everything on Zoe’s to-do list for that day and more.

They’d placed orders for inventory, found a commercial builder to install the shelves and racks and cases she wanted in the boutique, and even interviewed three potential managers for the store earlier that day. Since there was something else Zoe needed to handle outside of the office, Brittany was staying behind to call references on the applications to see which candidate received the best recommendation from past employers. Then came background checks, drug tests, and Zoe hoped by the end of the week she would be able to hire one of the women as a boutique manager and could put her to work as well.

“Thanks for taking care of the dirty work, Britt,” Zoe said, as she gathered up her purse and laptop case, to her assistant handling the rest of the application process. “If you need me for anything, just give me a call. Otherwise, I’ll see you bright and early tomorrow morning.”

“Okay, boss.” Ever the efficient, multi-tasking assistant, Brittany didn’t even glance up from whatever she was typing into her computer as Zoe passed by the petite blonde’s desk. “Have a good evening.”

“You, too. And don’t stay too late,” Zoe said over her shoulder, knowing that Brittany had a bad habit of getting so engrossed in what she was doing that she worked well past quitting time. It was a quality Zoe appreciated but didn’t want to take advantage of. “Tomorrow’s another long day.”

Abruptly Brittany stopped typing and glanced up at Zoe, her gaze soft with understanding. “Hey, good luck at your father’s office.”

“Thanks.” Brittany was one of the few people Zoe had told about her attempts to contact her father and how worried she’d been because he hadn’t been in touch, but she’d kept the darker accusations against her dad to herself. Until she had any kind of solid evidence to prove The Reliance Group’s claim against her father, she wasn’t about to add fuel to the rumors.

Twenty minutes later she stopped her car in front of her father’s office, immediately noting the lack of vehicles parked in the lot. Counting her Lexus, there were three cars total, which she found odd. Her father’s development company employed over a dozen people, from site and project managers to estimators, an accounting and payroll department, and a few secretaries to handle overflow work for the Meridian project.

As she’d witnessed in the past, usually in the late afternoon the office was a hub of activity, but today the place looked and felt like a ghost town. Unease twisted through her as she entered the building, and things only got worse from there.

The phone lines at the front desk were ringing persistently, but the receptionist was nowhere to be seen. In fact, as Zoe walked past the reception area to where workstations and smaller offices were located, she found the place abandoned.

Including Sheila’s cubicle and Zoe’s father’s office.

Then she heard voices coming from a corner office and headed in that direction, hoping to find a familiar face who could tell her what the heck was going on, because she didn’t like the sense of foreboding settling over her like a dark, brewing storm.

She reached the far office and recognized both men inside—Jeremy, one of the site managers for the Meridian project, and an older gentleman, George, her father’s controller, who’d been with the company for the past five years. They were arguing about a check that had bounced to one of their sub-contractors—and it was just what Zoe
didn’t
want to hear.

She knocked on the wooden door, startling both men out of their heated conversation. “Hi, guys,” she said when both pairs of eyes turned to her. “Where is everyone? This place is practically deserted.”

The two men exchanged a not-so-discreet look that only added to Zoe’s suspicion that something was very, very wrong. When neither of them spoke, she directed her gaze to the man she knew best. “George, what’s going on around here?” She couldn’t keep the wariness from her voice or prevent the nausea that was beginning a slow roll through her stomach.

Jeremy shook his head, looking both frustrated and angry. “I have somewhere else I need to be, so I’ll let George be the bearer of bad news.”

Jeremy brushed past her and out the door, leaving Zoe alone with the older man, who appeared worn-out and weary. George ran his fingers through his receding hair, then sank down into the leather chair behind his desk while Zoe waited not so patiently for him to speak.

“Things aren’t going too well around here,” he finally admitted as he tugged on the knot of his navy blue tie as if to loosen the fabric so he could breathe easier. “Quite honestly, we’re having a bit of a cash flow problem, and I’m having a helluva hard time trying to locate your father.”

Confusion, and something more oppressive, enveloped her. “He’s supposed to be on a business trip in Chicago.”

“That’s what I thought, too,” George said. “Do you know where in Chicago he’s staying?”

“No.” It wasn’t a good sign that one of her father’s trusted employees was hoping that
she
had some insight to her father’s whereabouts. “Wouldn’t Sheila have that information?”

The older man laughed, but the sound lacked any real humor. “Yeah, that’s her job as your father’s secretary. She sets up your father’s business trips and keeps his itinerary. All last week she gave me the runaround about getting ahold of your father, along with a bunch of bogus excuses, until I finally confronted her on Friday evening and demanded she give me the information. Which she did right before she left for the day, except the hotel whose name and number she gave me doesn’t have anyone under the name of Grant Russo registered.”

Zoe walked farther into the office, each step feeling as though her shoes were weighed down with lead. “What did you say to Sheila when she came in today?”

George’s mouth twisted grimly. “She didn’t come in today. No call, no show. No answer on her house phone or her cell phone.”

Nope. Not good at all.
“Where’s the rest of the office staff?”

He met her gaze, his expression turning harsh. “They haven’t gotten a paycheck in two weeks, so most of them have walked out until they get paid or they’ve just flat-out quit.”

Oh, God.
Feeling as though the rug was being pulled out right from under her feet, Zoe sat down in one of the chairs in front of George’s desk. “That’s not all, is it?” She instinctively knew there was more and it wasn’t going to be pleasant.

The man shook his head. “Not only are checks bouncing, but big money is missing from accounts that normally hold money in reserve. The Meridian project has shut down, without a legitimate reason that I can find, and we’ve been inundated with calls from angry sub-contractors who did work but haven’t been paid and now I can’t locate your father to get answers. All I know is that whatever is going on, it’s bad, and I have a feeling it’s going to get worse.”

She thought about the man who’d confronted her a week ago and how bitter and angry he’d been because he hadn’t been paid. There was also that Davenport man who’d made a scene at the casino Friday night. That was two people out of a dozen or more who were probably furious with her father, and the company, for withholding their money. What if someone had gone so far as to hurt her father, or worse, in their attempt to exact retribution?

She forcibly swallowed the huge lump of dread that had gathered in her throat. “Do you think something bad happened to my father?”

“I don’t know,” George said, his features suddenly softening with an emotion that looked like empathy. “But I have to be honest with you about something, Zoe, because you have the right to know. I’ve been doing my damnedest to figure out what went wrong with the finances, and all signs are pointing to your father having embezzled millions of dollars from the investment accounts. I’ve found discrepancies in financial records and bank statements, and possible evidence of wire fraud, and it just doesn’t look good that nobody seems to be able to locate your dad.”

An instant denial sprang to her lips to defend her father, but she could no longer ignore the very real possibility that her father
was
guilty of fraud and had gone rogue. She didn’t want to believe it, but it was as though everything she’d been denying for the past week was slowly unraveling and becoming her worst nightmare.

“I’m sorry, Zoe,” George said, his tone compassionate. “If your father doesn’t show up, and soon, there is no doubt in my mind that the Feds are going to get involved and things are going to get very, very messy.”

She could only imagine. Her conversation with Sean last Friday night played through her mind, along with the undisputable fact that The Reliance Group had been hired by a respected businessman who’d invested millions of dollars into the Meridian project, and how that same man was trying to find her father to reclaim his loan because the project had been shut down without legitimate cause—except the lack of money to pay people.

Everything Sean had tried to tell her was now being backed by someone from the inside, a man who had access to records and accounts and
the facts.
As much as it pained her to do so, she had no choice but to face the truth, because there was no ignoring the cold, hard, irrefutable evidence piling up against her father.

And what was up with Sheila giving George false information and disappearing, too? Was there any chance Sheila was intimately involved with Zoe’s father and was protecting him and the millions of dollars that were missing from the company?

Zoe had a difficult time believing that the two of them were lovers. Sure, Zoe’s father had always talked very highly of Sheila as a competent, efficient secretary, yet Zoe had never seen her dad treat Sheila with anything other than courtesy, respect, and professionalism. Not only that, but Sheila wasn’t even close to the type of woman Grant was attracted to and dated. In every way, Sheila was the antithesis of the young, blond, silicone-enhanced arm candy Zoe’s father preferred.

Which made the thought of Grant Russo running off with Sheila all the more confusing to Zoe.

Her temples throbbed with the beginnings of a headache. She felt as though she were trying to put together a giant, convoluted jigsaw puzzle and was missing crucial, key pieces. She needed some kind of solid, concrete answer, something tangible to confirm, or affirm, her doubts and uncertainties about her father’s relationship with Sheila.

An idea came to Zoe, one that might prove helpful if she was able to get George to cooperate. “I need to ask a favor. With Sheila now being gone, too, I’d like to take the hard drive from her computer.”

George frowned, looking confused. “What for?”

“I know someone who can analyze the information on hard drives, and since Sheila is my father’s main secretary who plans all his trips and itineraries, I’m hoping he might recover something that could indicate where my father is.” And Sheila’s whereabouts, too.

Zoe figured if Lucas wasn’t able to find anything incriminating or helpful on her father’s home computer hard drive, Sheila’s might prove to be more useful. It was worth a shot, anyway.

George hesitated for a moment, then released a heavy sigh and finally relented. “Fine. Take it.”

They walked to Sheila’s office, and Zoe waited while George retrieved the hard drive out of the secretary’s computer. He handed to Zoe the component, which she’d pass on to Sean tomorrow.

Still feeling numb from everything she’d just learned, Zoe left the building as though she was operating on autopilot. She got into her car and just sat there, staring blankly through the windshield, her mind spinning with daunting thoughts and an awful, sinking sensation taking up residence in the pit of her stomach.

None of this made sense to Zoe. The Grant Russo she’d known all her life was honest and generous and kind. An ethical, hardworking businessman who treated his employees fairly and had built a reputable development company. He wasn’t some kind of scheming, cheating con man who would, without conscience, bilk innocent people out of paychecks and investments due to them.

Her eyes burned with tears she valiantly tried to blink back as she navigated her way home. She
needed
to find her father and wanted desperately to believe he’d be able to explain away all the claims against him and everything would return to normal. She clung to that bit of hope, because it was all she had left.

God, she felt so lost and alone and confused. She knew she’d made a promise to keep Sean informed of any new revelations concerning her father, but she couldn’t find the strength to admit that Sean might be right and that some of the things he and Caleb had alluded to were proving to be true.

She picked up her cell phone to call Jessica and tell her what had happened but remembered that Jessica was on a date with Noah. Zoe didn’t want to interrupt her best friend to vent about her own personal family drama—or give Jessica an excuse to cut her evening with Noah short to comfort her. Those two had things to work out between them and needed whatever time they could get together before Jessica left on tour.

Briefly Zoe thought about contacting her mother, but if Zoe relayed what she’d just learned from George, she knew without a doubt that Collette Russo would freak out. Instead of offering her daughter a sympathetic shoulder or ear, her mother would give Zoe nothing but grief over the fact that
she
wasn’t getting her alimony. And that was the last thing Zoe wanted to hear from her self-centered parent.

Resolved to spend the evening alone to try to process everything she’d discovered that afternoon, Zoe continued toward her place. When she reached the Panorama Towers, she punched her code into the gate-control box, then gave a friendly wave to the familiar guard at the security shack as the electronic iron gate opened for her.