RISE - Part Three (The RISE Series Book 3) (5 page)

I'm suddenly glad that my brother hired Everett to represent my father. He needs the best if he's going to fight this.

"Why are the police accusing you of so many horrible things if you only signed a few policies that you didn't even write up? Can't you make them see that it was all a misunderstanding?"

His breathing stalls for a brief second before his eyes lock on mine. I see quiet resignation there. I feel it before he even speaks. "I did those things, Tess. I'm not innocent. I'm far from it."

***

T
he guard had called a ten minute warning to us after my father told me that he was guilty. I was grateful when he interrupted us because it gave me a moment to silence my heart's beat. I thought my dad, and the guard, would hear its steady rhythm. It was pounding, just as my mind was. I didn't expect this.

I knew when I arrived that I'd have answers to many of my questions. I didn't know that my father proclaiming his guilt would answer almost all of them in one fell swoop.

"I loved your mother, Tess." He smiles gently. "I loved her so much but something changed."

His declaration may have been welcomed in the middle of their contentious divorce, but today I don't want to hear any of it. I want to know more about the man who broke the law and then lived his life as if nothing was amiss.

"They said you are involved in the case of a missing woman," I say the words recklessly, not tempering the edge of anger that's there, in my voice. "Who is she? What happened?"

The muted accusation pushes him back in his chair. His eyes drop to my mouth before they settle back on my eyes. "I had nothing to do with that. I have no idea where she is or what happened to her."

That's more than I know. I hadn't taken the time or put in the effort to learn more about the woman in question. I had done that with purpose. I didn't want to catch a glimpse of her or see her name in print. I wanted her to be faceless and nameless so I wouldn't torture myself with imagined scenarios about what had become of her.

"Who was she?" I repeat the question.

"I'm trying to get to that." He sighs. "She was one of the agents who worked in my division. She wrote up those policies I told you about. She started everything in motion."

"Why didn't you go to the police then?" I push my palms against the edge of the table. "You should have gone to the police, dad. They would have arrested her."

"I couldn't do that." His weathered hands reach towards me, desperately seeking mine. "I cared for her, Tess. I thought I loved her."

––––––––

S
ince my parents divorced I've never heard either of them talk about loving someone else. I didn't expect my mother to seek out a new partner. She'd found her soul mate in the sorrow that she's immersed in since her marriage ended.

I always expected my father to date. He's an attractive man. He works out, he takes care of his appearance and his charm is undeniable.

I once asked him why he never pursued any of the women he'd met in the gym or why he wasn't interested in the beautiful brunette he always talked about from his book club.

The timing isn't right, he'd tell me. She's not really my type, he'd say.

It seems as though his type was an insurance broker writing fake policies who lured him right into her trap. She managed to do all that while he was married to my mother.

"Her name was Lydia. Lydia Keeley. She needed help. I helped her."

His voice is vulnerable in a way I've never heard before. I knew that the passion in my parent's marriage had waned. I assumed it was an inevitable part of life when two people settle into a routine with one another.

Now, the time my father bailed on our family vacation to North Carolina makes more sense. I don't have to question why he was always the one holding the camera when we stood in front of the fireplace for our annual family holiday photo. My brothers would run to get the tripod, but my father would wave them back to their places next to my sister, my mother and me.

He'd tell them that the lighting wasn't right with the tripod and he could always find our best angles. My mother's smile in those images wasn't as bright as it had been years before when he'd proudly stood next to her after asking the neighbor to step in to take the photograph for us.

They were small things that illustrated a major shift in the dynamic of their marriage. None of us noticed what was happening right in front of our eyes.

"What happened?" I push my hair back over my shoulders. "Where is she?"

He shakes his head, his shoulder slumping forward with the movement. "She left the office on a Monday afternoon to go meet a client. She never got there. They found her car in a parking lot a week later."

"When was that?"

"It was six or seven months after I ended things between us." His voice is low and quiet now. "The police questioned me about it then. They thought I had a hand in it. They were wrong. I may have stopped loving her, but I'd never hurt her."

***

"J
ust five more minutes," I plead with the guard. "I came all the way from New York. I had to take time off work and I won't be able to come back until next week."

The truth in that statement is so muddled with the half-truths that even I can't keep it straight.

I do have to focus on the event for Gabriel and if I leave now, I may not have the chance to tell my father about Landon and me. In a perfect world I wouldn't have to do it within a five minute time frame and with a guard breathing heavily nearby but this is what I've been given, so I have to make it work.

The guard points at the clock on the wall before he walks back to his post by the door.

"I need to tell you something," I spit the words out quickly while I press my hands over my eyes. "I'm sorry I have to do this."

I feel his hands grab mine. They're gentle and comforting, just as they've always been. "You can tell me anything, Tess. I will always be your father."

He will. I know that. Nothing can change that fact. If I have to take the train to Boston each week so I can visit him in a prison here, I'll do that.

"I told you I met someone."

"Frederick's son." There's no inflection in his tone at all. I can't gauge whether he's angry or not. "You've been seeing the older boy. He's the one who tried to save his father when the boat capsized."

"Landon," I say his name. "I met him on a flight."

He glances back at the guard. He knows as well as I do that our time together is almost done. "He turned his father into the police, Tess. That boy did the right thing."

I swallow as I consider my reply. I don't need to ask him how he knows. His lawyer told him. He's obligated to share everything with my father. I fumble with my words, wanting to challenge him on his declaration that Landon did the right thing. How is it the right thing if my father is going to be taken back to a jail cell within the next ninety seconds?

I don't have time to say another thing as the guard taps my father's shoulder. "It's time, Otis. We need to go."

"Thank Landon for me." My dad leans forward to kiss the top of my right hand. "Tell him I'm grateful for what he did."

––––––––

"H
e'll be released by the end of the week." Everett runs a hand through his dark hair. "I'd have him out sooner but that's when he's scheduled for arraignment."

"How much will the bail be?" I ask even though I can't cover it if it's more than a few hundred dollars.

I'd spoken to my siblings about how we'd raise bail when we all gathered for dinner at my mother's house after I saw my father yesterday. My mother was the first to offer her house as collateral. The silence that enveloped the room after she said that had mirrored what each one of us was feeling. We were shocked. She'd sprung back to life to help our father and when I left to catch the train to come back to New York last night, she had hugged me tightly, telling me that she'd never loved me more.

"No bail." He grins, before he slides open a drawer of his desk.

"No bail?" I parrot back. "Clinton said if they let dad go we'd have to come up with the bail money."

"All of the charges against your father are going to be dropped, Tess," he says softly. "He's going to be a free man."

"How is that possible?" I clench the arms of the chair I'm sitting in. "I spoke to him. He told me about what happened."

"Every shred of evidence against your father was gathered under questionable conditions more than ten years ago." He reaches for a pad of paper. "The state believes that your father's involvement in the crimes committed continued for years but I've produced proof that he contacted his superiors within the company and then stepped down as district manager and took on a job as a sales person in another territory."

I watch his lips as he speaks, trying to decipher exactly what he's saying. "I don't know that I understand."

"There is a statute of limitations for the crimes your father was accused of committing." He jots something down on the notepad. "That time frame has passed. The state asked for an extension, which is laughable. No judge will grant them that. It's unconstitutional."

"What about the missing woman? He told me about her."

"That's interesting." He taps the tip of the pen in his hand against the notepad. "Your father had an airtight alibi for that day. He couldn't have been involved in her disappearance."

"An alibi?" Confusion can't even begin to cover what I'm feeling. If my father had an alibi that would have taken his name off the list of people potentially involved in Lydia's disappearance, he should have produced that immediately.

He slides his suit jacket off before he loosens his tie. "I asked your father if I could share this. He had no qualms either way."

That's my father. He's open and honest to a fault but apparently not when he needed to be. "Where was he the day that Lydia disappeared?"

He rests his elbows on his desk, cocks his head to the left and shifts slightly in his chair. "Your father was in a hotel room near the airport. He was with Gianna Foster."

***

"I
'm happy for you, Tess," Landon says with his mouth pressed to my ear.

I want to pull back from the embrace so I can look into his face. I hear the honesty in his words but I know that a small part of him must have questions about my father's release.

"When will he get to go home?"

"After his arraignment," I offer as I push both my palms against his bare chest. "I haven't seen him since he got the news. I'm waiting to talk to him until he's back in California."

"Why?"

It's an expected question that I don't have an answer to.

After I'd left Everett's office and I'd come home, I'd thought endlessly about Gianna and my father. When I was offered the job to plan the Liore fashion show I jumped into it full force. I worked hard to prove myself to Gabriel and his brother, Caleb. I took chances, knowing that they might not like my style.

When Gabriel offered me the follow-up job in Los Angeles I was over the moon. I'd done it all because of my own hard work and perseverance. Now, I'm not so sure.

Even though Gianna has taken herself out of the role as advisor to the business, she's still more active than most people who actually work in management there. Her influence has touched almost every aspect of the event in L.A.

I no longer know if that's because of her insatiable need to control some small part of the company she once ran or if it's all about her relationship with my father.

He lives in Los Angeles. She travels there constantly. I'd be foolish not to believe the two are still connected.

"Landon." I look up at his face so I can focus on the man who has never wavered throughout all of this.

"Yes?" His full lips turn up into a sly smile. "What is it?"

"My father wanted me to thank you." I tap my hand on his chin. "He wanted me to thank you for turning your father in."

"I did the right thing." He reaches down to kiss me softly. "I did what needed to be done."

––––––––

"I
can't breathe when you do that to me," I mutter under my breath. "You need to stop. I'm begging you to stop."

He freezes in place. His labored breaths tickle my moist flesh. His shoulders are still resting against my inner thighs. I'm exposed and open. I've come twice already and if I don't stop him now, I'm liable to pass out from sheer pleasure.

"You need a time-out, Tess. You don't want me to stop."

He may be right but who am I to judge? I'd let him pick me up in the living room as I wrapped my legs around his waist. He'd pulled my clothing off so quickly that he'd torn a hole near the top of my dress where it buttons.

I hadn't wasted but a minute when I tried to unbuckle his jeans. I'd groaned out loud when I felt the outline of his erection pressing against the fabric. I wanted it then. I wanted to push him on the bed and slide my body over his, but he took control.

"Can't you just fuck me?"

The rumble of his laughter floats into me as he lazily draws his tongue over my core once more. "Can't I just fuck you?"

"I want it," I say brazenly. "I just want to feel you inside of me."

He looks up my body, his eyes stopping at my breasts before they settle on my face. "I love being inside of you. I love tasting you. I love it all."

I hold my hands against my chest as I try to find a deep breath. I'm flushed. I can see the pinkness as it pours over my skin.

"Will you kiss me?"

I don't have to say another thing before he's sliding his large frame over me. His cock presses against my thigh before he drags it along my hip until it rests against my stomach.

His hand leaps to my chin as he tilts my head to the left. His lips press into mine for a deep kiss.

I wrap my arms around him. I run my tongue over his bottom lip before I glide it over his cheek to his neck.

"I have to put on a condom." He kisses me once more, softer this time. "You can make me do anything, Tess. Anything."