Scandal Never Sleeps (31 page)

Absolutely, and Everly didn’t think Valerie was rowing her boat with both oars, so she might have wanted to kill Maddox. But being capable of his murder was something else. “I’ve worked with her for a
while. I’m a little surprised she managed to swindle a hundred grand. I definitely don’t think she’s smart enough to blow up a plane.”

Gabriel frowned. “Maybe her stupid is an act or she found greed motivating enough to get smart. Either way, I want the police to investigate. I’ll put together some information, then let them ask her questions. But I want you out of this as soon as possible.” He sighed and brought her closer. “I’d feel better if you came with me.”

“I’m perfectly safe in the office.” She still wasn’t convinced Valerie was anything but a bitch. Besides it wasn’t long before she was supposed to meet with her informant. She was fairly sure she’d be safe there, too. The parking garage was never empty before nightfall. Employees would be driving in and out, and there were plenty of security cameras. “Go. Do what you need to do. I’m fine.”

He leaned in and brushed his lips against hers. God, that felt good. “I’ll see you in a few hours. Don’t leave the building.”

She wouldn’t. Technically, the parking garage was attached. She glanced down at her watch. She had time.

Her office was blissfully quiet.

She went to the safe and pulled out the SD card she’d locked up previously. She sat down again and began downloading the photos. She wanted them on her laptop. Clearly, her desktop was no longer secure.

She stared at the third photo. She could see Mad through the window of her loft. He was smiling and he had a glass of her crappy brandy in his hand.

Her brother. What would her life have been like if she’d grown up with him?

She downloaded two more photos before her computer popped up a message that the destination drive lacked adequate space to store the files. Something was eating up her hard drive. She’d known she was having issues with this damn system.

Everly moaned. She hadn’t had the chance to fix or rebuild it, as
she’d intended. Because her laptop had been having issues, she’d planned on wiping the system and starting over clean, hoping it would clear the problem. She’d spent hours on Monday backing up her files to the external hard drive in preparation but hadn’t been able to finish the next step.

She hadn’t planned on spending her day performing computer CPR, but she suspected this evidence was important, and she needed to make another copy of the photos that she’d keep close—just in case. With grim determination, she double-checked that she’d captured everything she needed on her hard drive before she proceeded to wipe her system clean and reformat the drive. Once all that was done, she could finally reinstall the operating system but it was going to take her all freaking day.

Scott came by about thirty minutes later with a sandwich in hand. They talked about inconsequential things as though Scott knew she couldn’t discuss Gabriel. He kept it light. She dealt with a myriad of issues, the day flying by.

Hours passed before she looked up and realized it was time to meet her mystery contact. A little thrill of excitement zipped through her. Finally, something she could do. She’d felt so helpless the last few days, as if events were happening to her rather than her making them happen. The chance to be active was a relief.

She ejected the SD card. Backing up these pictures would have to wait until she could get her laptop running again. She wasn’t about to take the chance with this evidence, so she tucked the disc and her laptop into her safe, then withdrew her gun. She’d felt naked without it these last few days, but she hadn’t felt right carrying a firearm to a meeting with her new boss or the police precinct, so she’d left it behind. Now, she checked the clip and tucked it in her purse. The parking garage should be safe, but she wasn’t an idiot. If she couldn’t bring anyone with her, she must have some sort of backup.

Finally ready to get some answers, Everly called down to the
security office and got one of the guards on the line. He would watch over her from the cameras and send a sentry in if she got in trouble.

Now she had someone to watch her back. Everly could watch her own front.

It was time to figure out who her informant was and what the hell he knew.

•   •   •

S
o you’re telling me Mad was murdered over money?” Dax shook his head. “I always thought he’d fall off the roof while trying to sneak out of a married lady’s house. Or be shot by some jealous husband.”

Gabe looked at the receipts Dax had brought with him. It had taken his friend a few hours to gather the evidence they needed, discuss the situation with Connor, and cross town. He wished Everly would have made time to eat lunch with him, but she’d claimed she had too much to do. He’d spent a few hours organizing the receipts and Valerie’s HR file. Tavia had been right . . . and wrong. The purchase orders and receipts in the file looked damning but weren’t solid enough to convict Valerie if Mad had decided to threaten her with prosecution. But he may have found an ace up his sleeve. He had so much to wrap his head around but he’d been glad when Dax showed up.

“I don’t know if I would say it was entirely over money, but money was definitely involved. He apparently fucked Valerie at some point, before he dated Sara. I suspect he discovered that she was skimming money from the budget Crawford donated to the foundation’s galas. I found more information this afternoon. He’d gathered a pretty solid case against her. His secretary gave me a backup of his computer. According to her, he handed it to her in a sealed envelope the evening he died, just before he left the office.”

“Like he knew he was going to die?” Dax frowned.

“Hilary said he often did that before he went out of town because
he’d lost or dropped more than one laptop during his travels. He refused to use the same backup system as everyone in the building because he didn’t want anyone having access to his sensitive files. So he’d often backup to a thumb drive and seal it up in an envelope. When I asked Hilary where I should start figuring out how Mad ran this place and what plans he might have had, she handed me this thumb drive.”

Dax shook his head. “So you can piece together his case against Valerie?”

“Yeah. I found a whole folder about her. He’d compared the last three foundation fundraisers. Valerie handled all the ordering and catering for the last two. Between the year before Valerie stepped into this role and last year’s gala, the expenses went up nearly a hundred and fifty percent.”

Dax whistled. “Didn’t she think that would attract attention? Unless she’s stupid, she had to know it would.”

Gabe nodded, pondering Dax’s words. He was right; Valerie hadn’t been at all subtle. Everly had claimed the woman wasn’t smart. She’d managed to steal money, but not quietly. She had, however, shown enough creative accounting to make tracking her difficult. And that took brains. Still, if she’d been the one to blow up Mad’s plane, that would require more than passing intelligence. If she didn’t have much, wouldn’t there be some lingering clue? A smoking gun somewhere?

“I don’t know. Mad knew more than I first thought. I found some additional files, but he had them password protected. I need Connor to break in.”

He’d tried all the obvious passwords. He knew Connor could hack in, however. Since he wasn’t sure what he would find, he didn’t want Everly involved.

“Pressing charges against an employee for theft could give that foundation some bad press.”

“I don’t care.” He’d considered it and decided it was worth the bad
publicity to make sure that woman went to jail. If he was right, then she’d killed his best friend.

And he really hadn’t liked the way she looked at Everly. He knew a jealous woman when he saw one. Some women would merely be catty, but others—like Val—would go the extra mile. “The money was taken from Crawford Industries, not the foundation. It was an abuse of the company’s largesse, and as long as I come out with a firm statement of support for the foundation, it should be fine.”

Gabe didn’t worry about that. But what the hell was he going to do to keep Everly close to his side if the imminent danger passed? He could buy a couple of weeks at most because of the press. If he couldn’t change her mind by then . . . He cursed under his breath. He needed more time because he did not intend to become friendly strangers with her. He didn’t intend to be someone she said hello to at the kid’s birthday parties or at business meetings.

“I texted Connor. He’s already working up a dossier on Valerie. Roman has a couple of his associates compiling files on all of the workers here. And by the way, I talked to Everly’s mom this afternoon. She’s a real peach. She confirmed the information Everly gave us. I know your girl doesn’t want any more exposure than she’s already got, so I threatened her if she went to the press, just in time apparently. She was poised to make money off her daughter’s new fame.”

“If she speaks a word, I’ll ruin her.”

Dax chuckled a little. “I thought you’d feel that way. I spent some time with Everly’s employees. They’re really loyal to her. A couple admitted to being wary at first because she . . .”

“Has breasts?” He could imagine what some members of the cybersecurity team had thought about reporting to a petite female.

“Yeah. The last head of cybersecurity was an older guy, former military. Everly must have been a massive change for them. She proved herself very quickly. They now call her the queen of the geek squad. They like the hell out of her. They’re worried about her. You should be
prepared for them to give you a hard time. You need to face facts, Gabe. She’s happy here.”

Damn it, he’d rather have her with him at Bond. A working relationship would help foster their personal one, but she wouldn’t switch jobs for him. He respected that, even as he found it irritating. But she hadn’t given him much choice; he was going to have to deal because she was smart and competent and deserved her own career. Sara would likely back Everly up on this, so he would find himself outvoted.

“What else did you learn?” He wasn’t worried about any skeletons in her closet.

“She’s a hard worker. Everyone in her group likes her.”

Because Everly was the sort of woman who exceled. Unlike him, she hadn’t had a multimillion dollar company to fall back on. No inheritance. No cushy job or trust fund waiting for her. She’d had nothing but her own grit and she’d worked her ass off to succeed.

His heart constricted. He’d dated a lot of girls, but she might be his first real woman.

What was he doing with her? Playing around? Protecting his temporary turf? Because nothing they shared seemed that way. It felt so damn serious.

“She is exactly what she says she is,” Gabe said.

Dax nodded. “Yeah. You’re an asshole.”

“I know. I should have believed her when she said she hadn’t been another notch in Mad’s bedpost. But I can’t take it back now. And I can’t let her go.”

Regret weighed on him. He wished he’d had more time to convince her they could be great together. He would have come to the right conclusions about her platonic relationship with Mad on his own, but now he wouldn’t have the chance.

Dax nodded in complete agreement. “No. You can’t let her go. You need her. She makes you halfway decent to be around, man.”

“Asshole.” But he was smiling because it was good to have his friend’s approval. Dax liked Everly. Mad had loved Everly. Yeah, that
mattered, too. He wondered why Mad hadn’t trusted him with the knowledge that he had a sister.

His intercom buzzed. With a long sigh, he picked up the receiver. He recognized that he didn’t have the same enthusiasm for Crawford business that he had for his own company. He loved building planes and helicopters. As a boy, he’d been obsessed with anything that could fly. Bond had been his birthright. Crawford Industries might make him more money, and he just didn’t care. But Everly had a passion for this place. He couldn’t coax or force her to go to Bond Aeronautics with him, no matter how much he wanted to. She belonged here.

“This is Bond.”

“Someone from security is here to talk to you. He says he has information about security tapes.”

Shit.
“Send him in.”

Dax’s eyes widened. “What’s going on?”

“Someone broke into Everly’s office since she was here last. She asked the security guys to roll the footage to try to figure out who could have done it. Apparently, they found something.” He crossed the room and opened the door.

An older gentleman dressed in his Crawford Industries blue uniform stepped inside. He held a laptop and wore a frown as he nodded Gabe’s way. “Mr. Bond, I thought you would want to see this.”

Gabe sent the older man a grave nod. “Did you find footage of someone entering her office?”

“I definitely did. The door was locked, but apparently the woman had a keycard. Now, on the janitorial staff, the floor workers have cards that open almost every door, but they only clean the locked offices twice a week. This wasn’t Ms. Parker’s night, and the head janitor is a man.”

“What woman?”

The guard lifted the lid to the laptop and hit a key to start the video feed. The footage was black and white but showed the hallway outside Everly’s office clearly. The janitor, a short man wearing earbuds, moved
in front of the lens, sweeping his vacuum across the beige industrial carpet. He danced a little while he worked.

And then Gabe saw her. She’d tucked her hair up in a ball cap and she wore a blue janitorial jumper, though it hung off her thin frame. She started to look around, clearly nervous, but whipped her stare down, as though she knew exactly when and where the hall cameras would be aimed. But then any halfway decent burglar would know that.

“Who is she?” Dax asked.

He had a hunch, but it was hard to be completely certain. There were plenty of skinny, tall women working for Crawford. It was New York City, after all. The police would argue it could be any of them. Gabe leaned in, trying to discern anything definitive.

Then she lifted her hand to Everly’s doorknob and revealed something no real janitor would wear on the job: a delicate white watch. Chanel, if he wasn’t mistaken. Sure, it could be a knockoff, but why would anyone who immersed their hands in cleaning solution routinely as part of their job description wear jewelry that wasn’t waterproof? He’d noticed that same watch earlier when she’d done her best to stare Everly down.