Total pages in book: 211
Estimated words: 201554 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1008(@200wpm)___ 806(@250wpm)___ 672(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 201554 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1008(@200wpm)___ 806(@250wpm)___ 672(@300wpm)
The phone rings and she looks awkward, like she’s not sure if she should do her job and answer the phone. “Answer it,” I order. “I’ll wait.”
She smartly picks up the phone. “Kingston Motors, can I help you?” Her lips part as if she’s heard something shocking. “Mr. Kingston. Yes.” Her gaze darts to me as she says, “He’s standing right here. Yes. Of course.” She punches the hold button. “He wants to talk to you.”
“Conference room,” I say, heading to the left of the desk toward a set of stairs that will lead to a lower level opposite Gigi’s private domain. Gigi, who might have convinced Harper that she’s a new woman, but I know better. She has an agenda, something she’s after, something I can give her, and she’s smart enough to know I’ll find out what that is and she’s willing to take that risk.
I take my time going down the stairs, aware that my father could have called my cellphone. He called the office phone to record my reply, or allow Isaac to listen in, or both. Once I’m at the double glass doors of the lower level, I open them to enter the massive conference room, where I head to the end of the mahogany table and grab the phone, punching the line. “Father,” I say, though that word is acid on my tongue.
“I understand you’re now a stockholder.” His tone is dry, unaffected, but then he enjoys games, and while I don’t, we’re smack in the middle of one.
“I never pass on a steal of a deal. I got it cheap. Those recalls haven’t been kind to your stock or apparently your cash flow.”
“Our cash flow is just fine.”
“Considering you had to sweep Harper’s trust fund out from underneath her,” I say, “I imagine it is.”
“Sweep her trust fund?” He laughs. “That’s a joke. You don’t know half the story, boy, but you will. I’m on a private jet about to head home. We’ll talk and I promise you that even that genius brain of yours will feel enlightened.” He disconnects and I lean back in my seat. I don’t know half the story. He’s right for once where I’m concerned. I don’t know half the story, but I’ll know it all soon.
My cellphone rings and I snake it out of my pocket to find Blake’s number on the caller ID. “Talk to me,” I say, answering the line.
“There are cameras and recording devices in the room you’re in, which from what I can tell has been the case for years.”
“Of course,” I say dryly, finding the idea of my brother recording people and using those recordings against them—me included if I give him the chance, which I won’t—highly probable. “What else?”
“About fifteen minutes after you left your brother’s office, the tech team for Kingston Motors suddenly began deleting chunks of data; which even dumb shits like me that don’t have your genius IQ can assume is to hide damning information before you gain access.”
“Only it’s too late to matter.”
“Exactly,” Blake confirms. “I have everything downloaded as planned for comparison. I’ll send you a secure data file that homes in on exactly what was deleted. It’ll take a few hours once they finish what they’re doing to finish the analysis on our side, but it’ll allow you to see what matters, which is what’s now missing.”
“That’s going to be an interesting study.”
“Even more interesting, we’ve hacked all cellphones, emails, and external communications. Isaac somehow called his tech team and your father without me knowing when he did it, which tells me that he has a phone line or device that we don’t know about.”
In other words, he was operating off the grid before I walked in the door. “There’s a person I wanted you to focus on,” I say, redirecting the conversation to where I want it: Harper.
“You wanted to know where Harper fits into the family hierarchy. She doesn’t. She’s not close to any of them. She isn’t even close to her mother anymore. Word on that is there’s tension between them, perhaps over the trust, though Harper still sees her twice a week. Outside of that, she doesn’t socialize with your brother or father.”
“Not now,” I say. “What about in the past?”
“We’ve gone back two years. She’s been removed from the family for at least that long.”
“And yet she’s still here,” I comment, half to myself. “What about Gigi?”
“She has more contact with her than the others, but I’d still call it limited.”
“Then there has to be someone else. Who?”
“If you mean love interests, we’re already working that angle, but on first glance, there are only two men she’s dated over the years. They’re both rich, powerful and involved with your father and brother. However, that doesn’t raise a red flag to me, necessarily. They were in and out of her life and inside her normal social circle. That’s who she’d be exposed to, and gravitated to, naturally.”