Page 103 of The CEO Alpha’s Substitute Mate

“Do we have any direct communication lines between these people and the Thornes?”

Damien shakes his head. “I’ve looked, but whoever used these people was clever enough to scrub everything.”

“But they didn’t scrub the money trail?” I ask dubiously. “Tell me you see the problem I’m seeing.”

“It’s too neat,” Damien mutters. “The only thing missing is a big fat bow on top.”

We study the scene together. I want to keep digging, but with the pack meeting coming up and Luca’s public health check, I need to wrap this matter up. “We’ll bring Thorne to trial in front of the pack elders. Let’s do that on the surface and keep digging quietly.”

“You do realize that a lot of them will probably be complicit in this.”

My mouth twists in a cold sneer. “Oh, I’m aware. I just want to see how many of them protest. The ones that do will lose their heads.”

Damien just sighs. “Great. More work for me.”

Ignoring him, I order, ““Excavate him and put him with the others.”

He signals the men at the tarpaulin, wiping his palms down trousers already beyond saving. We begin the walk back to where our cars are parked on the other side of the territory.

“Silas may be greedy,” Damien begins thoughtfully, “but he’s not a fool. He’s not doing this alone. Whoever it is is trying to make us look in his direction really hard.”

I agree with him. “What do we have so far?”

“The driver was hired by the Thorne family, or a shell corporation of it. The two IT specialists were paid off by Thorne. They were also lured to their deaths. Now that we have the driver’s identity, we’ve found his apartment. It’s paid off, and he has no family, so nothing was touched. I’m having men search it as we speak.”

“It’s too easy. Too in-your-face,” I reiterate.

“Do you think the Thorne family is being framed?” Damien asks cautiously.

“No, they’re definitely involved. Otherwise, how would the bodies be found here? But it doesn’t seem as simple.”

Damien’s phone goes off before he can answer that. He listens with his head tipped, says, “Send the video,” then stops short of the cars with his thumb moving on the screen.

“They pulled security footage out of the driver’s apartment,” he reports. “He had a camera up in his own living room. This one is from the day before the accident.”

He turns the phone toward me. The recording starts on an empty room, shot from the top of a TV or something. Ezra comes into view. He gets close to the camera, fixing something, and then the camera topples. Nothing can be seen above the waist. He opens the door, and somebody enters. It looks like a woman. She has a thick envelope in her hand that she seemingly hands over to Ezra. The camera catches him counting the cash on the table. Then he gets back up, and I can see his waist again. They’re clearly having a conversation. The woman gestures with her hands and then walks out. Something in her walk narrows my eyes. She’s too familiar, though I can’t place her.

“Damien, take a look at her.”

He takes the phone. When he gets to the woman, his jaw tenses, and he replays it, only her part where she walks in. He replays it again. And then again.

“No.” His voice is hoarse. “There must be something wrong with the video. A glitch or something.”

“Damien, who is it?”

Wind moves through the birches, and the silence that falls between us is heavy. He says it again, quieter. “No. There’s something wrong with the video.”

He’s recognized her.

“Who is it?”

Damien’s mouth opens, and then he whispers, “Look at her wrist.”

I take the phone, and my eyes fall on the woman’s right wrist. There’s a thin bracelet on it, an unremarkable looking thing, one that I’ve seen hundreds of times and never paid attention to, a half-moon charm hanging from it.

“I gave that to Isabella for her tenth birthday.” Damien looks pale. “She’s never taken it off.”

It can’t be Isabella. Why would she—?