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“I’ve tried talking to you. Hell, I tried today in your office, but you don’t want to listen to reason. You never take me seriously.”
“You mentioned Simone—”
“And her team,” he interrupts me heatedly. “You only heard Simone’s name and tuned out all the rest, as per your usual.”
He’s not wrong. Anytime Trent speaks of Simone, I immediately see red, and my ears buzz. The very name drives me up the wall. When he brought up his ex earlier in my office, I verbally lashed out at Trent, accusing him of still harboring feelings for Simone.
“I only brought her up because I was trying to warn you.”
The hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. “Warn me?”
He yanks down his sweatpants, standing naked in front of me. For a moment, I’m distracted by his lean but toned frame until he drops a bomb on me. “Do you realize Mercy Ravens Security is only a few short days away from discovering who’s been stealing from the firm?”
My heart stops, dropping to my toes. “W-what?”
Trent nods, his face grave. “They have a program scanning all the digital records, sorting discrepancies from the hard copies Simone’s discovered. Your system for picking what accounts to take from is going to be cracked. Chase has attempted to keep it undercover, but it’s impossible to hide everything from me when I’m sitting in the goddamn room with him. That’s what I was trying to explain to you before you cussed me out of your office.”
Nervous, I scratch at the skin on my forearm. This is a nightmare. Yes, I had taken risks—enormous risks—by moving sizable sums of cash. But I thought I covered my tracks well. Apparently, not well enough.
“What do we do?”
“We?” he scoffs before turning on the shower and stepping into the spray. “You mean you. I’m not going down with this ship, Cynthia. Had you stopped when I told you to, this could have gone unnoticed. I’m not sure there’s much you can do other than dump the money into an account and abandon it for the security team to find.”
Abandoning the funds is not an option, not after all the effort I put into acquiring it. It was my lifeline to keep Trent in his place beside me. Without it, there’s nothing to tie him to me or hold over his head. And with Simone back in his sights, jumping ship was likely on his mind.
Desperation crawls up my spine, making me tremble. “No, Trent. I’m not returning the money, and I sure as hell won’t go down alone.”
Stiffening, Trent slowly turns his narrowed gaze on her. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me.” I swallow the lump in my throat, forcing my voice to be louder. “If I go down, you’ll come with me. You’ve been aware of this operation since I told you a year ago. You never stopped me, never turned me in. Law enforcement will consider you my accomplice.”
It’s a bold move, but I’m under the knife. I have to keep Trent in any way, shape, or form. Losing him would be my undoing.
Trent’s fingers coil into talons right before he rushes me, gripping me by the hair and pinning my body against the sink with his. Pain radiates down my body from where he yanks the roots from my scalp. I scream, tears springing to my eyes.
“Is this how you plan to keep me, Cynthia? With threats?”
I whimper pathetically in his hold, my fingers prying helplessly at his hands. Trent’s sudden aggression may have been triggered by my threat, but he’s never shown this level of violence before. Yelling matches are typical. Throwing shit against the walls when angry is normal behavior. Physical assault is not standard. The abuse is escalating, and it’s all because Simone returned.
As suddenly as Trent attacked, he releases me, shoving away from me as I grip at my sore head. I bite back my cries, alarmed by Trent’s viciousness. “What the fuck, Trent?”
“Don’t. Threaten. Me. Again.”
Still shocked, I try to justify Trent’s violent behavior. The man had lost his damn mind in the heat of the moment. He’s under a lot of duress, monitoring the auditors and making sure they don’t discover I’m the one stealing funds from the firm.
He’s trying to protect me. And I cruelly threatened him with jail time.It’s my fault he reacted the way he did.
A part of me knows there’s no excuse for assault, no matter if it’s provoked. But I squash those thoughts, ignoring the red flags as a one-off. It won’t happen again.
Cracking his neck, Trent returns to his shower as if nothing transpired between us. “You have forty-eight hours to dump the funds.”
Forty-eight hours isn’t nearly long enough to unload the money without the Mercy Ravens finding connections leading to me. “Why the short time frame?”
“It’s all I can give you. Any longer, and I’ll risk my reputation.” He’s being vague.Why?
“And how will you buy me two days?”
Trent finishes rinsing off the soapsuds, stepping out of the shower to grab his towel. “Already handled.”
