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She lifts her head up to glare at him. “You’re the worst.”
He leans forward and smacks her ass as Mikey walks them out of the room. “That’s not what you were saying last night.” My lips twitch at the sound of her groan as they move out of hearing distance.
Jade and Rachel trade looks, before turning their attention to D. “We can stay and start to go through the files Noah needs to look through?” Jade suggests and Rachel eagerly nods. He accepts easily and they both move to sit behind computers and wait for my instructions.
I look down at the papers in my hand, something Charles said still bothering me. “Why did the logo give it away?”
He rubs the back of his neck and looks at the floor before sighing. “I didn’t see it when I was younger,” he starts off defensively. But I don’t get the feeling that he’s defending himself to us. More like trying to justify his flaws even all these years later in an attempt to soothe the guilt. Guilt that may very well be misplaced after everything we’ve learned today.
“You wouldn’t hold a child accountable for the actions of adults. So stop blaming your younger self,” Declan interrupts him.
The look in Charles’ eyes makes me feel uncomfortable. Not because it’s wrong, but because it hurts to see how badly he needed to hear those words. I never wanted to like the guy, but slowly through our interactions I could see why Scar was having a hard time. I wanted to hate him because Kade and Luca would never do so without a valid reason, but it was clear how much he cared for Scar. Even now. Almost a decade since they were close, he still is fighting to help her. Hard to hate a guy like that.
Jealousy slithers down my spine. That’s something I don’t think will ever go away with my girl. I don’t mind sharing her with the guys. I’ve seen how much she needs them. How we all complete each other in a completely wild and fucked up way. We’re happy in our current dynamic. It feels good. Full.
Declan and Ryder both came in before we had that feeling. Everything felt up in the air. I was hanging on for as long as I could but never thought Scar could love me back. It’s different now.
I might come to like Charles, but I don’t want to share Scar with him. I don’t want to find a new dynamic. I like ours. The pain in his eyes reflects the same demons I’ve seen in the mirror, seen in Scar’s… and Declan’s… and Kade’s. Fuck. All of us bear similar scars.
Declan gave him exactly what he needed to hear like we all do for each other. He instinctively comforted him the way he would any of us. It’s almost a little too easy to see how he could fit amongst us. And I hate it.
Air hisses through my lips as I force myself to release the breath I’ve been holding as my lungs begin to burn. Fuck me. I’m not usually the emotionally charged one.
“We won’t blame a child,” I add in reassurance. Regardless of my feelings on the possibility of change, I won’t take it out on someone obviously hurting. Not in this way at least. If he crosses lines, I won’t hesitate to sic Kade on him. His anger and hate towards Charles will probably never completely disappear.
“My father,” Charles starts again. “He never really cared. Was never really around.” He stares off at a wall in silence, trying to find a way to string the thoughts into words that fully encapsulate the horrors he must have experienced. “Looking back it’s easy to see how when he did show interest, it always had to do with her.”
Declan nods along with his words and the sick feeling in my stomach intensifies. “Not always in obvious ways. Like he cared about my class schedule and my extracurriculars. But the changes always put me on the same schedule as her. We always loved it, thought it had to do with the inevitable merging of our families.”
“It didn’t?” Jade asks, confusion marring her face.
Charles shakes his head, sadness and grief emanating from his body. “It just made it easier for him to keep an eye on her through me. What was she participating in? How were her grades? What did she like? Never asked quite directly but with a ton of other questions that buried his intent and masked his attempts as an interest in his own kid. He drilled into me the importance of taking care of her as she would be my spouse. I was punished if she was hurt on my watch.”
“Creepy,” I agree, “but how does this lead to the logo?”
“He always gave her daisies,” he answers. “Called her his little daisy,” he continues and my stomach turns, the connection now obvious. No wonder she lost it at the sight of the logo. “Not often enough to raise any real flags, but often enough that we had our own little jokes about it. He stopped as we got older, around the time that we would have realized how odd it was.”
He shudders and I reflexively mimic the action at how sick the entire picture he paints. “As soon as I saw the logo, all those memories, all the once seemingly innocent moments came flooding back in a new light. A much darker one and I just knew.”
I look down at the USB still in my hand and get to work.
* * *
“It’sa lot worse than we thought,” I whisper to Luca. They just got back from seeing the progress on Poison and I hate to destroy the fragile peace they’ve found. But this can’t wait.
His eyes darken as he studies my face, trying to read my mind to prepare himself for how bad it is. He breathes heavily and I take it as a sign to get on with it.
“Not that anyone is surprised, but it’s a shell corporation. A good one though. He definitely knows how to cover his tracks. There’s a home office, a website, he files taxes, has detailed expense reports. The whole nine yards.”
“Okay,” he says questioningly.
I rub the back of my neck. “Well, it doesn’t seem like the reports are forged at all. Just the intent behind them is a lie.” I put up some of the information I’ve been able to pull from the USB Charles gave me onto the large screen in the center of the room. “Business conferences, meetings, marketing research. These are all trips that have been written off, but if you throw the locations based off of his receipts onto a map.” I open the map and thousands of red dots appear on it showing where Donaue has traveled to.
Scar stays quiet as she leans against the wall with her eyes shut. She almost looks indifferent, but I know better. She’s simply taking everything in, giving herself time to process the new information before letting her feelings in.
“He travels a lot?” Luca asks.
I’m not explaining this right. I cue in the animation I set up so each dot appears in the order of the dates those trips were taken. “This shows the timeline the trips were taken,” I explain. Luca’s eyes widen as he watches the dots disappear and then slowly begin to reappear one by one starting all around the town Scar grew up and rolling out like a terrifying wave across the country.
