“Walter!” Marie cried, but I didn’t let his words anywhere near my emotions. I knew he was simply a cruel man who did and said cruel things.
He waved her off. “Oh, save the hysterics, Marie. You don’t need to keep acting shocked by anything I’m saying. You knew who I was when you married me. Which is why you thought you had to keep the fact that Aaliyah was your daughter a secret.”
Just like that, the air was knocked out of Marie’s lungs as she stumbled backward. “You knew?”
“You really think I’m an idiot and couldn’t put two and two together? I allowed it, because I figured it could’ve been good to show our knucklehead son in a good light and marrying Aaliyah would’ve done that. I weighed the pros and cons of the situation and came to realize that it was the right business move to make.”
“You’re an evil man,” I said as my hatred built for him each passing second.
“Yes, well, at least I didn’t leave my daughter at a fire station in order to stay rich,” he said, rolling his sleeves up. “Are we done here?”
Marie had tears of horror rolling down her cheeks, and a part of me wanted to comfort her. But then again, she knew who she married. She knew who she crawled into bed beside each night. She made her bed, and now she had to decide for herself if she was going to sleep in it or move along on her own.
“We aren’t exactly done yet.” I pulled out my cell phone. I made a quick call and when the person on the other line picked up, I said, “Hey, yeah. It didn’t work out, so you can come in.”
Within seconds, Damian walked into the house, without knocking and came over to me holding a stack of paperwork in his hands.
“What’s the meaning of this?” Walter asked, his brows lowered. If there was anyone in the world he should’ve been intimidated by, it was Damian. Connor bathed in kindness and love. But Damian? He could kill a person solely with a look.
“Just a bit of good cop, bad cop,” I explained. “You should’ve really worked with me—I was the good cop.”
“And I’m the bad,” Damian said, dropping the packet on the coffee table.
“You really think I should be afraid of you and your tough guy act? You’re a child. Nothing you can do…” Walter picked up the files, and when he opened them, he paused his words. “Where the hell did you get this?”
“I’m the grave digger,” Damian calmly stated. “I dig shit up.”
“We are going to need you to do is sign all of Roe Real Estate over to Connor. You’re going to give him total control over it all, and you aren’t going to try to cheat him out of anything,” I told him.
“Otherwise, I’m sure the FBI would be interested in your whole money laundering issue,” Damian said.
“Money laundering?!” Marie gasped. It was becoming clearer and clearer that she knew nothing about what was going on with Walter and the life he seemed to be living behind her back.
Walter looked devastated by the fact that Damian caught him in a handful of scandals, some that would’ve easily landed him in prison for a very long time. Luckily, we didn’t want to destroy him, all we wanted was for Connor to have everything he worked so hard for.
Walter grumbled a bit and paced as he flipped through the pages. Then, he looked over to me. “I’ll have my team draw up the contracts to have everything transferred over to Connor.”
“Including the Queens property,” I said, knowing that Connor deserved the location that he’d fell in love with for his dream to come true.
“Fine,” Walter muttered, unamused.
“And one hundred million dollars for him to invest into said property,” Damian stated.
I tried not to react to such a high demand as Walter’s eyes bugged out.
“That’s ridiculous!” he shouted.
“Page five. Do you really want that coming out, Walty-Walt?” Damian dryly asked.
Walter flipped to page five. The look of shock hit him hard as he closed the packet. “Fine. Deal.”
Damian smiled. He actually smiled a big, bold grin. “It was great doing business with you, Rollsfield. I hope you have a good, fucked up life. Come on, Aaliyah, let’s hit it.”
As we turned to leave, my eyes locked with Marie’s for a moment. I saw the sadness in her eyes. My heart tugged a bit, but I wasn’t ready to deal with what that tugging sensation stood for. I wasn’t ready to deal with her hurts while I was still licking the wounds of mine.
Damian and I stepped outside, and I looked at him, a bit confused. “What was on page five?”
“Let’s just say it involved his pool boy in the Hamptons and plastic hot dogs.”