“And me and my family,” Luke said pulling a nod from her. “Dani, do you know how stupid not telling me was? What if they’re out there watching you?”
“That’s why I stayed with you, put up with…things, because we’re in the public eye and there’s Brad watching over me every time that I leave the house. They’re not going to risk coming after me, after us while…”
“What Dani?” he asked when she stopped.
“While we have proof of who sent Chance to me in the first place,” Dani admitted making Luke’s eyes widen in shock.
“What are you talking about?”
“The camera that caught you, it also caught my argument with Chance,” she said pulling up the file and playing it. She’d edited out the beginning where he’d been demanding to know where Dean was but left enough for it to show that they were after her.
Luke watched his fists clenching as Chance went after Dani. He hated seeing the fear in her eyes and the last look she wore, as though she were resolved to die terrified him.
“I’ll never…” she stated before his hand closed around her throat. Her eyes begged for death.
“No, you’re too valuable to us alive,” Chance taunted kicking her.
“Who’s us?”
“Me and Felix of course Danielle. You remember Felix, right? He and Dean had a lovely chat.”
“I don’t know Felix.”
“Everyone knows Felix you stupid bitch. Felix Gaston, the owner of all of southern Florida. He’ll be quite happy when I bring you to him. Who knows, he may like you enough to marry you. You do have the body for it.”
“Go to hell,” she said backing away. “I’ll never…”
Chance jumped her slamming her head into the wall and she slid down it as Luke entered the picture.
He stopped the video and stared at her. “Dani, hell baby…”
“I’d rather have married you knowing you hated me than let them get anywhere near me. I thought I could do this, but I can’t,” she said allowing the tears to fall.
“God, baby.” Luke groaned wrapping his arms around her and holding her against him. “You should have said something before now.”
“I couldn’t; I hadn’t planned on staying. I was going to take the money I still had and the two flash drives and disappear, but you hired Brad on fulltime…”
“And trapped you,” he said when she stopped.
“Yeah, I thought I could stick it out until you relented enough to let me go but then I got pregnant.”
“And you were trapped again.” Luke sighed, seeing the pattern they were trapped in and none of it boded well for them.
“I was so mad at first but then I realized I wanted the baby. The week before I had the miscarriage, I realized that I wanted it. I wanted to have someone who wouldn’t hate me for what I’d done and then it was gone and I…I feel like I’ve been swimming away from the edge of a waterfall. I constantly move but I can’t get anywhere. Add in it being my birthday and everything else…it’s just too much.”
“Dani, baby please don’t cry.” He groaned wiping away the tears. “I hate it when you cry.”
“I know but there’s two almost three years’ worth built up and I…I’m okay…” Dani pushed back all of her emotions and walked back to the computer. She pulled up the bank account information and sent the deposit to his account then walked over to the safe to get the flash drive.
“Here, it’s the only copy left. I scrubbed the file from the computer and the system and the other one ends after he comes at you,” she told him holding it out to him. “Luke please, just take it. I can’t keep it anymore.”
“Youscrubbed the file from the computer? Dani, how did you manage to pull off the transfers in the first place?”
“You might as well know it all. I graduated from high school early and then from college in computer sciences when I was nineteen. I have an affinity with them I guess you could say.”
“That’s not what your background check showed when we hired you,” Luke stated. The confusion and wonder on his face made her fight a smile.
“I’d ran Luke. I was trying to get as far from Chance and Felix as possible, so I changed my background, my last name. I didn’t want them to find me but unfortunately someone was following me from the start.”