“Not me—” Kam answers from where he’s crouched on the floor, hands in the air at the same time Ella tells me.
“Trish didn’t know that I didn’t know,” she comments softly, again looking behind me. “She wouldn’t tell me what he had”—she pales staring down at the lifeless man before looking back up at me—“but I know who he is so I’m pretty sure I know what you saw.”
I swear I can feel her heart break at this moment. Tears prick her eyes as she stares up at me.
“You don’t need to worry about that, my jailbird,” I murmur, vaguely aware that Kam is listening. Gripping her chin between my fingers, I force her to look up at me.
“You still love me?” she asks, her hand reaching up to the center of her chest and it dawns on me that the ring I gave her last night is there. Just beneath the deep red silk.
“Of course I still love you …” I trail off and take in a steadying breath, hating that there’s any doubt at all from my Ella. “I don’t want you involved in this and you should worry that you disobeyed me.”
“I didn’t,” she says and perks up. “You said I could accompany Trish.”
I’m speechless for a moment, staring down at her knowing she is once again topping from the bottom. “We’ll discuss this later,” I tell her and then kiss her gently. Then another kink in the chain dawns on me. “How did you get away from your security detail?”
“Silas?” she says and I nod, swallowing down the disappointment that she outsmarted the fuck out of me. “I left Silas by the powder room in the east wing on the first floor.”
“Go now, back to him. And you will text me once you are back with him. You will say nothing at all about what happened and you will go back to your seat and wait for me, is that understood? No … going around my rules or loopholes.”
My cunning, beautiful girl has the nerve to smirk at the last line. “Your ass will pay for that, Ella.”
She bites down on her bottom lip and it slips out easily as she murmurs, “Yes, sir.”
“Kiss me,” I command her and she does. As if there isn’t a worry in the world.
“Now go.” I send her off and she waves at Kam, telling him goodbye as well.
It’s only when she’s gone that I breathe out deeply, staring down at the unanswered messages from my brother and then to my left, to the dead body Kam has dragged onto the rug.
“Since I seem to be playing your game by your rules … How do we cover this up?” I ask.
Kam’s on his knees at the edge of the rug and I join him on the other side. “He lost a hell of a lot of money,” Kam explains with a grunt as he rolls the body up in the rug while I help. “As of two hours ago, his wife left him because she discovered the mistress he’s had on the side, along with the bank accounts being emptied. I’m guessing the cops are going to think he either ran off with the money to a remote island or killed himself.”
He says it so nonchalantly.
I look down at the body, his lower half now wrapped in a rug. There’s no way this guy could have killed himself like that.
“His body will be cremated by tomorrow.” Kam stretches with his arms above his head, then cracks his neck. “You probably don’t know how this works, Zander. We decide what goes on paper. The coroner has already determined that he shot himself after receiving phone calls from both his wife and mistress. They both left him over the loss of millions of dollars in a single week. It’s not uncommon.”
I’m speechless. The ease with which the explanation leaves Kam’s mouth is unfathomable.
The coroner hasn’t decided anything. The coroner hasn’t even seen the body. Yet Kam speaks like he knows it’s a done deal. He watches me with tired eyes. This man isn’t a ruthless killer, just a realist about the world Ella comes from. He said he would do whatever it took to protect her, and he meant it.
He doesn’t do this for the adrenaline rush. There’s a limit, and Kam has reached it, appearing far more battered than I’ve ever seen him.
“We’re going to take care of one another,” he tells me. “You understand?”
“I think so,” I say.
“You need to know so. There’s no going back. I don’t enjoy this, Zander. I don’t want this. But we do what we have to. You can understand that, can’t you?”
“I can.”
“Good, then marry her,” he says. “Legally, at the very least. There needs to be that level of protection.”
“What about my brother? What about The Firm? They’re waiting for me and for … him.”
“Your brother and The Firm can never know the details. They can learn of his disappearance when it’s reported in the papers.”
That one hits differently. A chill runs through me as I glance down at the body, the rug now wrapped around it twice and firmly secured.
“I don’t like lying to my brother.”
“You have to,” Kam says easily. As if he already knows I will go ahead with it.
I don’t want to lie to Cade. I did it once before, and it ended up with me nearly getting kicked out of the goddamn group. And I don’t like lying to the rest of the team.
But if this is what it takes, I’ll do it. Anything for Ella.