“We could increase your orders one hundredfold. Increase your orders, increase your success. This would in turn lead to you requiring more raw materials.”
“My raw materials are sourced locally. Highland wool and sheepskin—”
“You would need to outsource. Buy sheepskin from China, for instance.”
“I don’t understand. There are more sheep than people in Scotland.”
“You would receive shipments of Chinese wool to help with the influx of orders.”
Then the penny drops like a lead weight. “Along with other imports, I assume you mean.”
“One arm of my business deals with imports.” He adjusts the cuff of his shirt, his words matter-of-fact.
“Drugs?”
“Sometimes drugs, sometimes people. Sometimes other things.”
Oh, my God. He’s serious.
“Another of my businesses deals in exports.”
“You want to take over my business to help you import—”
“No, the business will be yours. In your name.”
“Therefore, the risk would be mine?”
“You assume there would be a risk. You assume this is what I would do. But I think this is too distasteful for you.”
“Just a bit.” I blink heavily. Meanwhile, he barely does so.
“A lady of your reputation, your standing. I understand.”
“If not my brother, if not importing illegal items, what else is there?” What am I bargaining with here?
“My friend… Michael,” he says, seemingly picking the name out of the air. “Mikheil, he buys a tweed jacket from you. The price is a little higher than was advertised last season but that’s inflation,” he adds with a theatrical shrug. “He pays for the jacket and recommends it to his friends, who all buy the same. They all pay by credit card, your website host receives their fee, the online payment platform, their cut also. Then you receive the balance into your bank account. You send the jackets, or not—”
That noise. I think it was my jaw hitting the table.
“You’re talking about money laundering,” I whisper, horrified.
“And you are not just a pretty face!” He jabs the air like I’m a child who just recited a clever ditty, then picks up his fork again.
“But surely, my very small business won’t be enough. If the business grows too fast, it’ll draw the attention of the authorities.”
“You might be the face of any number of businesses, their bank accounts wreathed in a web of protection. Bank accounts owned by shell companies registered offshore. Mysterious trusts you co own with persons living elsewhere.”
“So I’d be a front? Isn’t that what it’s called? A patsy?”
His fork drops to his plate and he bursts into the kind of laughter that’s far too much for this restaurant. “He did not tell me you were so amusing.”
“Tom?” I ask, horrified a measure more. To think I’ve been discussed, offered up like some fatted calf. I will kill him. I will literally murder the man! I’ll run the bastard over with my stupidly old Range Rover!
“He did not tell me you were beautiful, either.”
“I—” Bloody hell. The way he’s looking at me is unpleasant. I don’t like it. I don’t like it at all.
“So.” He picks up his fork and sets to his smoked salmon and eggs again. “You will open other businesses on my behalf. Lady Isla, upstanding business owner, doer of charitable works, member of the aristocracy. You will be beyond reproach.”
“You’d be in the minority to think so. In days gone by, people might’ve respected those who were seen as their elders or betters, but those days are long gone.” Good riddance too, I say.
He gives an unconcerned flick of his shoulder and reaches for his cup. “The National Crime Agency is woefully underfunded and very wary of litigation. Especially when it would involve someone of your background. So this will work in your favor.”
“How sure can you be of that?” Desperation leaks from my reply. “I’d think it would put a target on my back.”
“Who would they be more resistant to investigate, me or you?”
“My title won’t protect me,” I add quickly. “I know it won’t. But I suppose you don’t care about that.”
“It would be a shame to expose one as lovely as you to the criminal elements.”
“Like you, you mean.”
“Like a prison cellmate. Ah, I can see I have upset you. Don’t worry, my lady. This will never happen. The NCA would not think twice but a dozen times before investigating the sister of the Duke of Dalforth.”
“So that’s it.” I slump backward in my chair, my mind filled with a million things. “That’s what I have to do to keep my family safe?”
“And your ex-husband alive.”
I shake my head. Him I’ll kill myself. “For how long? How much money, or however these arrangements work.”
“Indefinitely.”
“No, that can’t be right. That would be like some version of indentured servitude. I get to live forever under the threat of violence or criminal investigation, meanwhile, Tom gets off scot-free?”
He folds his arms before bringing a finger to his lips, tapping it pensively. “No, he forfeits the land, the project.”