Chapter Twenty-Three
“What are you doing still up?”
Jackson had figured he’d be alone at this hour. Nick and Elliott had gone to bed around the same time he had. After hours of poring over the documents they’d brought, he’d been emotionally exhausted.
It was one thing to be told that Ridley had stolen from him but another to see it. If he hadn’t seen the wire transfer on the bank printout, he wouldn’t have believed it.
“Just looking at the information I received earlier.”
Elliott held up the pages he was reading. Even from across the room Jackson recognized the photo of David Finemore.
“Why are you still looking at that? We already know he and Ridley were scamming people. It’s over, Eli. Let it go.”
His brother made a frustrated sound and dropped the papers on the coffee table.
“What?” Jackson asked. It was hard to believe but his brother seemed almost more pissed off by the turn of events than he did.
“I feel like I’m missing something. Or maybe I just don’t want to admit that I didn’t see this coming.”
Suddenly Jackson understood. All his older brothers looked out for him, but security was Elliott’s specialty. Of course he felt guilty for not protecting him.
“None of us saw this coming. You can’t blame yourself for that.”
“I agree.”
They both turned to see Nick standing in the doorway. His brother had removed his dress shirt and tie and wore just a white tee shirt and slacks.
“You can’t sleep either, huh?”
Nick shook his head. He crossed the room and sat on the couch next to Eli, propping his feet on the coffee table in front of him.
“I’m surprised you haven’t said I told you so. It’d actually be justified for once.”
Nick leaned back and crossed his arms behind his head. “Somehow, I’m not enjoying this as much as I thought I would.”
Jackson observed his brother from across the room. They all had stubble and looked tired but Nick looked the worst of them, easily. It made him feel marginally better that his brother wasn’t gloating. Especially since he’d tried to warn him about Ridley from the beginning.
“I just can’t believe she would do this. I would have just given her the money if she’d asked.”
Jackson gritted his teeth. He’d told himself that he wasn’t going to think about it but he’d been doing nothing but all night. Turning it over and over in his mind. He still had no explanations for why Ridley would steal from him. She had to have known that he was gone over her. So infatuated that it was embarrassing.
And why steal the money when she’d refused everything else he tried to give her? He’d offered to be a landscaping client and she could have easily billed him an outrageous amount for that. Instead she’d pulled weeds in his backyard and dug a spot for a garden for free. The day she’d gone to the mall he’d practically had to beg her to take the Audi. She could have just driven off with it and not come back. She’d even refused the money he’d offered her the previous day when he told her to leave.
It just didn’t make sense. He needed it to make sense. Maybe if he could understand it he could stop seeing her face when he’d told her to leave.
“Wait a minute,” Nick interrupted. “What do you mean ‘if she’d asked?’ You’re saying she never asked you for money?”
Eli narrowed his eyes.
“No. I already told you guys. She hated the idea of charity. She didn’t even want to have her sister as a landscaping client because she wanted to do it on her own. She didn’t want people thinking her success was due to her sister’s fame.”
Nick steepled his fingers. “What kind of scam artist doesn’t even try to scam you out of the money first? Why come here and get all cozy with you if she wasn’t buttering you up?”
“She wasn’t buttering me up for anything.” Jackson glared at them both. She was just burying herself so deeply in my life that I can’t function without her.
“Well, if she wasn’t trying to scam you, then what the hell was she doing? If all she wanted was your banking information, she didn’t need to stay this long to get it.” Nick spoke so softly that Jackson wondered if he knew he’d said the words aloud.
Elliott sat up, a grim look of determination on his face. “Something about this doesn’t add up for me. We need to figure this out. Fast.”
“How?” Jackson ran his hands over his hair and blew out a breath.
“By going back to the beginning. Everything started with the car accident, right? The authorities indicated that it wasn’t an accident.”
“If you say she’s a murderer, then I’m going to hurt you. I don’t believe Ridley killed David.”
“I don’t believe she killed him either, but someone did. Which leads me to wonder what they hoped to accomplish? Were they actually trying to kill the guy or just scare him? And how does Ridley fit into the picture? If she’s not involved, then why are they coming after her?”
Jackson sat up straight. “The necklace!”
“The what?” Nick and Eli spoke in unison.
Ignoring their puzzled looks, Jackson ran upstairs to his room. He opened the door to his closet and pushed aside the row of black suits in front of his wall safe.
“Jackson, what the hell is going on?” Eli’s voice floated from behind him.
Jackson ignored him and punched in the electronic code. The numbers flashed and then a soft click indicated the unit was open. He pulled the door open and reached behind the pile of documents he kept on the bottom row. When he turned around, he held the necklace up to the light.
“I think I know what they’re after.”
Eli took it and ran his hands over the front. “What is this?”
“Ridley said David gave her this for safekeeping the day he died. That he was chasing down a lead and didn’t want it to get stolen. Do you think the jewels are what they’re after?”
Eli flipped it over and then grinned. “That’s not a necklace.” He yanked on the ends. It snapped in two.
“Wait… Did you just break it?”
His brother held up the two ends triumphantly. Jackson stopped in his tracks. One end looked like a jeweled pendant. The other end looked like a computer port.
“What is that?” he asked.
“This, little brother, is a flash drive. Now let’s go see what the hell was worth killing for.”
* * *