Chapter 5 - THE DEAD WOMAN’S SECRET
No one spoke for several seconds.
Mara heard only the refrigerator humming.
“That’s not funny,” she said.
Preston looked sick.
“I’m not joking.”
Dominic picked up the flash drive.
“What’s on it?”
“Payments. Emails. A private security company called Bellweather Risk.”
Dominic knew the name.
Mara could tell.
“What?”
“Bellweather does political cleanup.”
“What kind of cleanup?”
Dominic looked at her.
“The kind you don’t put on a website.”
Mara turned to Preston.
“You knew?”
“Not then.”
“When?”
“Three weeks ago.”
“Three weeks.”
“I started searching after your mother’s old accountant contacted me.”
“My mother had an accountant?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t anyone tell me?”
“Because Senator Thorne buried everything.”
Mara’s chest tightened until breathing hurt.
Preston continued.
“The accountant said Eleanor had been trying to recover the stolen assets before she died. She gathered evidence. She planned to go to federal authorities.”
“And then her car crashed.”
“Yes.”
Mara sat down.
Dominic moved toward her.
She held up a hand.
“Don’t.”
He stopped.
She needed anger.
If anyone touched her kindly, she was going to break.
Preston’s voice softened.
“I’m sorry.”
Mara looked at him.
“You always are.”
He looked down.
“I deserve that.”
“No. You deserve worse.”
Dominic’s eyes flicked toward her.
She ignored him.
Preston said, “There’s something else.”
“Of course there is.”
“The SUV this morning.”
Dominic’s head lifted.
“What about it?”
“I heard Thorne on the phone before I left the house. He said, ‘The cemetery was supposed to scare her, not turn into a circus.’”
Mara’s blood went cold.
“He ordered it?”
“I don’t know if he ordered the vehicle itself. But he knew.”
Dominic picked up his phone.
Mara stood.
“What are you doing?”
“Making sure the senator doesn’t leave Chicago.”
“No.”
“Mara—”
“No!”
Dominic’s jaw tightened.
“He had your mother killed.”
“We don’t know that yet.”
“He sent someone after you today.”
“We don’t know that either.”
Preston cut in.
“He’s dangerous, Mara.”
She turned on him.
“You don’t get to warn me now.”
He flinched.
“You had four years to stand beside me. You left because a senator offered you a cleaner future.”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t.”
Her voice shook.
“You don’t know what it was like watching you marry her. You don’t know what it was like getting rejected from every decent job because suddenly no one would hire me.”
Preston stared.
“I didn’t know about that.”
“Her father knew.”
Dominic said softly, “He blacklisted you.”
“Yes.”
She laughed without humor.
“So when the Thorne estate offered me work, I took it.”
Preston looked horrified.
“You worked in Bianca’s house because my father-in-law ruined every other job?”
“Now you understand.”
His eyes filled with shame.
Mara did not enjoy it.
She thought she would.
Instead she felt tired.
Preston reached for the flash drive.
“Make copies. If something happens to me—”
The penthouse lights went out.
Dominic moved before anyone else.
“Mara, down.”
A window shattered.
The sound was enormous.
Preston jerked backward.
Blood sprayed across the white wall.
Mara screamed.
Dominic dragged her behind the kitchen island as another shot cracked through the glass.
“Sniper!”
His men poured into the room.
Preston lay on the floor.
Blood spread beneath his shoulder.
“Mara,” he gasped.
She crawled toward him.
Dominic grabbed her arm.
“Stay down!”
“He’s bleeding!”
“So will you if you move!”
Preston reached inside his shirt and pulled out a folded piece of paper.
His fingers were slick with blood.
He shoved it toward Mara.
“Your mother… left this with me.”
“What?”
“Don’t trust the letter.”
Mara stared.
“What are you talking about?”
Preston coughed.
May you like
Then whispered something that made Dominic go still.
“Eleanor was working for the FBI.”
