Chapter 31
thirty-one
Despite my entirely shitty day, I almost laugh when Graham opens his door and our outfits match.
I swallow my amusement for two reasons—first, he looks way too good in that godforsaken pink suit. Even more wickedly sexy than any of his other ensembles. Maybe because it displays his unshakable confidence as much as it contrasts his dark, masculine features.
But second—and more importantly—I can’t so much as giggle once I see his face.
His skin looks ashen, his eyes solemn. He wears an expression somewhere between grim acceptance and true, helpless sorrow.
I’ve never seen him so serious. Raw, without a shred of his usual indolence.
“Juliet,” he murmurs, standing in the doorway, staring down at me. A flash of relief eases the tightness around his eyes for a moment. “I forgot you were coming, but I’m glad you’re here.”
He sounds sincere? Not taunting or flirting or insinuating anything. Not Graham-like at all.
I hesitate, suddenly unsure of myself. “I can go. I thought we had work to do.”
“No,” he replies softly. “Stay. I—God, I forgot dinner. Do you want food? I’ll order food.”
“I brought dinner,” I tell him, holding up my lunchbox. “Two of those sandwiches you liked last week. Abuelita made more steak yesterday.”
He seems so disoriented. I reach over the threshold to touch his arm, hoping to help him focus. “Graham? You look sick.”
Graham blinks. “Sick?” He glances down at himself, as though checking for some sort of stab wound before answering. “No. Not sick. Although…”
Without thought, my hand drifts up to cup his solid jaw. He’s shaved, but a thin layer of stubble still pricks my palm. Our gazes collide. His echoes the pain pulling at his features.
“Did something happen?” I ask him.
Graham’s eyes fall shut for a long second. I swear he leans his face into my hand slightly. “Let’s just say it’s a good thing I hired a lawyer.”
My stomach clenches. “Well, technically, you haven’t retained me yet,” I reply, trying for a teasing tone I don’t quite achieve.
Graham’s expression freezes over. He pulls my hand from his face and uses it to tug me into his apartment, locking the door behind us before dragging me into the great room. While I set all my things down in one of his chairs, he reaches for a slip of paper on the island and presents it to me. “Here.”
A check. For fifty thousand dollars. Made out to me.
I balk. “You don’t have to give me the full payment to retain me! What if I die before your work is finished? Or if I quit? Or do a bad job?”
Graham’s face doesn’t even flicker. “I told you I trust you. So take it. And don’t die. Because, believe me, you’re going to earn this money.”
“Graham.” Glancing nervously around the room, I scan for signs of a grisly murder or another heinous crime. But the only new addition is a file box in the center of his coffee table. “What did you do ?”
A sudden burst of manic energy twitches through him. He starts pacing, spinning his phone in his palm while he mutters, “Not me. I didn’t do anything. I don’t think. I mean, if I did, I didn’t know about it. What is that called— plausible deniability ? So, I have that, at least. Except, maybe not anymore since I know now. You’re the lawyer. You’ll have to tell me.”
He suddenly stops cold and rotates to face me. As soon as our eyes meet, all of the fight drains out of him. He slumps forward, pressing both hands into the edge of his white stone countertop.
“My father has committed fraud,” he finally says to the granite. “Multiple times. For three years, at least. I found one book he cooked, and I thought maybe it was a fluke or a mistake. But today, I got into a closet he always keeps locked, and there are?—”
He swallows, his gaze flitting back to the file box over his shoulder. “ Dozens ,” he rasps, squeezing his eyelids shut and shaking his head. “Dozens of falsified accounts.”
My mind whirs, trying to process. My criminal law knowledge is theoretical, but I studied many such cases over the years. I know the right questions to ask. And actually—much to my own surprise—I have answers.
“You had no prior knowledge of these accounts?” I verify. Though, even before he nods, I believe that. “Then you can turn him in under whistleblower protections.”
I state the fact immediately, without really thinking it through. When my brain catches up to my mouth, I bite my lip.
Turn his father in? For dozens of counts of stock fraud? Amounting to millions, probably… Surely enough to close Everett Alexander down.
What if he doesn’t want to report it? What if he wants to act like he’s never seen it?
“Or”—I choose my next words very carefully—“are we having a different conversation?”
Graham straightens, pinching the bridge of his nose. He only does that when he’s reached the end of his rope. “Jesus. I don’t know . I’m leaving the company either way. I guess I could just… slip away? And not tell anyone? But then, am I complicit if he ever gets caught by somebody else?”
My empty stomach heaves. We’re discussing how to let his father continue defrauding people. So he can make a clean getaway.
I have a difficult time deciding how I feel about that. On the one hand, greedy men like Mr. Everett deserve no mercy, in my opinion. And what Graham is proposing would allow his father to continue stealing from people indefinitely.
But I’m a lawyer, and Graham is my client. His interests have to be my priority. Legally. I’m obligated to answer his questions honestly and forbidden to breathe a word of our discussion.
After a deep breath, I reach for my phone and type a quick message into my notes app.
Are there cameras or recording devices in this apartment?
He reads it and blinks at me, visibly thrown by my train of thought. “No,” he replies aloud. “Neither.”
Gracias a Dios .
It never occurred to me to ask about a camera when I stripped both of us out of our clothes on Saturday night. Swallowing, I delete the words from my screen and force myself to focus.
“If you’re asking me how to get out of this situation without repercussions for yourself or your father, then we will have this conversation one time and never speak of it again.”
Graham’s jaw hardens. “I don’t know if that’s what I’m asking you. But I want to hear how it would go, should I choose that route.”
I nod. “All right. But, like I said, I’m only going to say this once, so pay attention.”
With a sigh, I look over at his box of files and then down at the phone in his hand. “If you’ve used your phone, laptop, or work computer to Google any of this, it’s too late. If you’ve texted, emailed, or spoken with anyone else about it, it’s too late. If you’ve implied to your father that you know anything, it’s too late. But if I am truly the only living soul who knows, apart from you, then you may not have to turn him in to save yourself. You could pretend you never saw anything.
“If you go that way, you will return the materials you found to their original places—after wearing gloves and wiping them down to destroy any fingerprints you may have left on them. You will destroy any copies you made, as well as any notes.
“You will go to your father and tell him your plans to leave the company. You will never tell him you know about the fraud. You will never imply that you know. You will follow his company’s usual termination practices and return all his accounts to him.
“I would advise leaving as quickly as possible without arousing suspicion—two weeks is the standard amount of time. I would also advise avoiding any work for clients from Everett Alexander in the future—just to keep things clean. We could say it’s an integrity move—not wanting to take clients from your own father.
“If you’re ever questioned, you will tell them you had no knowledge of any of it. Never saw the books. Never touched the accounts. Never brokered any of the deals. You will act appalled and make it clear you always intended to open your own firm for personal reasons unrelated to your father or his business practices. Then you plead the Fifth. Forever. And I mean refusing to answer a single question. There will be no evidence to incriminate you. So as long as you don’t implicate yourself, they won’t be able to charge you.”
Graham and I stare at each other. An endless silence stretches between us, thick and heavy. I watch the gears turn in his mind, processing.
His throat works on a swallow. “And if I want to report him?”
A wave of relief washes through me. My knees tremble with the force of it. I grip the nearest barstool, hoping I don’t look like I’m about to wilt.
“If we want to go to the FBI and tell them you want to blow the whistle on Everett Alexander, we have to work fast. You’ve done nothing illegal—yet. You only become complicit if you sit on the information. How long have you known?”
Graham’s jaw hardens. “I got the original tainted file last week, but I didn’t realize what I had in front of me until yesterday. I didn’t know about the other accounts until today; after I took them out of his office closet, copied them, and reviewed the results.”
A chill runs through my blood. “Did you scan them or photocopy them?”
“Photocopy,” he mumbles, picking lint off his sleeve. “I used our oldest copier in the back storeroom. It’s from the nineties. It doesn’t even hook up to a computer. No virtual copies, and it doesn’t store memory.”
He’s smart. I tend to forget that when I think of his flashy clothes, gorgeous face, and general nonchalance. All of that pretty packaging hides an exceptionally sharp mind.
But I’m sharp, too. I quickly spin through both scenarios, looking for loopholes and pitfalls alike. One stands out above all the rest.
“If you blow the whistle,” I tell him. “And the FBI finds out you started your company after you knew about the fraud, they could claim your new business and its profits as fruits of the poisoned tree. At the very least, it would taint your reputation to future clients and put you on every government watch list for the next two decades.”
His posture deflates slightly. “Goddamn it. How is that even fair? I haven’t done anything.”
I know how he feels, having been screwed over by my own father’s pitiful choices more times than I care to count. I have to rein in the part of me that longs to rail against the injustice of it all in order to think clearly.
“Unless you can prove that you planned to start your company before you had any knowledge of the fraud. If we had a witness or some paperwork to show that your plan was already in motion before your father ever assigned you the original account review, then we could show that your choice to leave Everett Alexander has nothing to do with any wrongdoing.”
Graham shakes his head again, the motion stiff. “No. I don’t have anything to prove that because it isn’t true. The truth is: I did decide to leave before I knew… but after he gave me the fraudulent ledger. And I did originally hire you to help me with my new company, not this issue. Even if all the timing looks suspicious, my story is true. They can give me any test they want.”
“This isn’t CSI,” I say gently. “They won’t polygraph you. If they can’t prove you’re lying, they’ll just try to screw you. Watch you. Possibly forever.”
Graham’s mouth rolls into a tight line. “Waiting for me to fuck up... Not to mention, I’ll have one hell of a time finding anyone who will hire me after all of Manhattan finds out my father’s been lining his pockets at his clients’ expense.”
My entire being cringes away from that concept. “So don’t tell anyone.”
Some color finally returns to Graham’s face. He scowls. “And he just gets away with it? For the rest of his life? While I go on pretending I can still look at him without wanting to retch?”
“No,” I snap back. “While you go on to have a successful career and make your own reputation, separate from his. I don’t?—”
I don’t want you to suffer .
I catch myself in time. It’s an unprofessional thing to say to a client .
And why do I want to argue with him?
In favor of his father ?
I blow out a breath as quietly as I can. “You’ll have to make your own decision, of course. I can advise you either way.”
Graham crosses his arms over his chest, glowering. “But basically, my options are to tell on my father so he gets punished, possibly ruining my own future in the process, or let him continue to steal from people while I do my best to distance myself from his shit and possibly live a long and very wealthy life without anyone finding out I ever knew?”
“Yes,” I admit.
Graham’s tense features tighten. “But if he gets caught later and I’m implicated, then all of my work in the interim will be taken from me?”
A pang of pain shoots through my chest. “Yes,” I whisper.
His color drains again. He drops his arms to his sides and stands there, in his pink-striped shirtsleeves and socks. In his gorgeous apartment. Looking desperately adrift despite all his charms.
Our gazes lock again. And though his expression seems eerily still, his eyes are turbulent. His voice cracks. “How much time do I have to make my decision?”
“I’ll have to research some precedent,” I mumble, more to myself than him. “But I would say—off the top of my head—two weeks sounds reasonable.”
He seems like such a solitary figure all of a sudden. I wonder why it’s never occurred to me to ask if he has any other good friends, aside from Grayson. He obviously isn’t close to his family the way I am. And, if he was close to them, he likely won’t be anymore.
When Mr. Stryker gets married and—one way or another—Graham leaves Everett Alexander, he probably won’t have anyone to turn to. No one to comfort him or stand by his side.
And he could lose everything… even his own name.
The pressure building at the back of my throat reminds me of the last time I shed tears. That day at work, in the stairwell. When Graham offered me his handkerchief and insisted on comforting me.
Before I know what I’m doing, I step toward him. My heels click on his wood floors as I close the distance between us.
Throwing my arms around his neck, I catch the flash of disbelief on his face before pulling myself into his chest. He holds me instantly, squeezing so tightly, I can’t move. A gust of breath ruffles my hair as he tugs me closer and exhales into my neck.
“God,” he says softly, bringing one hand up to hold the back of my head. “Jules.”
He starts to shake, so I stroke my hands down his back. “Shhh,” I whisper, hoping to calm him.
His body shudders, and I wonder if he’s eaten anything all day. Or had any water.
“Come here,” I tell him, my tone brokering no argument. “Sit. I’ll get our food.”
I know Graham must really be in bad shape when he does as I say. Without arguing or trying to undress me. Although, when I grab the plates and turn back, I find him blatantly staring at my body.
He sighs. “You really are beautiful, Jules.”
My eyes roll. “So are you, pinchao . I think it must be the pink.”
Within seconds, I set his plate down and unpack our dinner. “Now, eat. This is a fine mess you’ve gotten us into, and I, for one, will not suffer a weak partner in crime.”
The ghost of a smile tilts his lips. “Fair enough, bijou .”