Chapter Twenty
The next morning Justice woke up early, her body sore from the events the day before.
After she’d come home, showered, and had a moment to herself, she had gone through all the documentation Kent had gathered for her. As she sat in her bed, sifting through each revelation, some harder than others to grasp, she had become numb and angrier.
Sheriff Dussan called that morning and asked to speak to Justice, and she asked that Jinx and her daddy join them. Last night, she’d been too tired to speak to either of them about what Kent had told her. She’d been satisfied enough at the moment to know that Freedom was okay. Jinx had held her while she slept, and although her mind was spinning, she appreciated the comfort he gave her, although she knew it wouldn’t last.
By the time she stepped into her daddy’s office, Sheriff Dussan, Sam, and Jinx were already there. All three stood and greeted her as if she were about to collapse under any new information. She couldn’t look at Sam or Jinx. She kept her focus on the sheriff and held tightly to the paperwork she had in her hand.
“Thanks for allowing me to speak to you again, ma’am.” Sheriff Dussan shifted his weight uncomfortably. He looked like he hadn’t slept all night—all month.
“How’s Kent?” she asked.
“He’ll recover,” the sheriff answered.
“He’s one lucky bastard,” Sam said from where he sat on the corner of his desk.
“Have a seat, Justice. I won’t keep you long.” Sheriff Dussan motioned for her to sit on the couch.
Although she didn’t want to sit, she did and Jinx sat next to her. She would have found his presence comforting had she not known about the photographs.
“I was able to get a statement from Kent this morning. He said he’d asked you to come to his home under the pretense of business, but he’d learned some news about one of the ranch’s employees, and he wanted to warn you. Pok Malikan was employed here under the alias Rigs Fletcher.”
“I don’t know how in the hell we missed that one,” Sam growled.
“Mr. Malikan is quite the scammer,” Sheriff Dussan said. “He served prison time and during his sentence he honed all the tricks of the trade. He’d become fascinated—obsessed—over Freedom and he had this fantasy belief that the two of them would run away together. As his belief grew, so did his maliciousness. That’s how Lanah found herself involved in the scheme. She trusted him but he used her as a pawn in his own delusional revenge plot.” He went on to describe how he’d kidnapped her, brought her to the ranch and lured Freedom to the lake.
Justice listened intently and absorbed all the information. Disbelief kept her quiet.
Until finally Sheriff Dussan excused himself.
Justice halfheartedly bid him farewell but stayed seated.
She vaguely heard Jinx and Sam discussing the case and when they both had their attention on her, it was then that she said in a level tone, “Kent had informed me of many things before he was shot.”
“Can you believe an ounce of what that man says?” Sam bit out.
Jinx remained quiet.
“I do. He showed me proof. I’m just confused on the reasons and the timeline why you and Jinx would band together to deceive me.” She felt her heart ache for the dishonesty.
Sam was seasoned in keeping a poker face. Jinx, on the other hand, closed his eyes and ran his palms down his face.
“You took pictures for Daddy. And then you lied to me,” she said pointedly to Jinx.
“I asked him to,” Sam said.
“Yes, of course you did. I expect that from you, but Jinx, how could you?” Her voice held all her disappointment.
Crinkles appeared at the corners of his eyes and his mouth was a thin line, but he remained quiet as if he had nothing he wanted to say in his defense.
“Like I said, I needed someone I could trust to answer some questions I had.” Sam slid off the corner of his desk and took a seat across from Justice on the sofa.
“Questions you couldn’t just come to me and ask?” she said quietly.
He shrugged. “No father wants to ask his daughter if she’s sleeping with the enemy.” The weight of the world seemed to land on his shoulders. He suddenly looked frail and tired.
“And hiring someone to follow her and snap photos without her being aware of it is a far better approach?” She lowered her gaze to the floor, and when she looked back up, she had more control over her emotions. “The marriage, everything, was a sham.’
Sam blew out a long breath.
Jinx then said, “No, it wasn’t. I’ll take full blame for everything that I did, but the marriage was purely a decision I made because I wanted to.”
She looked at her husband, wanting to believe him, but trust was in small supply. “All those months you were watching me. Gathering information.” Disgust made the hair on her nape lift. “And Daddy, you have been hiding a lot these days.” She pulled out the medical document from the envelope and laid it on the glass coffee table between them.
“You took that off my computer?” he said in a choked voice.
“No, I didn’t. Kent gave it to me. My guess is Rigs, or shall I say Pok, has been behind a lot of the small mishaps we’ve had, including the poisoning of Freedom’s horses. Although I don’t have proof, my guess is that Kent hired Rigs as a mole to keep an eye on the comings and goings around the ranch.”
Sam lay back in the cushion, his tan fading. “You’ve got to understand. I wanted to tell you and your sisters about the cancer at the right time.”
“The right time would have been when you received the diagnosis. Daddy, you’re meddling in our business at every wind change and playing puppet master, but you don’t see how we, as your family, have the right to be in the loop, too. This is important. This involves all of us.”
He looked at her, his grey eyes bloodshot. “I’m asking for you to let me decide when I tell the others. It won’t be long.”
Tears filled her eyes and she found that she couldn’t be too angry with him. A tiger never changed his stripes. Yet, she could barely look at Jinx knowing what role he played in all this.
“Don’t wait too long, Daddy. They will want to know. For now, I need space.”
When she left the office, Jinx followed her, and once they were down the hall, she stopped to face him. “I didn’t want to say this in front of Daddy, but Lanah is not pregnant by you. I don’t know the details and I’m sure you’ll want to learn them, but I thought you should know.”
Jinx had concern etched in every line of his face. “I gathered as much.”
She folded her arms over her stomach, feeling sick. “I don’t have much else to say.”
“Justice, I’m sorry. I wanted to tell you. I did.”
“And yet you didn’t.” She held his gaze.
“We have a lot to talk about.”
“No, we don’t. As promised, we will stay married for Ilene’s sake. I will not disrupt her life because she is now starting to feel stable here. However, as far as you and I are concerned, we are together in a marriage of convenience only.”
“Justice, you must know that I’ve grown to care for you. I love you. If I hadn’t agreed to follow you, someone else would have.”
“Oh? So you were doing Daddy’s bidding out of the goodness of your heart?”
He rubbed his brows. “That’s not what I’m saying.”
“What are you saying exactly? Never mind because what I really want to know is did Daddy convince you to marry me?” She wanted to know, and yet she didn’t. But being in the dark never suited her.
“He did suggest that we get married.”
She snorted. “You betrayed me.”
“I didn’t marry you because Sam asked me to.”
“No? How much did he offer you?” She raised a brow.
“He didn’t offer me anything for marrying you except for Ilene being part of the family.”
“He paid you to follow me and snap the photos?”
“He gave me money and I put it in Ilene’s college fund.”
She felt like she’d been blasted by an internal explosion. “Well, I’m glad to know this is a business arrangement because that makes this much easier. I’m walking away now and do us both a favor and don’t follow me.”
Tears filled her eyes as she took each step further away from Jinx.
She took her phone out of her pocket and texted Freedom. Can I see you?
Yes, of course, she responded.
Justice would respect Daddy’s wishes but she and Freedom had a lot to discuss.