Chapter 43 Jude
On my flight back from New York, with city lights twinkling below me out the window, I got out my phone and texted Aaric, Quentin, and Cruz, leaving Bryce out of the group chat.
Jude: How did meeting Bryce’s fiancée go?
A few minutes later, there was a text.
Quentin: You know looking at blue light too soon before bed disrupts sleep, right?
Jude: I wasn’t going to bed any time soon anyway.
Aaric: She seemed nice, but she didn’t stay long.
Cruz: I think the wheatgrass shots made her sick.
Aaric: Fuck off.
Cruz: hahaha
I shook my head at them, biting back a frustrated sigh.
Jude: This isn’t a joke. She could end up with half of Bryce’s shares.
The chat went dead for a while.
Quentin: I think she’s hiding something.
I closed my eyes, a shiver of dread going through me. If she did something that hurt the company, my father would seek her retribution, whether I asked for it or not.
Aaric: She was nervous to meet us. That’s normal.
Cruz: You’re just anxious because you’re tired, Q.
I shook my head. If Quentin read something off, we needed to find out what it was.
Jude: I’ll look into it. You can get away from the big bad blue light, Q.
Cruz sent a line of ghost emojis, and Q responded with the middle finger emoji before I locked my phone screen and set it down.
Across from me on the couch, Owen was working on his laptop with his headphones on. He said the roaring of the plane gave him a headache. So I had to wave my hand at him to get his attention.
Finally, he noticed me and pulled back his headphones. “What’s up?”
“I need our PI to do a deep dive on Jada Baker.”
Owen looked surprised. “Bryce’s fiancée? We already did a background check, and—”
I shook my head. “We need to know everything there is to know about her. And I need it now. Before it’s too late.”
He nodded. “On it.”