Chapter Twenty-Eight
Alex went from carefree and lax back to corporate CEO like she flipped a switch. Worse, she resembled the boss with her family in a way Hawk hadn’t yet seen.
At some point on the plane, she’d informed her family they were on their way home and that an emergency meeting was needed.
Stiff politeness replaced warm smiles and laughter.
Hawk knew he’d done that.
He pulled his fucking gun on her. The woman he was protecting, the woman he wanted safe above all others.
Yet he was the threat.
All Hawk could do was stand back and watch while Alex greeted her family. Her quick recap of their time away was reduced to “It was nice to get away. The snow was unbelievable.”
Two sentences he wouldn’t use when describing some of the best days of his life.
Chase and Max shook his hand, thanking him for watching out for her.
He couldn’t tell them “You’re welcome” or “No problem.” Not when his protection of Alex was no longer an obligation.
From the moment he’d seen her in the parking lot being hassled by Bakshai’s man, Hawk was dedicated to the task of keeping her safe.
Once they were settled in the massive living room, Alex unzipped one suitcase at a time until everything was sitting there, looking like a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. “We found this in a safe in a hidden office.”
“It looks exactly like what we have upstairs,” Max said.
“Why?” Chase asked rhetorically. “Why did Dad have this?”
“Hawk has a theory,” Alex said, looking directly at him for the first time in hours.
Everyone turned to him.
“There are only a few reasons why your father would have this kind of liquid cash. He needed it as an escape plan. Or needed it to give to someone else without it being traced. Because your father was worth billions, the escape plan is laughable. Though he might have had need of it if Stone Enterprises was seized and all of his accounts were frozen. A few million might tide him over for a time.”
“Seize? As in the government?” Chase asked.
Hawk nodded. “This alone says racketeering, corporate espionage, skimming off the top, you name it. Your father didn’t quite fit the profile of drug runner or mob boss.”
“And he didn’t need to skim from his own company,” Piper said. “He was quick to write an owner distribution check whenever he wanted.”
That was useful information, Hawk thought. “Large sums of money that were cashed into this and stuffed away? How long did you work for him?” he asked Piper.
“A little over five years.”
“Is this five years’ worth of owner distribution draws?”
“It’s hard to say. Considering there is just as much upstairs, I’d say no. Not in the time I worked with him.”
Hawk reached into one of the bags and pulled out a passport. “Your father’s face, a different name. We need to see if this name is associated with a bank account somewhere in the world. And would it work for long? Men like your father can’t disappear. Not easily.”
“Unless they fake their own death,” Sarah said quietly.
Chase huffed. “Unfortunately, that isn’t the case. I saw his body. He’s dead.”
Hawk hadn’t considered that. Nice to have the theory cleared up quickly.
“What are all these files?” Max asked.
“They’re confidential information memorandums. We call them CIMs.” Alex said. “Basically, this is what a marketing department provides to potential buyers of a business.”
“Are they a part of Stone Enterprises?” Chase asked.
“No. None of these are hotels. They could be a part of a business Dad owned outside of Stone Enterprises. Or were ... or wanted to be. I honestly don’t remember all of them, and most have a management company doing the day-to-day work. Leaving Dad with nothing more than waiting for a paycheck.”
Piper picked up a random file and started looking through it.
“The best course of action is to get a list of these companies and compare them to anything linked to your father. How deep did you dig into the other safe?” Hawk asked.
“Not far. Those documents were more about property. Actual homes, art, things that cost more money than they are worth,” Chase said.
“Alexandrea said something about safety deposit boxes,” Hawk said.
“Money and gold. No documents.”
Hawk started to pace. “How many homes did your dad own?”
“There is another place in Italy. The one Melissa thought was a gift to her,” Alex said.
“There is an apartment in Manhattan and another in London,” Piper stated.
“Jesus,” Max said. “How many roofs does one person need?”
“The real question is if there is more where this came from in those locations,” Hawk pointed out.
The answer in Hawk’s head was yes. Aaron Stone spread out his hush fund ... or whatever it was he used this money for.
“It’s sketchy shit,” Sarah said.
“It’s not illegal to have a safe filled with money if the money can be accounted for.
The passports we can overlook for now. But if you find evidence of fraud, tax evasion, any of the scary scenarios you read about in The Sunday Times , we need to gather as much information as possible before anybody outside of this room knows about it.
” Hawk made eye contact with everyone one at a time.
“The real threat of the FBI coming in and seizing the company while they undertake an investigation is a serious reality we all need to consider,” Alex stated.
Alex turned to Max and Sarah. “How do you both feel about a trip to Italy via London?”
Sarah pushed her glasses higher on her nose with a grin. “If we must. I’m sure we can take one for the team,” she teased.
Alex nodded. “After Texas, then.”
Chase turned to Piper. “I can hop over to New York and be home the same day.”
She nodded. “I’ll get to work putting together a database with the companies in these files with everything I can learn about them. See if there is a common link beyond the CIMs being in the same safe.”
Hawk was impressed by how they all assigned appropriate tasks to get to the bottom of this.
“I’ll use my contacts to run the names used in the passports and ballistics on the weapons,” Hawk said.
“What do we do with all this?” Piper asked.
“Document everything you find, where you found it. Video yourselves counting the money with date stamps in confidential files. I’m talking locked down, encrypted shit.
If and when the government needs to get involved, you want your asses covered.
Right now, it is reasonable to believe that your dad liked to look at money, and he had the ability to write those owner distribution checks and cash them instead of putting them in a bank.
” Hawk took a breath. “And ask yourselves who else could have known about these safes. Melissa? Someone else on the top floor? A friend? Ask yourselves why .”
“What about how ?” Sarah asked.
“I’m more interested in why ... What was your father afraid of?” Hawk asked.
“Nothing,” Alex muttered.
“No. This is fear. I can smell it,” Hawk insisted.
Alex looked at him again. Her smile less than welcoming ... almost tired.
She stood. “I’m going to shower, change ... and start counting.”
Hawk watched her retreat with a heavy heart.
“I’ll show you the other safe,” Chase told Hawk.
Chase and Max stood in the driveway once again, watching Hawk drive away.
“What the hell happened in Colorado?” Max asked.
“I don’t know. Piper thought for sure Alex and Hawk were getting along.”
“They barely looked at each other.”
“Maybe they had a fight,” Chase said. “I’ll see if I can pull Alex aside and ask.”
Max nodded a few times.
“What do you think about all this money laundering business?”
Chase ran a hand through his hair. “I think our dad had a lot of people in his life that tolerated him. If the government seized Stone Enterprises, he would have lost it. The company meant everything to him. More than us, his wives ... anyone ... anything. If he did something illegal to get all that cash, something serious went down to compromise the business.”
“The government shuts shit down and asks questions later,” Max said with a sigh.
“We’ll get to the bottom of it,” Chase said.
They turned back toward the house.
“I’m going to ask Sarah to marry me,” Max said from nowhere.
Chase paused and then opened his arm and pulled his brother in. “That’s awesome. We love Sarah.”
“Piper has figured out what kind of ring she likes. I just need to know where to go and get it.”
Chase narrowed his eyes. “Piper didn’t say a thing to me.”
“I asked her to be on the down-low.” Max stood tall. “Any suggestions for a jeweler?”
“Piper loves her ring.”
“Great. The sooner, the better. I want to pay for it while I still have money.”
Chase shook his head. “I don’t think we have to worry.”
Max raised an eyebrow. “If you grew up the way I did, you’d know that as fast as it can be given, it can be taken away.”
“I hope you’re wrong, brother.”
They started walking again. “Any idea when you want to propose?” Chase asked.
Max smiled. “Italy seems like a place where a woman would like to be proposed to.”
Chase patted Max on the back. “I’m happy for you.”
“Me too.”
The rest of the week following her vacation, Alex spent much of her workday at the estate. The rotation of security included everyone but Hawk.
He sent her a text every morning telling her who was going to be there.
Alex’s reply was just as warm and fuzzy as his message.
It wasn’t.
And it hurt. More than she wanted it to.
The Tuesday preceding the wedding in Texas, Alex couldn’t hold off on going into the office any longer.
Three days at the office.
That was all Alex had to endure at work, with Hawk standing like a damn statue in the corner of every room she entered. Or flanking doors when she needed him outside.
Truth was, she needed him way outside. As in outside the building.
The ride in had been painful.
Alex had opened one of the files from the safes and pretended to be deep in thought about what she was reading the whole drive in.