2. Jacob
2
Jacob
The rain pelted against the window so hard that I could barely see the downtown skyscrapers from my penthouse. The rain mimicked my mood, and the constant vibrating of my phone did nothing to improve it. I knew it was Rachele. Every time we met with the divorce lawyers, she called and apologized for how she acted, but she never signed the documents.
I sat down in the black leather chair with a glass of whiskey and watched the rain come down. When my phone rang again, I pulled it out. Rachele’s name was on the top of the screen. “What.”
“I’m sorry.” Her voice came out slurred. It didn’t surprise me—she had always taken to drinking when she was stressed.
The tie around my neck felt like it tightened. I reached up and loosened the knot. “What do you want, Rachele?”
The sound of music was faint in the background. If I had been a betting man, I would have said she was still at her parents’ country club, having drowning in multiple bottles of her favorite wine. “Maybe we can make this work. Do we really need to get divorced?”
My hand balled into a fist. I wanted to scream at her to just sign the papers, but if I lost my temper, she would go back to Los Angeles without signing. We had another meeting scheduled tomorrow. “Rachele, I want to move on with my life. Maybe have a family with kids. When we got married, it was supposed to last two years. Neither one of us filed the papers back then—we’ve let this go on for too long. The reason for the wedding was for you to get your trust and for me to get my startup money. I paid you back the startup cash with a bonus a year after we wed. This marriage isn’t helping either of us. You need to find a nice man, settle down, and enjoy your life.”
It was the longest conversation we’d had in years. We didn’t talk to each other unless we needed the other for a function. She lived in one of my houses on the West Coast.
The older I got, the more I wanted something real in my life. I filed for divorce over a year ago, and she’d been fighting ever since. Rachele had a nice trust fund, but it would not be enough to continue the lifestyle she was accustomed to with my money.
“I’m willing to move to Houston to make this work.” She was grasping at straws. Rachele didn’t want to lose the clout of being married to one of the Black brothers. Her family had money, but nothing like what my brothers and I made over the past ten years.
I downed the remaining whiskey. “Why? We’ve never slept together or even lived together. This isn’t going to work. I offered you a great deal of money in the divorce. Let’s go our separate ways.”
“I’m still in Houston for the week. Maybe we can try to make this work.”
Over the past couple of months, she had kept trying to push me to go on a date. She would send a text every other week asking. I never replied, hoping she would get the hint. I knew she had been in Houston more and more lately, but it didn’t change how I felt. I wanted the woman out of my life. “No, Rachele. We are never going to be together. Hell, we never really were. Just sign the damn papers.”
“I want the house in Los Angeles,” Rachele slurred. Each time we went to the table for negotiation, she came with a new demand. Last time, she wanted the vacation home in Cocoa Beach, Florida. I gave it to her, and then she didn’t sign. I was at wit's end. If I was going to move on with my life, I needed to make a clean break with Rachele.
I got up and poured a couple more fingers of whiskey. “Rachele, you will sign the papers as is. If you delay one more week, I will start over and make sure you get nothing and then come after whatever money you have left in your trust.”
Her voice hitched on the other side of the phone.
“No more changes,” I ground out.
“But I can’t afford to live in that neighborhood unless you give me the house.”
She was no longer my concern. Rachele’s family might’ve had more money when my brothers and I started Nova Satellite Security, but their net worth didn’t come close to mine anymore. The house she was living in was worth over thirty million dollars. I didn’t need the home or money, but she needed to learn that she couldn’t have everything she wanted. She needed to grow up. I let out a sigh. “Then move to another. I’ve given you more than I needed to. We aren’t married for love, just sign the damn papers and let us move on with our lives.” When she got back to Los Angeles, she would not be pleased. I had movers come to the house and move all her stuff to storage. The gates and house locks were changed. She wasn’t getting back in. Next week, the house was going on the market.
If she wouldn’t go through with the divorce, I was going to make her life a living hell. The woman was pure evil. A few weeks before, she didn’t like the way an owner of a restaurant looked at her, and she used her connections to get the place shut down. Since filing for divorce, I had a private investigator following her wherever she went. The reports coming back were horrific—she treated people horribly.
She sniffled on the other end of the phone. “Fine, I’ll sign the papers and have them brought over to you tonight. Can we meet for lunch tomorrow, since we don’t need to talk with our lawyers? That way we can discuss me moving out of the L.A. house.”
I wasn’t going to tell her she was already out until the paper was signed and in my lawyer's hands. “Thank you, Rachele, I don’t think lunch is a good idea. When are you heading back to L.A.?”
“I don’t know, Houston is starting to grow on me. Maybe we can start with a clean slate.”
No matter how many times I told her it wasn’t going to work, she ignored me. Luckily, my phone beeped to let me know I had another call. I looked at the screen, and Kat Ross’s name flashed. “I need to take this call, Rachele.” I swiped to the other call before she could answer. “How is my favorite assassin doing?”
Kat huffed on the other end. “Antonio doesn’t let me kill anyone anymore.”
I laughed, which felt good after the day I’d had. “Really? That’s not what I watched in the video last week.” Asher, Antonio’s twin brother, had added me to the group text discussing Kat’s kills.
“CJ really needs to stop stealing our camera footage. I took our security system off the internet because Brock kept hacking in. Now, when CJ and Asher watched Ant last week, he took a copy of our surveillance hard drive.”
Asher and Kat’s husband were twin brothers who looked alike but acted nothing like each other. Asher was quiet and fun loving, but Antonio barely cracked a smile unless he was looking at his wife and kid. “You know, nobody would be going after your videos if you didn’t keep dragging bodies through your backyard.” Rumor had it that Kat was pregnant, and Antonio was at wit's end with his wife. I couldn’t wait to watch a video of her eight months pregnant and dragging a body across the lawn. I knew nothing would stop Kat from protecting the ones she loved.
The phone crackled for a second. “I have one more in my sights, and then I might consider giving up my craft.” She let out a sigh. “Greg somehow got out of jail.”
I put the glass of scotch on the table and paced in front of the large windows. Lily was supposed to be safe—her moving to Houston was a precaution. A week before, I was talking with Antonio about how I’d lost my assistant to a competitor, and he asked if I was looking for a new one. He started to talk about Lily and what she had been through. Antonio knew about my past and how I wanted to help anyone in danger of abuse, so he Antonio sent her file over. The woman reminded me of a Victoria’s Secret model with her long blonde hair and striking green eyes. When I flipped to the sheet listing which bones had been broken over the years and finally the last page showing bruises, I didn’t blame Kat for wanting to kill Greg. If I ever saw the man, I wouldn’t think twice about doing the same. “How?” I yelled into the phone.
Muffled voices echoed on the other end. “Sorry. Antonio asked me something. What did you say?”
The Houston skyline lit up from the lightning, and thunder cracked less than a second later. “I asked how? Antonio told me he wouldn’t get out. I read her file. There is no way that man should be walking the face of the Earth. So, I ask again, how did he get out of jail?”
“Don’t snap at me,” Kat growled. “Someone tainted the evidence, but it’s more than that. The pictures and statement from Lily should’ve kept him in longer. The officer who tainted the evidence is gone. Vanished. We can’t find him. We’ve been looking since Antonio got the call from Detective Higgins. The officer who processed him went missing. Someone wanted Greg out of jail, and the person who did this has connections or bottomless pockets.”
I grabbed the glass of scotch off the table and downed the remaining alcohol, though it didn’t help. Nobody liked watching a woman get beaten, but unless one had seen it firsthand or been a victim to abuse, it was hard to understand. No woman should ever be hit. My jaw tightened as a memory of my piece-of-shit father throwing my mother across the room flashed in my mind. It had been a long time since I thought about him. “What do you need me to do?”
Papers crackled through the phone before Kat answered. “We’re keeping Abe there. He’s in the condo across from Lily. He agreed to watch Tommy during the day while Lily is at work. Abe will take her to work then come back and stay with Tommy.”
“Maybe she should wait to start work until you find Greg.”
Kat let out an aggravated sigh. “In a perfect world, we would do that. I know Lily, and she wants to start her life and make money for herself. It’s killing her to stay in the condo and not pay for it. I told her you own the building and that it was okay, but she’s stubborn and wants to do things on her own.” I kept a few of the condos in the building open for guests and friends.
I couldn’t hold back the smile. “Stubborn people frustrate you, Kat?”
“I’m different.” She huffed.
There was no point in arguing with Kat. She was the most stubborn woman I’d ever met. “Okay. I’ll make sure security knows to keep their eyes open. I’ll send them a photo of Greg. When you hear anything, let me know.”
“Greg might send someone else after Lily. He knows we’ll be looking for him. However, he has no money… Unless the person who got him out gave him some.”
Every protective instinct I had kicked in. “I’ll make sure nobody gets into Nova Satellite Security without identification.”
“Thank you for helping, Jacob. I’ll keep you posted.”
“Bye, Kat.”
I slid the phone back into my pocket and sat in the black leather chair. I planned to do everything in my control to make sure Lily stayed safe. I sent a text off to my brothers, letting them know I was going to beef up security at the office. They would understand. I watched the way my oldest brother Jared’s jaw had twitched when he saw the pictures of Lily—growing up, he’d shielded Jax and me from most of my father's drunken episodes. Jared responded almost immediately that he would go in early and make sure security was tight.