49. Declan
When we arrived at the bank, my men already had Layla surrounded, and one of the investigators was talking to the guy she was with.
At least it looked like her. There was the smallest glimmer of doubt until I got to them and heard that familiar smoky voice with that grating accent.
It was something I used to hear all the time.
We approached them, and Layla turned to Enslee, looking confused because she didn't know who she was. That confusion ended the moment her eyes moved to me. As her gaze locked in on mine, her blue eyes widened.
“So we meet again, Miss Harte.”
“D-Declan,” she stammered. “What are you doing here?”
“Isn’t that obvious?” When she said nothing, I added, “Looks like you've been having a great time spending all of my money.”
“It became mine when you gave it to me.”
“True, but I didn’t know you intended to use it to do this.”
“I didn't know there were conditions upon it. Furthermore, I don't know why you have these guys harassing me. You, and your little posse, need to let me leave.”
I stepped closer to her, ignoring the growl from the other man. “I can't do that.”
“Why not? I'm not bothering anyone. I left town, and I’m out of Brogan's life like you’d wanted.”
“I never asked you to leave town. I only asked you to leave him the hell alone.”
“What better way to do that than leave? It was a win-win for everyone involved. The two of you didn’t have to see me at social events or anywhere else. You’re both free to be together, and—”
“Wrong. Your fucking disappearing act has actually implicated him in a crime. I'm not sure if you're aware of it or not, but he's not only been arrested for your disappearance, but there's a knife and key with your blood on it, so he's also been locked up for your murder.”
A smile tipped her lips, and it took all I had to not reach out and strangle the bitch where she stood. “Is that so?”
“Layla,” I growled her name in warning.
“What? I didn't know he’d been arrested. Okay? I didn't know,” she repeated.
“Now that you do, you need to go back and make it right?”
“No,” she said, shaking her head emphatically. “I'm not going back to the United States ever again.”
“Your father miss—”
“I definitely don't want to see my father.”
“Why not? Aren't you daddy's little girl?”
She glared at me. “I don't want to go back, so I'm not going to.”
Enslee stepped forward at this point, and she extended her hand out to her. “Hi, I'm Enslee Byrne, and you’re Layla Harte, right?”
Layla looked her up and down. “Do I know you from somewhere?”
Enslee shook her head before responding. “No, but I have a podcast called Killer Thoughtz.”
“Never heard of it,” Layla said haughtily, the snobbishness I’d come to know from her evident in her tone. The blonde looked over at me before turning back to Enslee. “What are you doing with him?”
“She’s a friend,” I quickly answered so that Enslee wouldn’t have to.
“Of course. I thought maybe with your lover boy locked up that you’d decided to go straight again.”
I leveled her with a glare. “Neither my sexuality nor sleeping partners are any of your business. We’re here because we need you to return to the city.”
“No,” both Layla and the man she was with said.
I arched my brow as I looked over at the man one of my investigators had their hands on. He was holding him back from coming over to us. “Who the fuck is he?”
“A bodyguard to protect me from assholes like you.”
I exhaled sharply while pinching the bridge of my nose. She was itching for me to strangle the hell out of her, but I managed to maintain my control. “I’ve never harmed you, even though the thought has crossed my mind more times than I can count.”
“How reassuring…”
“I'm serious, Layla. You need to come back to New York. Brogan’s in a lot of trouble right now.”
“Even if I wanted to go back there, which I don’t, I can’t.”
“You have to,” I said as I went to move forward. I managed no more than a single step when Enslee placed her hand on my arm as if to tell me to step back. I took two steps back, and she moved in between Layla and me. They looked each other up and down before Enslee started to speak.
“I understand you're scared, but nothing will happen to you. You don't even have to stay. All we need is for you to show the NYPD that you're alive so an innocent man can be set free.”
“Innocent? Brogan is hardly that.”
“It doesn't appear that he'd harmed you in any way.”
“Maybe not physically, but mentally I've been subjected to Brogan’s and…” She paused to point over Enslee’s shoulder at me before continuing, “his barbs and attitudes for years. It was certainly not the way a man would treat his fiancée.”
Enslee sighed. “There’s no need to pretend around me. I already know the truth.”
“You do?” Layla asked her.
Enslee nodded. “I've been working on this particular case, and I know there was a financial agreement in place between you and Brogan, so there was no romantic interest. I also know it ended mostly due to the money you’d received from Declan.”
“Are you like a cop or something?”
“No, like I said before, I have a podcast. I’m a true crime influencer.”
“So why are you even here?”
“That’s none of your business or concern.
I'm here,” she repeated as she raised her tone a few octaves, “because an innocent man is sitting in jail facing life in prison without parole for a murder he didn't commit. You’re alive, and even if you don't like him, I don’t think your conscience will allow you to do that to Brogan?”
“Look, missy,” she said in a condescending tone. “It's not that simple.”
“Do you hate Brogan that much?” I asked her.
“I don't hate him. Yes, he’d gotten on my nerves, but I didn't hate him. If there was any other way to do this without going back there, I would.”
“What’s so terrible back in the States?” Enslee asked her.
This time when I looked into Layla’s face, I saw the tears brimming in her eyes.
Did the bitch actually have a heart? Or at least some semblance of emotion? And the tears didn’t look like the fake, alligator ones she’d cry over the years to get her own way. She was an actress, so I knew she could pretend, but these seemed genuine.
“I’d needed the money to escape from somebody, or somebodies.”
“Who are you running from?”
“I can't say anything other than I needed to get away. There are people there that have hurt me, and—”
“Hurt you in what way?”
Layla gulped before she looked around first at me, then the guy she was with. His mouth was in a thin line, and his eyes completely narrowed as he glared at her. “I'm afraid they’ll hurt me, especially if I try to get Brogan out.”
“For fuck’s sake,” the other man cursed, but I ignored him.
“Who’ll try to hurt you?” I asked her.
Her head snapped up. “I can't say.”
“Who did you need this money to get away from? Your father’s worried sick about you, and I'm sure he’d protect you if he—”
“He can't.”
“Is your father one of those who have or will hurt you?” Enslee asked.
Layla covered her eyes with one of her hands, then swiped it across to wipe away her tears. “My father’s in a lot of financial trouble.”
“Is that why you needed the money?”
“No. Brogan had already helped me out with most of that trouble, but before his help came, I had to do things for and with others to keep our empire afloat.”
“What kind of things?”
“I'm tired of having the weight of responsibility and obligation bearing down on me. I couldn't do it anymore, so when you gave me that money, I finally had enough to leave.”
I huffed. “So you hired this joker over here…” I said while pointing to the bodyguard.
She shook her head. “No, Nash was already in place. He was hired by Stanley Sinclair.”
I gasped at the realization that Brogan's father knew she was alive the entire time, yet he’d still allowed his son to rot in jail.
The hate I had for this man was growing more with every second…
the rage inside of me about to boil over.
I wanted to choke the life out of him, then drop his lifeless body out the fucking window of my forty-eighth-floor penthouse.
“The knife and the key… How did he get those?” Enslee asked.
“He never told me what he planned to do with them. He’d just said he’d needed something to bring Brogan to his senses.
I hadn’t wanted to go along with it, but he’d already found me and knew where I was.
I kept trying to escape, but there was none.
If I go back to the city, I might never get the chance to go to the police station to help Brogan.
If his father finds out I'm back in the States, much less in the city, he’ll make sure I can never speak again. ”
“Damn it,” I cursed, then turned around and soon felt Enslee’s hand on my arm.
“Calm down, Declan,” she told me.
I raked a hand through my hair. “How in the fuck can I calm down knowing the man I love is going to spend the rest of his life in jail for a crime he did not commit? And what’s worse is that it’s a crime his own father set him up for.
” I spun around and closed the distance between Layla and me.
“You have to come back, Layla. I’ll protect you. My men will protect you.”
Enslee cleared her throat. “Since Brogan’s arrest, I’ve been talking to someone at the NYPD. I could arrange a meeting at Declan’s pla—”
“No, no, no,” she said as she shook her head.
“Okay, if you don't want to go there, we can have the NYPD meet us at the airport. They’ll make sure you're protected.”
Layla looked between Enslee and me once more. “Why do you care so much about Brogan and Declan? I’d ask if you're sleeping with them, but that’d be laughable.” I growled, and she paused. “Oh my god! You are, aren't you?”