Chapter 32
Charlotte hadn’t had a chance to speak to Jude over breakfast, since he and his team had already started working early to shore up security at the estate.
After Steve’s intrusion the previous day, she was glad that everybody was taking action to prevent another security breach.
When she’d heard Jude’s voice coming from his office, she’d cracked the door open to see if she could interrupt him, when she’d overheard him claiming that Byron was stabbing them in the back.
She’d been too stunned, and for a few seconds she’d just stood there, digesting Jude’s accusation, when she’d heard that he wanted to keep something from her.
At that point, she hadn’t been able to keep silent any longer.
“Tell me, Jude!”
She noticed him and Francisco exchanging a look.
“Why are you saying that Byron is stabbing you in the back? After everything he did yesterday? That’s pretty shitty of you…”
Jude hesitated visibly. “I’m sorry, Charlotte, but you shouldn’t have heard that. Francisco and I are handling it.”
“Handling it? Or did you mean handling me?”
“It’s not like that, believe me.”
“Then what’s it like?” she asked, more insistent now. “You think I’m too weak for whatever you think you have to keep from me?”
“I don’t want you to get hurt.”
“That’s not how this works. I want to hear the truth. Why do you think that Byron is stabbing you in the back?”
She braced her hands at her hips and tipped her chin up to challenge him.
“Fine.” Jude let out a long breath, then looked at Francisco. “I’ll take it from here. Leave the tablet with me.”
Francisco turned around and left the room without another word. When the door fell shut behind him, a few seconds of silence spread between her and her brother.
“There’s a surveillance video that captured Byron and Flora in a private conversation. We would have never been alerted to it, had Flora not tried to delete it and gotten caught by Francisco.”
What could be so bad in a conversation between Byron and his aunt? Instead of making a comment, she simply waited until Jude continued.
He reached for a tablet on his desk and tapped on it to wake up the screen.
“Listen, before you watch this, you should know that Byron was very upset the night this recording was made. I think he spoke in anger, and I know Byron well enough by now to know that he flares up quickly, but then calms down just as quickly.”
“You’re stalling,” she interrupted and stretched out her hand to demand the tablet.
He handed it to her, then tapped on the video file. It began playing. At first, it was exactly the way Jude had described it: Byron had been upset about being ordered around by Jude. She looked at her brother, shrugging.
“So?”
“Keep watching,” he said calmly.
That’s when she heard the rest of the conversation. Blood as cold as ice started running through her veins, chilling her from the inside. Byron had planned all this? Planned to make her fall in love with him, so he could dump her and break her heart?
She shook her head. “No. It can’t be. Maybe this is a fake. Maybe somebody changed the audio on it. There is software out there where you can clone a voice…”
Jude put his hand on her forearm. “The video is real. If not, there wouldn’t be a reason for Flora to want to delete it.
” He sighed. “But given what I’ve seen from Byron since that night, the way he looks at you, the way he saved Danielle, I don’t believe that he’s guilty of this, of betraying you like that. ”
“But you don’t trust him. Otherwise, you wouldn’t claim that Byron is stabbing you in the back.”
“I said it was a possibility, and had you not come into my office without knocking, I would have confronted Byron myself to figure out whether he really wanted to go through with his plan.”
“Oh, so now it’s my fault, because I didn’t knock.”
“No, sis, I didn’t mean that. I simply wanted to spare you the heartache.”
“By keeping it from me?”
“By talking to Byron to find out the truth.”
“I can do that myself. I’m not a little girl anymore that you have to protect from all the bad out there in the world.”
She tossed the tablet onto the desk and turned on her heel.
“Please, Charlotte, let me handle this.”
She didn’t stop and opened the door. Holding her head high and her shoulders back, she left the office.
Her heart was pounding, her palms felt sweaty, and her stomach felt as if it was filled with a bag of pebbles that threatened to drag her down.
But she couldn’t let that happen. She had to stay strong and find out the truth for herself, because everything boiled down to one thing: had Byron lied to her?
It took a few minutes until she finally found him in the basement, where he was sorting through weapons to make sure they were loaded and ready to use.
When he saw her, he placed a shotgun back into its space in the rack and walked toward her, his arms already spread out for an embrace. But she didn’t walk into his arms and instead stopped a few feet away from him and lifted her hand to indicate that he shouldn’t come any closer.
His forehead furrowed instantly. “What’s wrong, babe? Are the Leons back?”
She could see his concern, but she didn’t let it sway her in her mission to find the truth.
“There is a video recording of you…” she started.
“What video? A sex tape? I can assure you I never made one. It has to be fake.”
She shook her head. “Not a sex tape. A video of you talking with your aunt. Jude showed it to me.”
He shrugged. “So what?”
She collected all her strength. “You and she were discussing how to hurt Jude by making me fall for you and then dumping me.”
Byron’s face blanched in shock. Guilt was written all over it. When he ran a hand through his dark hair, she noticed that it was trembling.
“I’m sorry, babe, I didn’t even know you then.
I was pissed off about Jude, and I was just venting.
I don’t even remember what I said to Flora that night.
But none of that matters now. I’m in love with you.
And I won’t give you up. I have no reason to hurt you or Jude.
Damn, I even regret having fought Jude back when he first became alpha. Please, believe me…”
He looked at her with his puppy dog eyes.
The words had been so smooth, rolling easily over his lips as if he’d practiced them, as if he always had a speech like that prepared.
She couldn’t tell if he spoke the truth.
The fact that she was in love with him was clouding her judgment.
She couldn’t think straight. Maybe she should have left it up to Jude to confront him.
Maybe Jude could recognize when Byron lied, but she couldn’t.
It meant she couldn’t even trust her own judgment.
She shook her head. “I can’t do this anymore.”
“Do what?”
“You and me. I can’t.”
She turned on her heel.
“Charlie,” Byron called after her. “I love you. Please. I made a mistake, but I never followed through with it…”
But she kept walking until she was far enough away so the temptation to throw herself into his arms would diminish.
The more distance she brought between them, the more her heart ached.
She loved him, but could she truly trust that he carried the same love for her in his heart?
Or was he still playing a cruel game with her?