Shattered Dreams (9 page)

“He’s stooped too low this time. I really will kill him before I let him take everything.”

Looking into two shocked faces, Claire realized she’d said too much. Without explaining any further, she gathered her things and handed the pile to Gwen. “You two will have to take care of this without my input. I’ve got a few calls to make.”

Gwen hesitated, eyeing Claire with concern. “Are you okay?”

“Don’t ask. It’s too complicated.”

While heading out of the conference room, her thoughts were on her asshole of a husband. Husband. Ha! What a laugh. He’d never been a husband . . . more like a spoiled child. She was finally tired. Tired of everything.

Thank God that Hennessy, being an exacting man, had called asking for her when he couldn’t get in touch with Carl. Seemed there’d been some small glitch in the paperwork he and Carl were working on, and it had to be redone.

Claire’s next step involved taking action. No way that sniveling coward would steal what was hers. She stormed into her office, picked up her phone, and punched a preset button she never thought she’d use again, until now.

“Crystal Grayson.”

“Crystal? It’s Claire.”

“Claire?”

“You got a minute? I need you.”

“That’s a switch.”

“I didn’t call to fight about past grievances. Carl’s disappeared.”

“So I heard. I can’t believe the bastard drugged you.”

“How’d you know?” The news stunned Claire.

“Jason told me when I asked how things were going.”

“It’s gotten worse,” she said, ignoring a twinge of annoyance. So what if her sister and Jason had a relationship? “He’s selling our assets. Plus, he applied for a large loan, using the company as collateral. My signature’s on the form. Crystal, he forged my name. If not for an error in paperwork, he’d abscond with over ten million dollars and bankrupt the company. I need to stop him.”

“About damn time.”

Claire clenched her teeth. “You can gloat later.”

“I don’t want to gloat.” Crystal sighed, and her voice took on a conciliatory quality. “Believe it or not, I did what I did for you. So you could see what an asshole he is.”

“Spare me the details.” Claire snorted.

Only Crystal could make herself out to be some kind of hero for screwing her sister’s husband. Yet Claire had bigger worries now, so she relented, doing something she’d sworn she’d ever do—ask her twin for help.

“You’re the attorney. Get me the divorce you promised and stop him. I want the bastard nailed. Maybe I can sue him for desertion.”

“Let me work on the means,” Crystal replied. “I’ll make a few calls and start proceedings. Do you want me to contact Jason for you?”

“No. I fired him.” Or at least, she thought she had.

“Why? He may be a little distracted because of his own nasty divorce, but he’s the best there is.” Crystal broke off and then sighed. “Never mind. I know why. It’s because I sent him, isn’t it?”

“It had nothing to do with you,” Claire lied, unwilling to divulge the reasons for her unease with the charming attorney.

“Jason’s special. I hope you were nice to him and didn’t take our differences out on him, because I did you a huge favor sending him.”

There was a touch of censure along with wistfulness in her twin’s tone. Claire shook her head, dismissing it.

“I don’t need him any longer.” Crystal couldn’t have a thing for Jason, considering her sister’s tendency to use men rather callously. “Carl’s obviously alive to be making my life miserable, so I know I didn’t kill him. Not yet.”

Still, it wasn’t like Crystal to call a man “special,” or to say “hope you were nice” in a sentence about anyone. In fact, it was usually Claire who did that type of begging.

After scheduling a time to meet and saying good-byes, she hung up the phone, wondering for the hundredth time what, if anything, was going on between her twin and the irritating attorney.

• • •

Later, Claire sat behind Carl’s desk and searched through his personal effects.

Nothing.

She shoved the drawer shut in a fit of frustration, but it caught. After readjusting, she spied the problem and yanked papers to undo the small jam. The drawer glided shut.

Why were charge receipts stuck in Carl’s desk? Had he meant to hide them?

She inspected the small pieces of paper more closely. They were from a local hotel. The date and amount told her they were probably for a room.

Claire headed for her office, intent on researching more thoroughly. Once there, she picked up a phone and dialed Harris, the head of accounting.

“Can you pull all the expense reports in the last six months for the sales department?”

“Of course. It may take a bit of time.”

“No problem. Call me when you have them. I want to review them.”

Within an hour, she stood at Harris’s desk, going over them.

“What about this card number?” she asked, nonchalantly giving him the account number off the receipt she’d found.

Harris took the number and typed. After a moment, he cleared his throat. “Are you sure you have the right number?” he asked, searching her face.

“No,” she replied hesitantly, unwilling to say more. “Why?”

“That’s not a sales account. It’s listed as one of yours, or rather
C. Carter
.”

“What?”

“Your signature’s on all the paperwork.” He pointed to the screen. “It’s all right there.”

She glanced at the screen and sure enough, there was her signature.

“My mistake,” she murmured, keeping her face from showing any emotion when inside, she seethed. “I must’ve mixed up the numbers.”

As she eyed the information, her mind spun. “Can you print those pages, as well as the last month of sales expenses so I can compare them to my copies?”

“Is there a problem?”

“No. Of course not. I just found a receipt of Carl’s, and I’m trying to figure out where it goes,” she lied, hoping the lame excuse would work.

Harris only nodded, his look telling her he wasn’t totally convinced. But since she was the boss, he didn’t say more.

When he handed her the information she’d requested, she smiled and thanked him before returning to her office. Seated at her desk again, she turned on her computer and went online. For more than an hour, she searched charge records from the number on the receipt, looking closely at statements and seeing several duplicate entries.

She called the credit card company, asking for clarification on certain line items. Armed with the information, she googled the Ocean View Resort and quickly punched in the phone number.

“C. Carter’s room, please?” she said when an operator answered.

“One moment and I’ll connect you.”

Having gotten what she wanted, Claire hung up the phone and swiveled her chair. She sat, immobile, staring out her window without seeing the view.

Chapter 9

“You got a minute?” Deputy Snyder asked after Jason picked up the phone and recognized his voice.

“Sure. What’s up?”

“The forensic preliminary report on the blood came back. The evidence suggests the blood was most likely planted. Poured from a distance of eight to twelve inches.”

Unsurprised, Jason grunted but stayed silent, waiting for the deputy to continue.

“Something to do with the way they splattered or didn’t splatter and the trail. My guy says it’s human. His hunch is that it came from the blood bag we found to get that type of consistency without smears or footprints.” Snyder paused a moment and added, “And the bloody knife is just that. A bloody knife, as if someone dipped it. If it had gone into skin or hit bone, the serrated edges would’ve held at least minute traces of tissue. Tissue was found, all right, but it was animal tissue, not human. So it’s unlikely anyone was stabbed.”

“Interesting,” Jason murmured, leaning back into his chair. “Not very thorough, is he?”

“Must not watch much
CSI
.” Snyder chuckled before his demeanor sobered. “Since the wife was drugged, I’m betting the husband’s responsible. Makes me curious as to why anyone would go to such lengths to disappear while ineptly trying to make it appear as if his wife was guilty of some heinous crime. Pretty sadistic, if you ask me.”

“Who knows what goes through people’s minds. So, what happens now?”

“A report’s been filed. Since the evidence points to the husband leaving on his own and the wife isn’t pushing, the investigation will probably end up in limbo because other cases take priority.”

Jason thanked Snyder and hung up, his mind spinning. Eventually, he picked up the phone and punched in a number he’d memorized.

“Claire?”

“Jason? This is a surprise. I thought I was clear. I no longer want or need your services.”

“I know. Did you eat anything today?”

“No,” she said on a sigh. “But I’m betting you already knew that. Didn’t you?”

He could sense her smile through the phone, and it brought out one of his own.

“Yes.” He chuckled. “Consider it part of my job description as a friend. You’ve got to eat sometime, so I’ll be by your office in an hour. I’m picking up my boat this afternoon to sail back to the marina. It’s been in dry dock for two weeks, having the bottom scraped and painted.”

“I don’t—”

“You should know I won’t take no for an answer.”

“I’ve got too much work to take the afternoon—”

“This isn’t about work,” he interrupted again. “It’s about making sure you take care of yourself. You’ve had a rough week. I barbecue a mean steak. I promise a nice, relaxing evening on the water. One that includes a very nutritious meal.”

The line was silent before she sighed. “You bribing me again?”

“I told you; I use what works.” He smiled. “I’ll be there in an hour, so be ready. You won’t regret it.”

His grin spread wider as he hung up to Claire’s burble of laughter.

• • •

Claire’s smile was still in place when she heard the final click. The guy had a hard time understanding concepts, especially if they contained the word
no
. But she was glad of it. She didn’t want to be by herself, not after the morning she’d had tracking down Carl.

An hour later, she let go of the glass door and walked outside just as Jason drove up and stopped short a few feet in front of her.

“You’re prompt,” he said once she’d hopped inside the Mercedes.

“I try to be,” Claire murmured, remembering his words from yesterday.

“My kind of lady.”

He whipped onto I-95 and drove forty-five minutes north until he exited the interstate. In another ten minutes, he pulled into the parking lot of a boat yard.

Claire looked around and noted dozens of boats in various stages of repair.

“Which one is yours?” she asked, wondering what type of sailboat he owned.

The man was too good a sailor to own a powerboat. In the boating world, there were only two types—those fortunate to sail, and everyone else.

“That’s the
Seawind
over there.” He pointed to a sloop that had to be at least forty-five feet long, docked and ready to go.

“She’s beautiful,” Claire whispered.

“Wait till you see her under full sail. Only another sailor can truly appreciate the way she cuts through the water, like a knife through soft butter. And she’s fast.”

Pride rang in his voice, and she understood it. Fast under sail meant something totally different from fast under power. When heeled over on a sailboat, traveling through the water with both the sun and the wind hitting the face and no loud engine to mar the silence, it wasn’t about speed. Usually the boat wasn’t going much over six knots, or roughly seven miles an hour.

Claire had spent years mastering the power of the wind and the challenge of the sea, learning to sail a boat built to harness both. It was an exhilarating experience to be able to hoist a bit of cloth and make the sloop move without the aid of a noisy engine.

Jason paid and arranged to have his car driven back to the marina in Boca. Claire followed him and stepped on board the
Seawind
. They swiftly unloaded the provisions he’d bought earlier along with his gear, and pushed away from the dock.

As they motored north toward the Palm Beach Inlet along the Intracoastal Waterway, Jason gave her a quick rundown on the specifics.

“Where are we sailing and how long will it take?” Claire asked as they passed the red buoy with flashing lights that signaled sailors from miles away.

“South to the Boca Inlet.” He was totally at ease at the helm. The boat then glided between the jetties of large rocks on either side of the inlet, heading into the deeper waters of the Atlantic Ocean. “The marina’s not too far from there. It should take several hours.”

They passed the green buoy that indicated the mouth of the channel. Both busied themselves unfurling the sails, Jason raising the mainsail and she the jib. Done, he switched off the motor. Silence surrounded them except for the water lapping at the boat as it heeled over, along with the flapping of the sails until he trimmed them by turning the winch to take out the slack as the canvas filled with air.

After Jason set the course and the autopilot, he lounged across from her, appearing relaxed.

“Today’s a good day for doing this because the wind’s coming from the north-northwest and the seas are fairly flat. We’ll be going downwind after tacking out a ways.”

She nodded and remained silent. They were heading out into the deep ocean, away from land. Normally, she didn’t sail this far north. There were no heavy swells to contend with in the shallower water off Key Largo, which she preferred and was why she kept her boat there. Nor did the Gulf Stream current affect sailing that far south. Both yielded a totally different experience.

Jason gave her a small smile. “I promised to feed you.”

As he went below, Claire stayed topside, enjoying the warm wind on her face. He returned with a plate of hors d’oeuvres and went below again, this time carrying a small cooler of soft drinks and bottled water.

“Eat up.” He nodded to the broccoli florets, baby carrots, dip, and crackers with cheese. “I’m sure you’re hungry.”