The Rider's Dangerous Embrace (An Interracial Bad Boy Romance Story) (22 page)

“Mom, mom, are you home?” Mark used his key to unlock the door to the rather large rustic home, a common choice of living for the wealthy in the area, it seemed.

She clearly was not hurting for money, so why she would be stealing from the company made little sense to her. Jayda was starting to second guess coming here in the first place.

“Are you sure we have to do this now?” She hissed a whisper to him. They drove over right from his house, not bothering to wait until actual daylight.

Luke didn’t even bat an eyelash as they explained the entire thing to him. It was like he knew this was happening all along. She stored that little bit of dissonance away for later.

“Why wait? Give her time to find out that we know? You didn’t grow up around her Jayda. She is my mom but… she isn’t always a good person. No, this has to be done now. It has to.” Mark’s eyes narrowed as he looked back, towards Luke’s truck. “She can’t be allowed to continue doing these things to you because she is jealous or mad or something. It affects too many people.”

She nodded, he was angry enough that she had no choice but to believe him. He knew the woman better than she did, she didn’t know her at all, other than those few words she spoke to her. None of which were kind.

They walked into the dimly lit hallway, and he called out again. “Mom, it’s Mark. I need to talk to you. You home?”

“Yeah, give me a minute, I’m upstairs.” She all but barked it before a light at the top of the stairs came on. “I didn’t expect you, Mark. Why not call?”

Sarah appeared as she took each step at a time, a dark robe tightly wrapped around her body. Jayda wasn’t one to judge, but the woman looked surprisingly good for her age, though the severe look on her face appeared to be a permanent fixture.

“Well, mom. We had something we needed to talk to you about. Something that needed to be addressed now.”

“But it is almost midnight, and who is this ‘we’ you keep referring to?” Her expression changed immediately when she realized that Mark was not here alone. It transformed into something sourer than the previous face.

“I see you have brought my boss into my home. Why would you do that, Mark?”

“I think you know why. I think you know a whole hell of a lot more than you are letting on.” Mark’s tone wasn’t kind as the words flew out of his mouth, and that surprised Jayda. There was an anger in his voice that she had never heard before, one that shifted her confidence to fear, and she realized she was frightened of him.

“So you told her, did you?”

“No, I didn’t. I didn’t tell her anything. She found out all on her own, but I wasn’t going to lie to her about it when she came to me with it.”

“Great, so what do you expect us to be now? One big happy family? Because that ship sailed a long time ago. We could have been happy, until your mother came along and stole what was mine. My future, my fortune.”

“So you are angry at me?” Jayda asked.

“Why wouldn’t I be? You have everything, and we had to act like beggars. Alwyas seeking handouts. Always asking for more. Sure, John gave it to me, and then some, but it should have been my empire.”

“Then why didn’t you tell him? About Mark?”

“Oh, you don’t know John, honey. He may have been your father, but he wasn’t the kind man everyone keeps sanctifying. He was cold, calculating, and after he was done with me, the first time, I knew I was on my own.”

“That doesn’t make any sense, why would he give you a partnership, if he was so cruel?”

“To shut me up. Keep me from ruining his perfect image. I didn’t know it then, I thought he was being kind, but as the years went by, of him using me, leaving me, staying with her, I realized it. He never cared about me. Never cared about Mark. All he wanted was to keep his little indiscretions hush hush.”

“So you thought stealing from his business was the best way to do it?”

“Hurt you, and make my move to own it, why not?”

There it was. The confession she needed. Sarah had become angry enough that she didn’t care what she divulged. “He didn’t even give Mark a share in it.”

Mark’s rage grew. “Because I fucking asked him not to, mom. I didn’t want any part of it, not if I couldn’t earn it myself.”

“Sarah? What are you doing down there? Who are you talking to?”

Another voice. Shit. They weren’t as alone as they thought.

“Fucking hell, mom. Him?” Mark asked, he seemed to recognize the voice right away. “Dad hated-“

“I don’t give a shit about who your father liked and hated. They are all snakes in the grass, all of them.” This woman apparently loved her clichés, which made it that much harder for Jayda to take her seriously.

“That’s it, I’m coming down,” Chad Hayworth bounded down Sarah’s stares, a glare on his face as he assessed the situation. “What the hell is going on?”

“What is going on, is you are leaving, you piece of shit.” Mark glared at him. “This is between me, my mother, and Jayda.”

“Like hell it is. What is going on, Sarah?”

“They know.” Sarah crossed her arms and stared them down. “They know everything.”

“About?” His eyes registered something, but his voice was what really betrayed him. He was just playing dumb.

“Well, why the hell else would they be here. I knew Edward couldn’t fucking keep his mouth shut. I told you he would do this.”

“Look, if they are here, and the police aren’t, it means they don’t have any proof of anything.”

“No, we have proof, but we want to give you the chance to do the right thing. Pay back the missing money, resign. Admit that you did wrong, and we won’t press charges. All of this could be handled civilly.” Jayda was fair, but kind. She didn’t want this lingering over them anymore than it was.

“Yeah, they say that, Sarah, but they are both the spitting image of their father. Liars, and thieves.”

“I’ve had enough of you talking about my father. He was a good man, not perfect, but good. You need to shut up and get the hell out of here.” Jayda spat each word out into his face, but it only seemed to enrage the man.

“You little bitch, I’ve had enough of your shit.” He reached for her throat, grabbing it with both hands and shoving her against the wall. “I am so sick of seeing your fuckin’ face everywhere. You little fuckin whore.”

The edges of her vision were starting to go black, her airways closing, consciousness waning. There was no way a man like this was going to take her, she fought back, trying hard, and failing, to remove his hands from her flesh. If a fist hadn’t flown from behind her directly into his face, she would have lost consciousness.

Luke.
When did he get in here?

“I reckon you think it’s fine to hit a lady, but it ain’t. You son of a bitch.” Luke landed punch after punch, but Mark was there in an instant holding him back.

“It ain’t worth it, man.”

Sarah looked shocked for the first time, her anger finally melting away into worry.

“He, he tried to strangle you?”

“You have eyes.” Mark wasn’t nearly as nice, as he and Luke grabbed Chad, holding him down.

“Chad, why would you do that?”

“Why the fuck do you think? This little bitch is gonna to get away with everything, and now we are the ones who are going to take the fall, Sarah. Think about it.”

“Stop.” Jayda croaked. “I don’t want anyone to go to jail. I just want this to end. I want my business to prosper. Neither one of you are concerned with what is important. The animals. The riders. I’m going to call my lawyers, and if you don’t agree to just give back the money, resign, apologize, I’m going to press charges on everything, Sarah. Do you understand? You will lose everything. Ever scrap of wealth my father gave you, gone.” She stepped forward and handed her a letter, one with her name on it, in her father’s handwriting.

“This is for you. If I can’t convince you, maybe he can. You have a lot to lose, Sarah.”

“Like a son.” Mark finished, his eyes cold. It was clear she had already lost that.

The middle aged woman ripped into the envelope and opened the letter, scanning it, only moments elapsing before tears started falling.

“Shit. Shit. Shit.” Sarah sunk down in a chair and held her head in her hands. “I never wanted it to go this far. It was just a fucking idea. I didn’t mean to make it happen. Hell.”

“What is your choice?” Luke asked, speaking with complete authority.

“I’ll do it. I’ll do whatever you want, just don’t hurt him. Don’t.” Sarah pleaded as she looked up, eyes wide, hair frayed.

“We wouldn’t ever hurt him. Your resignation. On my desk. Monday. Along with any money you took. If it isn’t exact, you know what happens.” She turned and walked out the door, both men releasing Chad, and following her.

***

“I can’t believe you pulled it off.” Thomas was more amused than concerned.

“Why? All it took was a quick discussion with the accountant about some errors in the forms and files, and the corrections to them, along with a nice pile of money.” Jayda balanced her cellphone in one hand while leaving the small town accounting firm, the one that double checked and officially handled all of Rivers and Fields business.

“Well, yeah, but everything else.”

“Thomas, I understand why you didn’t tell me about Mark, but it could have saved us a lot of time.”

“I honestly never thought she would do that. She loved your father, pretty desperately, I mean, I would be lying to say he didn’t feel something for her too. They were off and on your entire life.”

It was crazy to think of her father as that kind of man, but it was a part of him, and it meant that she got to have a brother. One that she was starting to care about, deeply.

“I don’t know, selling the shares to Mark seemed like the right move, though. He’s made a pretty good partner.”

“Though he asked to remain silent.”

“That is his decision, but it works well, as I am sure you are aware.” He had been watching everything like a hawk since it all went down, double and triple checking each piece of paper that went through the office.

“You hear from your mom?”

“Not since I sent her that letter from my dad. I don’t know if I’ll hear from her any time soon, but I can live with that. I’m building my own family."

“Look, kid. We got lucky this time. We always seem to get lucky.”

She climbed up into the rusty old pickup truck, the one where she first fell in love with Luke Daniels, and looked over to see him staring at her, his eyes deep with emotion.

“I know Thomas. I guess he passed his luck on down to me.”

Epilogue

Jayda sat down on the hotel bed and let out a sigh. Her feet were sore from standing after the rodeo, talking to all the young riders who were interested in talking to her, to Mark.

She finally felt like she was in charge, like everything was falling into place.

Jayda looked down at her phone, a new text.

Talking with a young buck that you are going to want to meet. She has quite the talent. - C.

Mark. He had really taken who his work, and since then the facility had grown, and it was coming together nicely.

She shifted her attention on the sound of the shower in the bathroom of the hotel. He was dusty and dirty, and the pile of mud stained clothing on the floor. He had nothing left on in that bathroom, so she why she wasn’t in there, she didn’t know

She set down her phone on the bed and walked over into the bathroom.

“You clean yet?”

Luke stood in the doorway of the shower with a towel wrapped around him, looking over at her.

“I was waitin’ on you. You gonna get undressed, or do I have to rip it off you.” Luke walked over to her and wrapped his arms around her. “I love you, Jayda.”

“You going to rip my clothes off now, or do I have to do it all myself?”