Page 139 of Lust & Lies

“But now he’s going to have to protect her from the Clarks.”

Thanks to the bugs she’d planted, we knew they were targeting her for having called the police. Her life was in danger for helping us.

“Does he care about her?” Julian asked the million-dollar question.

“I think he does. He’s still childish as hell. But he seemed genuinely worried about her today. He had her come to him, and now they’ve gone to his house out in the country. It looks like he cares for her to me.”

“At least she’s safe. What happened after the cops came?” Julian asked.

“They picked up father and son for questioning after taking witness statements. Junior wasn’t at the office. They had to go to his home to find him. My sources tell me they found him high asfuck, and he started telling the cops everything before his lawyer even showed up.”

“Fucking idiot.”

“Yeah, he’s always been an idiot.”

“So now we just have to wait and see if Aaron Clark retaliates.”

“He’ll be going down, too. When the police come here to ask questions about the staffer who was killed by Junior, I’ll review the footage with them of her last day on the job. I’m sure we’ve got Senior on camera entering our facilities. That’ll prove he helped Junior cover it up. And since Louis is a no-show this morning, I’m sure I can help the cops figure out his connection to it all and make it seem like the bastard ran off with some money to escape the Clarks.”

“It looks like this may be wrapped up nicely. But we both know things never go as planned.”

My life was proof of that. My gaze drifted to the security screen. Noe was awake. She’d gone downstairs and gotten herself a book and a bowl of cereal. She was now relaxing in bed, eating and reading. Not once had she come to check on me or tell me good morning.

I could be dead in one of these rooms, and she wouldn’t even know or care. Despite knowing that, I’d still rather be beside her than in here, half asleep, trying to handle business. In fact, I was tired of staring at her on this screen. I needed to see her face in person.

I muffled my yawn before telling Julian, “You’re right. Things don’t always go as planned. So, be careful. I’ll call you if the recording picks up anything you should know.”

“Thanks, Aiden.”

I ended the call and was just about to go check on Noe to see if she needed anything, but my phone rang.Fuck. My. Life.I answered the call, which led to a video chat with my hotel manager.

That call lasted longer than I’d intended. But that was my fault. I wanted to know how something like this could’ve gone down in our fucking hotel and we’re just now finding out about it.

We had policies in place, just as other hotels did, that were meant to prevent shit like this from happening and also prevent human trafficking. We had teams in place that monitored hallways in our hotels to see who entered and exited rooms, making sure no women or children entered but didn’t leave the room.

A few years ago, an agency offered classes that trained staff on how to spot suspicious activity that could be associated with trafficking, domestic violence, and child abuse. I sent my entire staff to those classes, even the kitchen staff.

So how had those women gone into that room but didn’t come out alive without anyone noticing? Though we wouldn’t take the fall for the murders, this would affect our reputation.

And it should, because we’d failed those women and our staffer. We’d have to work on a statement to let the public and our board know that we were actively putting procedures in place to prevent such things from happening in the future.

The management team and I went over countless possibilities and questions the police could ask when they came to do interviews. I wanted to make sure the managers were prepped on what to say and, more importantly, what not to say.

When lunchtime rolled around, I thought about going to eat with Noe. Then Ethan called to fill me in on something he’d overheard by listening in on the conversations going on at Clark Constructions.

A new problem had arisen, and this one would affect Julian and Cattaneo Constructions. So instead of going to eat with Noe, I had to make another call to Julian Cattaneo.

While waiting for him to answer, I watched Noe on the security cam as she went downstairs, heated some of the food Dolores had brought us, and ate alone. She was perfectly content without me by her side, while I was over here going through withdrawals.

“What happened?” Julian finally answered the call, already sensing something was up.

I sighed, massaging my forehead, sick of dealing with this shit.

“The bug has picked up on something you need to know.”

“What is it?” Julian asked.

“Aaron Clark has another son.”