Page 41 of The Hanging Dolls (Zoe Storm #1)

FORTY

Rain hammered against the windows as Regina slipped into the darkened office, the wind howling through the narrow gaps in the old building’s frame. The lights had gone out minutes earlier, leaving her in near-total darkness, but she couldn’t wait. There was too much at stake.

There was a low rumble of thunder, like a warning, as she fumbled through the desk drawers with shaking hands. Her flashlight cast an eerie, narrow beam, illuminating papers strewn across the desk, files haphazardly stacked, and the occasional coffee-stained document.

Guilt flooded her. She was their leader, the boss. She should have known about this instead of trusting Connor with everything.

Next, she found a stack of loan applications, each neatly bound with rejection letters stapled to them.

One after another, banks and private lenders had turned them down.

“Insufficient collateral,” “high risk,” “no credit history”—the reasons varied, but the result was the same.

The campaign was on the brink of financial collapse, and no one had bothered to tell her.

A flash of lightning lit up the room, the sudden brightness throwing the papers into sharp relief. For a moment, she stood still, the realization of their impending doom sinking in. They were out of time, out of options.

But then, just as quickly, darkness swallowed the room again, and in the afterglow of the lightning, her eyes caught something else. Something hidden under the desk, barely visible beneath a pile of old newspapers—a duffel bag.

Regina’s heart galloped as she knelt down, pulling the bag out into the open. It was heavy, the zipper straining against whatever was inside. With a trembling hand, she slowly unzipped it.

Another burst of lightning flashed through the window, just as she peeled the bag open.

Inside were neat stacks of cash, tightly bound with rubber bands, the sight of which left her confused if anything.

Was Connor stealing money from the campaign and building his own nest?

But there was no time to be angry about that.

There was something else that made her blood run cold.

Nestled beside the cash were several unmarked black envelopes and, most terrifying of all, a gun—its cold, metallic surface glinting in the brief light.