Page 1 of Vengeful Lies

Chapter

One

September 1st

8:51 A.M.

This felt wrong.

Cade Charleston sensed it down to his bones.

He shouldn’t have come.

Knowing they had no other options right now, that the danger surrounding their family was only growing, and if they didn't find some answers soon things were only going to get worse, meant he’d had no choice but didn't make it any better. He should have found another way. Would have if he’d had more time.

So far, he and his family had been lucky. His younger brother, Cooper, and his now girlfriend, Willow, had been lucky to survive what happened to them in Egypt, and without the intel they’d managed to gather they’d be no closer to proving their mother was innocent. That she was no traitor who had betrayed her husband and her country.

But the price of those answers had almost been Cooper and Willow’s lives.

Now, the men behind the conspiracy to frame his mother and stepfather had made attacks on his brother Cole’s neighbor, who they mistakenly believed was Cole’s girlfriend, and his brother Connor’s ex-girlfriend. Luckily, both Susanna and Becca had survived, and each time they gained a tiny piece of intel they hadn't had before.

Not enough though.

Never enough.

Which was why he was there even though every cell in his body screamed at him that this was wrong. That he was making a mistake, one that might not be easily rectifiable.

What choice did he have though?

Allow Becca, whose family had lived across the street from his when they were children and who had practically been part of their family, to come?

Alone at that?

Because those were the instructions she’d been given in the phone call she received last night.

A man who had briefly worked at her charity while living and working in a small village in Cambodia had called her out of the blue. She’d told them that the man had replaced someone else at the last minute and she’d never had a good feeling from him.

That alone would have put them all on edge.

But it wasn't all the man had told her.

He’d claimed he was the half-brother of Cade’s baby sister, Cassandra, and he had information on their father that he wanted to pass along to her.

Only a few weeks ago, they’d learned that Cassandra had a different father. Their mother had been gang raped on what would have been her last CIA mission. That one of her assailants had impregnated her and the men responsible for that rape were determined to cover up their crimes by whatever means necessary.

Including having their victim’s husband’s Delta Force team ambushed and slaughtered then setting her, and the only survivor of that attack, up to take the fall to silence them. Then going after his family when it became clear they were starting to get close enough to find the proof they needed to exonerate their deceased mother’s name.

They couldn’t pass up the opportunity to meet with him just because they had no way to corroborate whether this man, who called himself John Jones, was telling them the truth . If he really was Cassandra’s half-brother, they’d either have the name of her father or, at least, in the event that John was another product of rape, more intel to put together with what they had.

If the man was lying, then hopefully, Cade could interrogate him and find out who he really was and who had sent him to Cambodia to watch Becca and told him to call her.

Answers.

They were desperate for them.

Desperate enough for him to sit in his car watching the busy parking lot of a local mall where John Jones had told Becca to meet him.

Although Becca had been willing to meet with the man she’d known in Cambodia, even though he’d asked her out several times and made her uncomfortable, the entire family had vetoed it. She was only just recovering from her and Connor’s ordeal a week ago, no way were they throwing her right back into the line of fire.

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