Page 106 of Owen

He snaps his fingers over and over. “You’re a smart man. Keep up, Owen. Your father’s debt went unpaid. This house and the life insurance cover some of it, but like I said, you are ten million short.”

“But I have no money,” I stutter. “You can have my car. That’s all I have left.”

Sounding bored, Richard sighs. “Your car is too old and only worth a fraction of what your father paid for it ten years ago. I’m not interested.”

My mouth falls open in shock. Is he for real? It’s worth forty grand, but it won’t even make a small dent in the ten million he’s demanding from me.

He drums his fingers against the wooden desk. “What about your trust fund your grandfather left you?”

“Father cleaned out my account. I don’t know what he did with it, but I don’t have it anymore.”

“Well, you had better get your thinking cap on then, eh? What other accounts did he have?”

“I don’t know,” I bellow, my voice bouncing off the stone-cold walls.

He eyes me suspiciously. “As the finance director, you must have shown him all the tax loopholes and dodges?”

“You are not listening to me. I was a director in name only. I was only ever given access to two accounts. One for the business savings, which he withdrew my access from, and one for the everyday in and out transactions. Both of which I’m guessing are frozen by the liquidation of the business.” My voice takes on a new pitch of its own.

“We only know about the everyday one. The bank hasn’t been able to source the savings.”

“Because there won’t be any,” I yell at him again “He told me in Cyprus?—”

Gideon interrupts me. “He visited you in Cyprus?”

“Yes.”

Richard lifts one eyebrow. “Interesting.”

“There is nothing fuckinginterestingabout it.” My blood threads through my veins like hot barbs. “He begged me to come back to help him work out how to liquidate the business without losing everything. He admitted that he messed up. He told me that he had lost billions, gambling stocks and shares, and hedge funds. You name it, he did it. But it’s all gone. All of it. You’ve come to the wrong place if you’re looking for the money he owes you because I have none. I have the clothes I am standing in, a car that, like you said, is worth nothing to you, a few books, a surfboard, a bike, and that’s it.” I’m so out of breath, but I keep going with all that I know. “He withdrew my admin access to the business savings account and moved it elsewhere months ago. I don’t know where it was moved to, but I can assure you, there will be fuck all left. He blew it all on crypto. He lost every penny. Including yours. He gambled the money he borrowed from you to cover the staff wages on even more stocks and shares and fuck knows what else. It’s all gone.”

They both stare blankly at me as Camilla continues to sob.

“Ten million. You have ten days.” Richard pushes up out of the chair.

I laugh at his demand. “You’ll have to make that ten years or decades, not days, because I have no way of getting that money. Good luck though.”

“Thought you might say that,” he mutters blandly, laying his hand out flat.

Gideon places a brown envelope into the palm of Richard’s hand and presents it to me like he’s a waiter serving canapés at a dinner party.

Dread encases me as I stomp forward and snatch it, tearing it open and pulling out whatever is concealed inside.

From the other side of the room, Camilla’s sobs become louder, as if she knows what comes next.

It takes a few moments for my brain to comprehend what the photos in my hand are of and what he’s implying. It’s only then that a single word tears from my throat. “No.” I shake my head rapidly as a lump the size of a cannonball forms in my windpipe.

“Please don’t do this to my family, Richard,” Camilla cries, covering her heart with her chest.

Speechless, I look from Camilla to Richard, then Gideon, and back down at the photos.

“Ten million, Owen. Ten days. You wouldn’t want anything to happen to those two beautiful redheads now, would you?” I rifle through the photos of Jade and Poppy. Some with me. Playing in the garden at her house. Photos of us kissing in the kitchen. Us doing the grocery shopping together. Poppy at nursery. One of Jade sitting in the cockpit of her jet getting ready for take-off on the airfield on base, and there is even one of her taken in what looks like a restaurant overseas with her team.

“How?” I ask in horror, unable to comprehend how he penetrated a high security military compound.

“I’m a man of many talents, Owen. I have eyes and ears everywhere,” Richard says firmly. “Find my money. You have ten days orpoof.” He splays his fingers out in the air. “Gone.” Eyes widening as if he’s the fucking Joker himself, he smiles maliciously. “It would be such a travesty should anything happen to yourHotshotgirlfriend.”

How the hell does he know my pet name for her?

---