He Locked the Boardroom Door—"You're Not Leaving Until You Tell Me the Truth"
THE RCMP TOLD A JUNIOR PARALEGAL HER BILLIONAIRE BOYFRIEND WAS LAUNDERING MONEY—THEN ALEC FITZGERALD LOCKED THE BOARDROOM DOOR, SLID A PHOTOGRAPH OF HER SECRET MEETING ACROSS THE TABLE, AND SAID, “TELL ME WHAT YOU TOLD HIM BEFORE SOMEONE DECIDES YOU KNOW TOO MUCH.”
Vivian Sheridan thought the most dangerous choice she had made was meeting an RCMP financial-crimes officer behind Alec Fitzgerald’s back after he offered her witness protection and a new identity.
Then Alec showed her proof that someone had been watching both of them before the RCMP ever approached her—and that two men inside his father’s old empire were quietly moving millions to make Alec look guilty.
By the time Vivian discovered who had really chosen her as the perfect informant, she understood the terrifying truth: neither the police nor Fitzgerald’s enemies wanted her dead—they wanted her alive long enough to destroy the man she was beginning to love.
PART 1 — THE PHOTOGRAPH ON THE BOARDROOM TABLE
The fluorescent lights in Fitzgerald Capital’s forty-second-floor boardroom buzzed just loudly enough to make my headache worse.
“Sit down, Ms. Sheridan.”
Alec Fitzgerald never shouted. Men who needed volume to control a room did not interest him.
Tonight his quiet voice frightened me more.
“You’re not leaving until you tell me exactly what you said to Sergeant Cole.”
My knees wanted to fold. I lowered myself into the leather chair anyway and pressed my palms against my thighs so he would not see them shake.
Six weeks earlier, I had been Vivian Sheridan, twenty-nine, junior paralegal, failed law student, owner of one badly assembled IKEA bookshelf and sixty-eight thousand dollars in deferred student debt.
Then my firm sent me to deliver documents to The Meridian.
That was where I met Alec Royce Fitzgerald.
Forty-two. Dark hair touched with silver. Cedar cologne. A face built for magazine covers and cross-examinations.
He had taken the envelope from me, read my name from the courier slip, and said, “Vivienne,” as if he intended to remember it.
The next morning he invited me to dinner.
No question mark.
I should have hated that.
Instead, I went.
Then there were more dinners. LSAT books appeared at my apartment. A winter coat replaced the one with the broken zipper. A driver waited when I worked late.
And somewhere between resenting Alec’s certainty and discovering how completely he listened when I spoke, I began wanting him in my life.
Then Sergeant Damien Cole stopped me outside my office after midnight.
RCMP Financial Crimes.
Four-year investigation.
Money laundering.
Ports.
Construction companies.
Cayman accounts.
Organized crime.
“We need someone close enough to see what warrants can’t reach,” Cole had said.
“You’re already close.”
I met him once in Kensington Market.
Forty minutes.
I gave him nothing.
Apparently forty minutes was enough.
Alec opened the folder between us.
The first photograph showed me sitting across from Cole in the café, both hands wrapped around a paper cup.
The second showed Cole approaching me outside my office.
The third had been taken before that.
I stared.
It showed Alec and me leaving The Meridian together eleven days earlier.
Across the street, barely visible through wet snow, stood Sergeant Cole.
Watching.
My stomach tightened.
Alec came around the desk.
“Tell me.”
“He approached me.”
“I know.”
“He said Fitzgerald Capital launders money.”
Alec’s face gave away nothing.
“He showed me transfers.”
“What did you give him?”
“Nothing.”
His jaw tightened.
“Vivian.”
“Nothing.”
He searched my face.
I stood.
“If you’re guilty, I won’t protect you.”
Something painful crossed his eyes.
“I know.”
“And if he’s lying, I won’t help him destroy you.”
Alec went still.
That answer had not been expected.
He walked to the windows.
“Cole thinks you’re leverage.”
“Against you?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Alec turned.
“Because he knows you matter to me.”
The room became very quiet.
Then he opened another file.
Bank transfers.
Corporate structures.
Names.
Two names were highlighted.
Graham Sloane. Peter Vale.
“My father’s oldest partners,” Alec said.
“What about them?”
“They are the two men preventing me from fully dismantling the last criminal relationships Fitzgerald Capital inherited.”
I looked at the photographs again.
“You think Cole is working with them?”
“I think somebody gave Cole information designed to look incriminating without being complete.”
“Why?”
“Because if I’m charged before the restructuring closes, Sloane and Vale regain operational control.”
A chill moved through me.
“And me?”
Alec’s gaze settled on my face.
“You were supposed to believe Cole.”
He opened the final page.
A confidential RCMP contact assessment.
My name appeared at the top.
But the document was dated six days before Sergeant Cole had ever approached me.
Under my name was one handwritten sentence:
SHERIDAN IS THE ACCESS POINT. FITZGERALD WILL CHOOSE HER OVER THE COMPANY.
I looked at Alec.
He looked furious.
Not with me.
“For someone inside a federal investigation,” he said quietly, “to write that before Cole ever spoke to you, someone had to tell them exactly what I felt.”
He slid one last photograph across the table.
It showed my apartment building.
My front door.
My window.
Taken yesterday.
Alec’s voice dropped.
“Vivian, this stopped being an investigation the moment somebody started mapping where you sleep.”
Entertaiment
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