Bad Boy (An Indecent Proposal) - J.C. Reed Page 0,42
The first time I’d seen him, I thought he was going to shake my world. Well, he shook my world, rocked it, and made sure that everything I had known and believed in, crashed and burned.
“I’m still the same man, Laurie. I never meant to do you any harm,” Chase said, oblivious to my thoughts.
I snorted.
He had never wanted to.
Of course it hadn’t been his damn intention.
As if the knowledge would make me feel better.
When people said ‘I never meant to do you any harm,’ what they really wanted to say was ‘I never meant to do you any harm, but things turned out differently, and there was a choice: you or me. Guess what? You lost.”
“I should never have believed you,” I whispered. “It was stupid to trust you when you so clearly only think of yourself.” I felt the pressure of my unshed tears gathering behind my eyes.
Stupid emotions.
Why couldn’t I stop them?
He set his glass down. Instead of replying straight away, he moved closer to me, but didn’t touch me.
“I’m not doing it only for myself,” he whispered after a pause. “I’m also doing it for you. Why do you think my brother doesn’t know we got married?”
“You already said you married me because of your personal issue with Clint,” I said matter-of-factly. “As for Kade, maybe you didn’t tell him because you were waiting for the surprise party.”
His eyebrows rose slightly. “Don’t be ridiculous. I’m not just having issues with Clint, as you so eloquently put it. It goes much deeper than that.” He patted the seat next to him, his voice rising up a notch. “Sit down. This will take at least twenty minutes.”
I didn’t move. “Ten minutes. Tops. And I’m standing.”
“Fine. I’ll give you the short version then.” He motioned at a nearby seat. When I made no attempt to move, he sighed.
“Guys like Clint pave the way so people like us wind up with nothing,” he started. “He used your mother’s money—money he was never supposed to touch—to set up a corporation. He uses the funds as loans to small businesses in return for shares knowing that they can’t afford to pay back the loans. Then he seemingly helps them so that the business takes off. It all comes down to the business owner not being able to repay him, so he takes over the business and everything else to get his money. That’s what happened to a lot of families. This is the simplified version. Basically, many people have lost their income. Their homes. Their dreams. Someone needs to stop him. That someone has to be me.”
I ran my tongue across my parched lips, his words resonating in my mind.
Holding my bag in front of me as if it was some shield, I sat down, eyeing him carefully. “So, he supports them in order to cheat them out of their livelihood?”
“I wouldn’t call that support. He sets them up for their own fail.”
I frowned at his choice of words, my heart racing. “I don’t understand. How does he do it?”
“It’s all a bit of a gamble,” Chase said. “He lends them a lump sump of money and convinces them to invest their money, their homes, everything they own into their business. When things start to go well, he makes sure that a competitor beats them in a series of events that leaves them in greater debt than before, unable to fight him. I don’t have to tell you that he’s the competitor. His loss is minimal, but the rewards are huge. In the end, Clint is the one who owns the business and all the money invested in it while the previous business owner is left with insurmountable debt.”
I frowned. “Is that even legal?”
“Is tricking someone into buying a car that is a piece of shit, legit? Yeah, it is. Unfortunately.” He stretched out his legs, an angry expression flashing across his face. “Clint is the reason why I became a lawyer,” he continued. “For as long as I can remember, I wanted to be part of the law so guys like him could be served justice. I want to fight; I want to implement a change. Unfortunately, what he does is legal. In the legal sense, all parties involved agreed to his contract. There’s absolutely no proof that what he does is premeditated. Without that proof, an investigation is a waste of time.”
“He’s using the gray area of the legal system to further his own agenda. Just like you did with