Blind Faith - Sharon Sala Page 0,67

healed herself of cancer. And if she also attained psychic skills, it would explain how she’d outed Boyington.

“Why do we yearn to create that which will destroy us?” he muttered, then picked up the coffee cup on his desk and threw it across the room.

It shattered against the wall, leaving coffee splatter on the wallpaper and shards of pottery all over the floor.

His secretary heard the noise and came running.

“Mr. Parks! Are you okay?” she asked, staring at the mess in disbelief.

“No, I am not. Get the janitorial service in to clean this up. I’ll be out for the rest of the day, and I am unavailable. Period.”

“Yes, sir,” she said, and hurried away.

Cyrus took a back exit out of the building and headed home. Just thinking of all the power brokers who kept UT’s donations healthy made him anxious. They weren’t the kind of people who bought into the “it’s the thought that counts” mindset. They gave money to make it back many times over. Even if it was his personal money, they would not be impressed.

At first, he didn’t know how he was going to sell this, and then it hit him. The men he’d been dining with when his money first disappeared knew he’d been hacked. If he could make them believe it was the hackers who’d done this, too, then the rest of this would all blow over.

Except for Wyrick, who wasn’t going to go away.

* * *

Charlie sent Wyrick a text the next morning and got an instant reply.

I’m back in town.

I know.

Fine, but since I’m not tracking you like a lost dog, are you okay, and are you still working from home?

Yes, and yes. Found a missing granddaughter for a client via internet. Case closed. Merlin is failing. 24-hour nursing at his home and Hospice involved. I am his heir. As if I wasn’t rich enough already. Life is a joke on all of us.

Charlie read between the lines of her text. Maybe because he’d just lived it, he saw the fear and sadness, but he couldn’t empathize. She would slit his throat before she’d let him say he was sorry for her in any way.

No more trouble from daddy dearest?

He just donated 40 million dollars to survivors of Hurricane Dorian. A real bighearted guy.

* * *

Charlie blinked. A forty-million-dollar hit for siccing a hit man on her? He couldn’t help but grin. Damn, but he did like the way Wyrick rolled.

Fourteen

Three days later

It was late afternoon when Charlie left Dallas with Annie’s ashes. She hadn’t ridden in the car with him since the day he moved her into Morning Light, and this ride was going to be their last. He glanced at the box in the passenger seat and then back at the highway, blinking back tears.

“So, lady...why do I feel like you’re really here? Maybe because the best part of you came along for the ride?”

He wasn’t expecting an answer, so he wasn’t disappointed by the silence. Instead, he turned on Sirius XM to the Willie Nelson channel and caught the end of “Seven Spanish Angels.”

“Ah...missed one of your favorites, honey. But it doesn’t matter now, does it? You’re a real angel now, even though you were always mine. Oh hey, here comes my favorite...‘You Were Always on My Mind’...and that’s the truth, Annie. No matter where I was, or what I was doing, you were always on my mind. I don’t know how the hell to function without you. Even when you forgot me, then forgot you, I remembered us. I don’t want this to be over, but it already is, isn’t it? I’m the one who’s still struggling.”

And so he and Annie drove for two and a half hours to Lake Texoma, with Willie singing background. After he reached the lake, he wound around it to the turn leading to “their” rental cabin down by the water. He had a sack of groceries in the back seat, and Annie riding shotgun—just like they’d done so many times before.

He pulled up at the cabin just in time to watch the sunset, then got Annie and the groceries and went inside. He set everything on the kitchen table and turned up the thermostat.

“Damn, but it’s cold in here. I’ll get a fire going before we roast the wieners and marshmallows. Remember the last time we were here? We came to have a little cookout, only it was July and pouring rain. Remember that fire we built in here? It was the middle