Dark Redemption - Charlotte Byrd Page 0,34

months? I don't know how long. But he'd have to trust you."

I nod. “Some of that proposition is a lot less enticing. This is like a full-time job, and that's if I can get it."

"It's true." He nods.

Suddenly, the question of where we stand in our relationship comes up, but I don't want to be the first one to bring it up.

We have just met. We connected. This is unfair, this talk about ... so early in whatever it is that this is.

"I travel a lot for work," Dante says. "I can take some time off, but not much. I don't have that much leeway. But we can see each other and I can visit you in Seattle if this works out just as easily as I could visit you here."

I smile. This warms my heart. "Really?"

He nods. "Really."

"Okay. I'll think about it."

20

Dante

I feel bad that I haven't told her the truth about everything. But when I saw her on the beach, we started talking. Then we were going on that date, it was like I suddenly got to be with her again and I remembered what it was like and how good it felt and I didn't want to ruin it.

After Jacqueline had a fight with Allison, we spend the day at the beach. I pack a lunch and an umbrella and a cooler full of cold drinks, and we swim and make out in the ocean.

We hold hands and play and laugh. We have the most perfect day. And while she reads stuff on her phone, I catch up on some emails.

I'm putting in a lot of extra hours at work to pay off the debt that she doesn't know that I owe. The money that I paid for her mother's treatment came partly from my trust fund and partly from…elsewhere.

I keep waiting for one of the companies that we had invested in to be sold. But they're hang-ups, nothing outrageous or unexpected, but every time there's a delay, it means that there's a delay in the money that comes back to me.

The thing is that the trust fund is not the only place where I had borrowed the money from. I was short and I needed to do this for her because of the mistakes that I had made. So I borrowed about seventy-five from very bad people.

This is part of the secrets and the lies that Jacqueline can never know.

She thinks the money all came from me. But I owe debts, which I don't know how to pay back.

Life would be so much easier if Cedar had told me the truth about his investments with Vasko. I have suspicions about the kickbacks and the fact that he's using this infusion of cash to raise other money or perhaps pay back debtors that he's beholden to. Not that I would allow him to do that.

The duty that I owe my investors, I take very seriously. If they find out that Apex Capital is involved in some sort of scam, they will pull out. And if two pull out, then they all pull out because rumors are the one thing that can kill a financial company. The rumors don’t even have to be true.

Our reputation is our bond.

That's why I have to find out what is really going on with Vasko.

I've brought in enough investors into Apex to get them to leave with me if I were to start a new company, but the success of that company is entirely dependent on the quality of Apex Capital.

If I were to leave now and set myself up as a competitor, theoretically stealing his clients away from him, Cedar will go after me with everything he has and I don't stand a chance.

He will tell every startup, everyone he knows, not to invest with me. And even the clients that I do manage to bring over will start to have doubts if we can't find suitable investments to place our money into.

If I find out and confirm that the deal with Vasko is a backhanded thing and show proof that I formed my company to not participate in fraud, then all of his clients will run over to me, setting myself up as the winner in this exchange.

I will be someone who is on the right side of things.

While Jacqueline tells me about her struggle to find a good-paying job, I suddenly have an epiphany. What if I had someone competent, someone who knew how to investigate on the inside?

I