Into Her Fire (Fantasy Heights) (10 page)

Thomas told Jerod, “I always knew you were ambitious. Stupid was a surprise.”

Jerod crumpled, shaking his head as if he himself couldn’t quite believe how dumb and gullible he could be. “Thomas, I’m sorry. But how was I supposed to know? I’ve known Steph most of my life. Why would I even suspect she was kicking me out of the frying pan and into her fire?”

The kid had a point. Steph had surprised a lot of people these last few months, and not in a good way. Some of the suspicions were so bad that they kept him up a night, but he would have to follow up on those later. Right now, the important thing was figuring out how to handle what lay on the table before him.

The first item was the dismissal form Steph had filed to get rid of Amanda, the one that had finally cracked Jerod Hughes.

Thomas pulled it over to his side of the table, and took a seat.

Jerod immediately asked, “Did you tell Amanda about me?”

“Tell her what? That you were her mystery client, or that you were stupid?”

The kid went quiet again while Thomas examined more documents. Email transcripts of Steph, posing as the CEO of a corporation three states away, bribing Andrew West into sneaking an unscreened client into the booking queue.

Next was a wire transfer confirmation, showing West had accepted the bribe. Thomas hunted until he found Scott Milazzo’s trace of all the emails, and all the scheduling system hacks West had used to make the bookings appear legitimate.

If Steph could have left well enough alone, West might never have known he’d been set up. Steph had made Jerod actually carry out the fake bookings on Amanda’s schedule to seal West’s fate. But Steph had lumped the observer on duty during those fake bookings into the dismissals. The guy had gone down swinging, telling West that Jerod Hughes was the unscreened client.

West wasn’t stupid. He knew entrapment when he saw it, and that it wasn’t legal grounds for dismissal. He would also figure out, if he hadn’t already, that Steph had promised Jerod the chief’s post if he helped carry out her coup.

West was already lawyering up, and the resort was about to get its ass sued off. West would walk away with at least seven figures. Possibly eight, depending what else he had on Steph.

Thomas raised a hand and rubbed his jaw. The problem of how and when to disclose all this to Josh, Mercury and Wade aside, he knew how Steph’s colossal fuckup would be used. This, in conjunction with her piss-poor judgment on the Warnous thing could be used to get her kicked off the Accord.

Hallelujah, was all Thomas had to say. Steph would have no say in Amanda’s fate.

Looking up at the kid, he said, “I will let you keep your job on two conditions.”

Jerod returned his stare with a look of disgust. At the moment, he didn’t feel he deserved his job, which only proved that he might one day make a decent chief of security. “What are the conditions?”

“One, if anyone asks you about this, I was Amanda’s mystery client.”

“No. If Mercury or Josh thinks you colluded in this thing, they’ll blame you.”

“You’ve got a lot to learn, kid. If you, me and Amanda insist I was the mystery client, everyone will know we’re covering something up. They know me well enough to stop asking questions. Steph is the one who needs to get the message.”

The kid narrows his eyes. “What message?”

“That it’s unforgivable, what she did. First she orders you to fuck Amanda, and then asked you to fire her? Hell, no. You are on the inside, now, and she is out.”

Jerod squeezed his eyes shut. “Done. What’s the second condition?”

Thomas rubbed the nail of his middle finger on the tabletop. He might be signing the kid’s death warrant, doing this, but the time had come to invade enemy territory. “I need you to get close with Ridley. Use her to have a look inside DriveRate.”

Always a pleasure...

Meg Silver writes fun, fast-paced erotic fiction. Passion and pleasure are always the main themes, and the series installment format makes for great light reading, whether readers are looking to spice up a quiet evening, or warm up the engines for something more adventurous.

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