Forbidden Fantasies Bundle(138)

He was Lucifer. And she was having trouble reconciling the two.

She would have to think about that later. Right now, she had to concentrate on the fact that Jed Calhoun was in trouble. He’d been framed for a murder. In spite of her report, Lucifer had been blamed for Frank Medici’s death.

Zoë made an effort to focus her attention on the discussion that was going on around her. The tall man sitting at the end of the couch with one leg extended was Gage Sinclair. This had been the man, she’d learned, who’d had the envelope delivered to her at the Blue Pepper so that she could pass it on to Jed.

Ryder had brought a whiteboard into the room and was busily writing down notes as each of them talked. Bailey Montgomery was perched on the arm of the sofa next to Gage, and she was frowning at Ryder’s notes.

Jed had told his story first, recapping how he’d been contacted by Agent Montgomery at the CIA and asked to deliver a message to Frank Medici. There was a chance that Frank’s cover had been penetrated so urgency was key.

Ryder took him over the same details that she’d spent so much time analyzing—how he’d met Frank at the designated bar and delivered the message. Then seconds after he’d left the bar, the bomb had gone off.

Bailey went next, taking the files out of her bag and placing them on the coffee table. When she’d summarized the contents and Ryder had added pertinent details to the whiteboard, Zoë opened the file with her name on it and studied her signatures.

“They certainly look like mine,” she said. “But I never wrote those reports. I ran all the data on Lucifer, and then I added my own analysis. That part’s been expunged. I wrote that Lucifer was just not the type of agent to suddenly take drug money and arrange to kill an old colleague. I told Mr. Richards that twice when I handed in the reports.”

“How did he react?” Ryder asked.

Zoë clasped her hands tightly together. “After I handed in the first one, he asked me to run the analysis again and told me it was urgent. I was to deliver the results to him at the Four Seasons because he would be spending the night in D.C. After the second run-through, my analysis didn’t change.”

“What about the report that showed the money in an account Jed had taken out in the Caymans?” Bailey asked.

“I didn’t write that one. Mr. Richards and I…had a problem. He asked for my resignation a few days after I submitted my second analysis on Lucifer.”

“What kind of problem?” Jed asked.

Zoë lifted her chin. She knew what he was asking, and heat flooded her cheeks. He wanted to know about Bailey’s accusation. “The problem isn’t relevant. The important thing is that someone forged my name to those reports.”

“Something that would probably never have come to light after you’d resigned.” Bailey studied Zoë thoughtfully for a minute. “That wasn’t the first time that Hadley had asked you to work late and take reports to him at the Four Seasons, was it, Zoë?”

“No. He’d given me several assignments to do for him because he said that he liked my work. He asked me on three occasions to join him for lunch at the Four Seasons and make my reports, but that was the first time that he invited me to come in the evening. We had a drink in the bar, and someone stopped by the table. Mr. Richards seemed upset. When I asked him why, he explained that the woman was a particular friend of his wife and he was sure she would misinterpret our relationship. The next day at work, I heard the rumors that Mr. Richards and I were having an affair.”

“I heard them, too,” Bailey said.

“And you believed them,” Zoë said. “Everyone did.”

“Hadley does have a reputation with women,” Bailey said. “But you didn’t have an affair with him, did you, Zoë?”

Zoë laced her fingers together and stared down at her hands. “No. But two days later, Mr. Richards called me into his office and asked me to resign before the rumors grew. He claimed that his wife would be devastated, and that if there was any hint of scandal, it would be bound to reflect poorly on the administration because of his father-in-law’s position as the president’s security advisor.”

Bailey’s brows shot up. “So he played the do-it-for-your-country card?”

“I…didn’t think of it that way. I just figured that I shouldn’t have been so naive. Looking back, I can see that meeting him that way outside of the office in a public place, it could appear that we were having an affair,” Zoë said.

“He was your boss. You met with him at his request,” Jed pointed out.