Colton's Surprise Family. Karen Whiddon
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wandered over and stood in front of the tree, still thinking of Eve, then eyed the hallway that led to his father’s office. Might as well do some poking around while the entire house slept. Darius never locked the door, believing his inviolable authority made him invulnerable.
Maybe so, but Damien had been screwed over enough.
Moving quietly, he slipped down the hallway and opened the door. Conveniently, Darius had left the desk lamp on.
Damien took a seat in the massive leather chair and started with the obvious—the desk drawers. A quick search turned up exactly nothing.
But, then, what had he expected? Darius was too shrewd to leave incriminating documents anywhere they could be easily read.
Which meant there had to be a safe.
He turned to begin searching for one when a movement from a shadowy corner made him spin around.
Duke stood watching him, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed.
“What are you doing?” Duke asked, “You know the old man’s going to be pissed when he finds out you went through his papers.”
“Maybe,” Damien allowed. “If he finds out. I’m not planning on telling him. I’m trying to figure out what happened to our inheritance.”
“What do you mean?”
Since Duke didn’t sound too perturbed, Damien figured his brother hadn’t been given the same unlikely story as he’d heard today. “I asked Darius about it earlier today. You know how I’ve been wanting to buy my own ranch, maybe in Nevada or Idaho?”
“Yeah.” Duke uncrossed his arms and came closer. “Don’t tell me he refused to give you your money. He might be conservator, but you’re well over the age of twenty-one. And you were in prison at the time you turned twenty-one.”
“No.” Damien watched his brother closely. “He didn’t refuse to give it to me. He said it was all gone.”
“What?” Duke’s casual air vanished. Shock filled his brown eyes, so like Damien’s. “How can three million be gone, just like that?”
“Exactly. Tell me, bro. Did you get your inheritance when you turned twenty-one like you were supposed to?”
“Hell, no. He offered to let me use it to buy a share in the ranch and I took it. Darius needed cash for some reason, and I wanted to make sure I’d always have my house and land. So I bought my hundred acres from him.”
“Damn.” Damien closed his eyes. When he reopened them, he saw his brother watching him, a worried expression on his handsome face.
“Are you okay?”
“No,” Damien exploded. “I’m not okay. The entire time I was in prison, I was counting on this money being there for me when I got out. The money the state’s going to pay me won’t buy even twenty acres. How the hell am I going to make a fresh start without any cash?”
“Surely there’s been a mistake.”
“I don’t think so.” Grimly, Damien resumed his search for a safe. “How good are you still at guessing lock combinations?”
“What? You mean to break into Darius’s safe?”
“Once I find it, yes.”
Duke narrowed his eyes. “Well, then, let me help you out. I know where it is. I’ve been in here often enough when Darius had to open it.” He crossed to the wall where a huge, ornately framed oil painting of the ranch hung. “It’s behind this.”
Removing the picture revealed a small wall safe, black, with a touch-pad combination. The entire thing was maybe two feet square.
Damien stood back. “Have at it, bro.” As teens, Duke had exhibited an exceptional skill for picking locks and determining combinations. Within five minutes, he had the safe open.
“There you go,” he said, stepping back.
Reaching inside, Damien extracted a leather-bound notebook and a sheaf of manila folders, held together by a rubber band. There was also a tiny metal box, like the kind used for petty cash. He removed everything and placed it on the desk.
“I’m out of here, man,” Duke said.
“Will you just stand guard for me? I just need a few minutes.” He started with the leather book. “Surely there’s something in here that will tell what happened to my inheritance.”
Inside the book were receipts for wire transfers. All of them were withdrawals from his account made over a period of three years. “Bingo,” he said softly. “My money.”
Though clearly reluctant, Duke moved over to take a look.
“How do you know it was yours?” Duke asked. “You know when Grandfather died he left all of our money in the same account. I authorized Darius to take mine, and maybe Wes, Finn, Maisie and the others did the same.”
“But I didn’t authorize anything. Yet Darius claims the account has been closed and there’s nothing there.”
“Did you see the bank statement?”
“He wouldn’t let me.” Damien flashed him a grim smile, reaching for the manila folders. “Oh, damn.”
“That looks like a second set of accounting records for the Colton ranch.” Duke scratched his head. “Why would he have that? Unless…”
Without answering, Damien continued digging. “Look here. A list of some sort of vendors and receipts for transactions.”
“Transactions of what?”
“I don’t know.” But he had a good idea. The FBI had approached him shortly after he’d been released from prison, intimating they were investigating Darius. Damien, still smarting from his father’s refusal even to visit him in prison, had agreed to act as their insider, an informant of sorts. This was exactly the sort of thing they’d expect him to report.
“I think our father has been running a little business on the side.”
Duke cursed. “What are you going to do? You can’t be thinking of turning him in?”
“I don’t know.”
“Damien, you know how the old man is. I doubt he’d survive a year being locked up. I’m not sure I could do that to him.”
“But then again, he didn’t steal your money, did he? You handed it over to him, lock, stock and barrel.”
“Please, think about this before you do anything rash.”
Flipping through the last of the folders, Damien reached for the metal box. Duke reached for his hand to stop him. “Hold up.”
“What?”
“You’ve found enough. Put it back. I think we need to talk to Wes and Finn before we do anything.”
Clenching his jaw, Damien stared at his twin. “I’m not asking you to do anything.”
“This is a family matter.” Moving with purpose, Duke took the metal box, folder and notebook and placed them back in the safe, exactly the way they’d been. “We—or you—aren’t doing anything until we talk to the others.”
“What about Maisie?” Damien asked. “She has a right to be involved, too.”
Duke shot him a hard glance. “If you can trust her to keep her mouth shut, fine. But you know, she’s been contacting that TV show, trying to get them out here to do an exposé on the town.”
“She’s been talking about that, but I don’t think anyone there took her seriously.”
“I know. Let’s keep it that way, okay?”
Reluctantly, Damien agreed, watching as Duke