But is it a Miracle?

Chapter 10- Mately Machinations

Jin-Yeon POV

I needed a moment to process what she had shared, and run up to my apartment to see if I'd gotten my requested files from Cha Hyun-su. At least, it was certain I'd been adopted by my Marigold as a cat. Not only that, she wanted me. It wasn't hesitation because we just met, no, it was because she was still wounded from her past. A past that made me distinctly angry. She was missing a piece somewhere. With her family, and with this dumbass ex-husband.

My instincts said whatever it was, they were in on it together.

And I was determined to fully utilize my resources to find out.

I linked Tae that I was on my way up, and he held the door to let me in, holding my robe out when I shifted. I strode directly for ym room where my phone sat on its charger. no iphones allowed, okay? Always Samsung. Just my preference, no matter how many times Tae tried to convince me otherwise. I didn't like some of Apple's business ideals. Specifically, Steve Jobs' insistence that if you can charge for it, it should not be free. There are ways to be successful without sticking it to consumers every chance you get.

Anyhow.

Much to my delight, an email sat waiting for me. It was a lot of information, holy s**t. Tae snooped over my shoulder.

"I think you might want your computer for that much data, hyung." He commented, and as annoying as his snooping was, I merely nodded and moved to our office.

I did most of my "work" from home anyway. Our whole apartment was a super-modern marvel with vaulted ceilings throughout. Everything was in dark wood and gray marble by my choosing, trimmed in gold but subtly. It was pretty similar in feel to our bar, actually. We had bought the building and had it remodeled so that the 5th and 6th floors became our apartment, while the 1st and 2nd were the first floor of the bar, and the 3rd and 4th were the second floor of the bar.

The wall facing Puget Sound was all windows and part of where our living/dining/kitchen great room was. The great room was to the left after you entered the foyer, while our office was to the immediate right. At the end of the foyer was a half-bathroom. From there was a long hallway to the right that led to the bedrooms and laundry room, with my master suite at the end of it. Tae occupied the first bedroom, with a guest bedroom between us. I'd made sure we had a large terrace off the great room as well, which gave us a realized place to be outside a little bit despite living in an apartment. The place was well over 3,000 square feet.

Most of the walls were either dark wood, iridescent gray tile, or a toasty beige. I had the same fixtures, ivory fabric pendants, in nearly every room. My own room was decorated in shades of deep teal with wheat gold accents. Tae had done some deep red he called manly, but I called immature. He had little say when it came to the rest of the apartment though. It was mine, after all. If he wanted something different he could go buy his own, being just as wealthy as I was.

We had matching desks that faced each other, bookshelves lining the walls. There was no window, but the room did have a skylight in addition to the light pendants, so it never felt too closed in. I waited for my computer to boot up feeling ridiculously impatient. We both had gaming PCs, but one thing I'd say, is that if it can handle gaming, it can handle a lot of processing. Those five seconds though, felt like five years.

I clicked on Hyun-su's file eagerly. There before my eyes, was far more than I was expecting. A full background on each family member, Colton, his new wife, and of course, my girl. The smallest file was hers, and it confirmed exactly what she had said. Hyun-su had even dug deeper into police reports from neighbors, and there was a far too large folder just of noise complaints from neighbors about Colton's yelling. s**t. My fist clenched.

He also found a series of payments from Marigold's parents to her husband. Once a month for every one they were married. What the f**k?! As I looked over at her parent's financial information, I could not see that they were wealthy enough to pay a man to marry and abuse their daughter, but somehow they were doing it. They had some rather mysterious deposits into their own account. Flagging them, I sent a request asking for more on where this extra money was coming from.

Hyun-su had also given me far too much information on this disgusting ex-husband. His mistresses, his finances, his legal troubles. Apparently, the man had a serious gambling problem, and the real reason he'd left Marigold was that her parents replied to an email from him demanding more money " to keep their pet on a leash" than they were able to provide. His new wife had excessively rich parents who spoiled their daughter. Their one demand? Heirs.

He'd been banned from a majority of the gambling establishments locally because he got violent when he lost.

Shocker.

His house had been mortgaged to the hilt when he left Marigold, and the little slut's parents had quickly paid that off. He'd nearly lost his car too. Even if Marigold had worked since college, which, she had a decent degree, he'd have gambled it all away. Well, I guess that's Colton's story. For now. If he dared to approach Marigold again, which I suspected he would, given the way he talked about her to everyone, I would make sure he never did so again.

See, he might have told her and her family she was awful, but to his real friends, he couldn't shut up about her curves and submissive nature. Pissed me right the f**k off. The man enjoyed being an abuser, not just a dominant man. There's a big difference. He talked about how much he liked to see her cry. He was in it for more than the money, and was a very sick man.

Now on to her siblings.

Sage Brenner... honestly, he was just a jerk to his eldest sister, from all accounts. He lived a normal life, with a normal family. Did his job as a hedge fund manager with a surprising amount of integrity, all things considered. He had a wife and three kids, the very picture of the traditional American dream. The weird thing was... his parents had sent all three of their kids to school and paid for it personally. For a private university, UPS. That ended up coming out to $250K per child, $750K total.

Something was not adding up.

Larke Brenner... I sighed. She was a classic spoiled youngest child. Sage was two years younger than Marigold, but Larke was six years younger. Something told me she'd been sort of... unplanned, if you will. She had some marketing degree but was a homemaker for the man that had initially been her boss. Not exactly ethical, but she had resigned once the company realized what their Marketing Manager was doing behind closed doors with his PA. She barely made it a year into actually working before all of this occurred. It gave me an icky feeling.

Her husband was nearly twenty years older than her, which added to the ick. Again, I don't have an issue with age gaps, once Marigold found out how old I really was, I was going to look like a f*****g creeper. That being said, this stunk or either a young woman seducing an older man for money, or an older man taking advantage of basically an intern. Outside of that, Larke was much like Sage. Maybe more than a little trashy on occasion, but no cheating, just flirting. They had one daughter and two sons, also with a nice, typical house in the suburbs.

Now we come to the parents. I took a deep breath. The siblings I would leave alone.

The ex was on my s**t list, and I suspected these parents were next.

Rosemary Brenner, née Grey, had never worked a day in her life. She had married Harold Brenner right out of high school. Rumors swirled that she was pregnant, but apparently nobody actually saw her while she was pregnant with Marigold. Highly suspicious, if you ask me. Harold had worked as a postman since he was an adult. See, a postman can't afford nearly a million dollars to send his three kids to college without scholarships. He was still working, too.

There was nothing glaringly obvious though, no criminal record (you can't be a postman with a felony, after all), and from what I could tell, no extended family on either side. I tapped my chin. That had to be wrong. I looked for something on their parents, siblings, et cetera, but found nothing. Picking up my phone, I called Hyun-su directly.

"Boss." He answered, as always.

"Hyun-su, are you sure you could find nothing about her grandparents?" I huffed out. He sighed.

"I can't even find their birth certificates, Jin. They just appeared in their school as seniors. Since they were both already eighteen, nobody questioned it, other than the principal. He has a note in both their files that he thought the circumstances were odd, since they shared an address. School can't really do much anyway, especially if they are eighteen years old." He sounded frustrated, and that was rare for Hyun-su.

"Do you think it's possible she was abducted or something? With all these mysterious payments, and a postman paying out what he did not only for their tuition, but that rather large house they live in, doesn't it reek of something underhanded?" He hummed in agreement. "Look up missing persons or kidnapping around her birthdate. I sent you a picture, right?"

"Yeah, Boss. You thinking maybe she got stolen and the fake parents are extorting her real ones?" He mused. See, this is why I like this man, he always gets what I'm laying out.

"I am indeed thinking that. They need her to be weak and mousey so she doesn't try to get too bold and assert herself." I posed.

"Could be, I'll look into it, see if maybe I can get someone to pull fingerprints." He offered.

"Do whatever you have to, Hyun-su. It's for my mate, after all. Your Luna, Gamma." He chuckled.

"We're not exactly wolves, Boss. I'll help you, no need to remind me how important she is to you." He was so cheeky, but I wasn't complaining.

He wasn't wrong. Only within the family back home was hierarchy nearly as strict and merciless as a wolf pack. Well, per my understanding. I didn't hang out with overgrown dogs. Maybe American wolves were nicer, I hadn't taken the time to find out yet. They typically had pretty damn strong smells, so it wasn't my idea of fun.

"Thanks Hyun-su, I appreciate it." I was not one to forget my manners, after all.

"You got it, Boss. We'll speak soon." He ended the call, and I thought back to when he'd snuck on the chartered plane I'd managed to get on to leave South Korea for Japan. I had planned on just taking Tae since he was worse than a f*****g barnacle, but there was our childhood best friend, Cha Hyun-su, grinning like he'd won the lottery.

I knew leaving with us signed his death warrant, since my parents wanted him to support my eldest brother, a man he despised.

Still, he'd insisted, saying if he was going to serve anyone, it was going to be his choice.

I certainly could not say no.