His Son. Her Secret.

Chapter 25

The alarm in her friend’s voice made goosebumps form on her skin. Beth's head snapped back around, and she immediately realized her mistake. She’d closed one tab, but that only meant she’d exposed the one she’d been reading before. s**t! She quickly reached out and turned off the monitor. “Mind your business.”

“Why are you googling Santiago Burns?” Belle demanded.

Her voice hadn’t been low, so it was no surprise that Mal looked over instantly from the snack shelf like a shark that had scented blood. Avi lifted her head too.

Beth regretted existing. “I’m not googling him.”

Belle gasped dramatically. “She’s lying too. This is serious.”

“I am researching,” she blurted out, panicking.

“Researching what?” Mal asked, already frowning as she walked closer. “Rich men with sharp jawlines?”

Beth glared at her.

Unfortunately, that only encouraged them.

The broken computer was totally forgotten now. Belle dragged her chair closer to Beth, hands reaching for the keyboard as though she had every intention to find out exactly what Beth had been reading. “This should be fun. Let’s see what you got from stalking a billionaire.”

“I am not stalking anybody.” Beth tried to slap her hands away.

“Mm-hm.” Belle leaned sideways, trying to peek at the screen again. “What’s next? Are you joining high society?”

“Beth Burns,” Mal said thoughtfully. “Actually, that sounds expensive.”

Beth almost smiled despite herself.

Unfortunately, Belle noticed. Her entire face lit up with a combination of horror and excitement. “Oh my God,” she whispered. “You were smiling.”

Beth’s stomach dropped. “What?”

“You were smiling,” Belle repeated louder, pointing at her like she’d discovered evidence of a crime. “At the idea of you taking Mr. Billionaire man’s name.”

“I was not.”

“You literally were.”

“I think she has a crush,” Mal announced, a pointed look in her eyes that once again made Beth wonder if her friend knew more about what happened in that dark study than she'd let on.

God, this couldn’t be happening. Beth prayed her face wasn't as hot as she suddenly felt. “I do not have a crush.”

“Beth has a crush. Beth has a crush,” Belle began singing, much to Beth’s annoyance.

Avi sighed heavily, still seated at her table with the books. “And now you are behaving like teenage girls.”

“Beth is,” Mal said casually, hopping onto the counter beside Beth. “Tell us, Beth, did the billionaire prince catch your eye, oh sweet Cinderella?”

Groaning, Beth rubbed a hand over her face. This was the most relaxed Beth had seen her friend in weeks, and it came at her expense, it seemed. “You’re all annoying.”

“It’s okay, Bethy dear,” Ms. P, an old woman who always came to the cafe to check her emails, said as she approached the counter. Clearly, their discussion was now open to the public. “I used to have a crush on the president. It’s healthy to dream about unattainable men.” She looked so convinced as she paid her bill with a few crumpled notes from her knitted bag before she turned and left, not waiting for Beth to respond.

Which was just as well because Beth had nothing nice to say to that. Of course, it wasn’t healthy to fantasize about unattainable men. In fact, she was certain it was the opposite, and women who did that either lived in constant states of depression or were angry at the world all the damn time. That wasn’t what she was doing. She wasn’t fantasizing over Santiago Burns. It was just curiosity and the need to know that Kaleth was in good hands. That was her story, and she was sticking to it.

“See, it’s okay, Bethy dear,” Mal whispered mockingly once the old woman was out of hearing shot.

Beth shot her friend a glare. “Stop it, or I will bring up Joe.”

Belle burst out laughing so loudly that two customers looked over. Even Avi smiled faintly before shaking her head and returning to her paperwork. Mal, on the other hand, pressed her lips together as though she’d tasted a lemon. Yeah, the joke was only funny when you weren’t the subject matter.

The customer from the back suddenly yelled out again, “The internet is dead again!”

Belle didn’t even look up. “Have you considered patience?”

“I paid…”

“Yes, yes,” Mal interrupted, waving a dismissive hand in the air. “We know. Tragic.”

The customer grumbled. Everyone ignored him. Then Avi closed the accounting book in front of her and called for the others to join her.

Without hesitation, the four women gathered around the side table while customers continued clicking away around them.

Avi lowered her voice carefully. “I got more information on the nightclub.”

Beth’s stomach tightened immediately. Of course, this again. Was it too much to hope the idea would be forgotten? She guessed that wasn’t happening, and she was the only one getting constipated about it. Mal practically vibrated with intrigue.

“We are hitting the safe kept in the back?” the woman asked.

Avi nodded once. She looked around as though to make sure their customers were too occupied with their tasks to pay attention, then continued. “I just heard back from someone who works there that the place launders money, so there is almost always a million plus in the safe.”

That information immediately put a frown on Belle’s face. “Avi, that’s not playing with fire. We would be jumping straight into an active volcano,” she hissed.

Beth couldn’t agree more, but the others didn’t seem as concerned. Avi shook her head. “Think about it. If the money is dirty, they won’t be in a hurry to report the theft to the police. So, as long as we don’t get caught, there will be no investigations to worry about. We have insider help, and he only wants a twenty percent cut. It’s a good idea.”

No, it wasn’t a good idea. “Criminals may not report to the police, but they don’t take too kindly to someone stealing from them,” Beth said flatly. “At least with the police, we get jail time. Whoever runs the club would just chop us up into little pieces and feed us to some pigs on a farm.”

Belle shuddered. “Yeah. I don’t want to end up pig food.”

Beth folded her arms. Neither did she. Even Mal looked thoughtful for a beat.

Not Avi, though. The woman was like a bull with a juicy bone. There was no getting this idea away from her determined teeth. To prove it, she slid a printed layout across the table. “It’s a solid plan. Look, security rotates every thirty minutes. Cameras change angles every ten. There are private rooms upstairs, restricted to VIP clients only.”

“Armed security?” Beth asked immediately.

Avi met her gaze. “Yes.”

Silence settled briefly between them. Then Mal picked up the layout. A slow smile spread across her face. “I like it.”

“Of course you do,” Beth muttered.

“What?” Mal shrugged. “Big risk usually means big payout.”

Belle bit her lip while studying the paper. Nervousness flickered across her face, but curiosity was there too. “Was your informant sure about the amount the keep?”

“Yes.” Avi then sighed heavily, as if the weight of the world was on her shoulders. “It might be even more if we hit it on a weekend. And that could be enough to pay for the surgery,” she said quietly.

That changed everything. Beth hated that it did. Nobody spoke for a moment, and she knew they would do it because they had no other choice.

Beth looked down at the club layout. Still, something about the whole thing bothered her. After everything with Santiago and Kaleth, the man following her in the alley and the black SUV, her instincts felt sharper somehow. And right now they were screaming. “This feels wrong,” she said.

Mal sighed dramatically. “You think everything feels wrong lately.”

Avi stayed thoughtful. “We just have to plan carefully,” she said. “In and out. No improvising. Is that understood? Beth?”

She blinked. Three faces stared at her. “What?”

Mal arched a brow. “Don’t ask what. We don’t need you to go off script again.”

Beth’s cheeks heated annoyingly fast. She opened her mouth, but nothing came out.

Avi rubbed her forehead tiredly. “Maybe to be on the safer side, Beth can be the lookout this time.”

Wow, that stung, but she couldn’t blame them for not trusting her. Anyway, it seemed they were going to rob the club whether she liked the idea or not.

Outside, thunder rumbled faintly somewhere over the city like a bad omen confirming the feeling in her gut that something was about to go very wrong.

And somehow, they were walking straight toward it.