All Chapters of Beyond Reasonable Doubt (Full Series): Chapter 31 - Chapter 40

Chapter 31Jordan POVTessa Rhodes didn’t lurk.She didn’t hover in doorways or wait like a problem hoping to be noticed. Tessa moved through Mercer like she belonged there—heels quiet on polished floors, hair perfect in a way that looked effortless, smile calibrated to land as friendly even when her eyes were counting exits.I’d seen her at dinner. I’d watched her posture. I’d clocked the way she held space around Maddox like she had history on her side.And now I had a login line on a screen that said her name next to words like EXPORT and DELETE.Elias had wanted me to wait. Not because he was wrong—he wasn’t—but because if Tessa realized we were onto her, she’d pivot. She’d burn whatever else she could reach. She’d move pieces I didn’t even know existed yet.So this wasn’t a confrontation in the traditional sense.This was a temperature check.A pressure test.I wanted to see what she did when the conversation brushed near the truth without touching it.I walked down the hall towa

Chapter 33Jordan POVMaddox’s “office” at the packhouse wasn’t really an office. It was a room designed to make people choose their words carefully.Dark wood. Clean lines. No clutter. Nothing personal except the weight of him sitting behind the desk like he’d been built for it.I set my laptop down and slid a yellow legal pad across the surface between us. “Okay. Welcome to Criminal Court Procedure 101, but with higher stakes and worse lighting.”His gaze flicked to the pad. Then to me. “I don’t need a class.”“You do,” I said pleasantly, opening my laptop. “You just don’t want one. There’s a difference.”Kane stood near the door, quiet, arms folded. Rowan was somewhere outside the room, because apparently my life came with layers of security now like I was a celebrity who couldn’t be trusted near her own mail.Maddox leaned back slightly. “Talk.”“Here’s what’s coming,” I said. “Silvia will move fast because she wants you off-balance. That means she’ll try to secure one of three th

Chapter 35Jordan POVRoger Teller didn’t text like a normal person.Normal people used punctuation. Normal people used full sentences. Normal people didn’t treat every message like it might be read in court and then used to ruin their life.Roger wrote like a man who had learned the hard way that phones were evidence and silence was protection.My phone buzzed at 6:47 a.m. with a single line:On him.I stared at it from the edge of my bed, hair still damp from the shower, coffee not yet in my system, brain already sprinting.I typed back:Which him?Three dots. A pause.Kline associate. “Mason.”I swung my legs off the bed and grabbed my laptop, moving on instinct. The packhouse was still quiet—quiet in the way places got when everyone was awake but no one wanted to admit they were nervous. The media leak had put a film of tension over everything. People spoke softer. Doors closed slower. Even the staff looked like they were listening for a siren that wasn’t there.I opened my case b

Chapter 37Jordan POVAs soon as I realized Rowan wasn't outside my door, I made a plan to go out and revisit the property line where the soil had been disturbed.I didn’t tell anyone I was going back out.Not because I was sneaking. Because if I announced it, I’d get a committee.Kane would ask for a plan. Elias would ask for a tracker. Rowan would ask why humans insisted on walking toward danger like it was a hobby. Maddox would just look at me with that quiet, controlled expression that somehow managed to feel like a leash even when he didn’t say a word.I’d already had a full day of press fallout, case prep, and pretending I wasn’t thinking about a black wolf in my dreams like I’d joined some kind of paranormal book club against my will.And still—my brain kept circling that area of the property. Why had it been tampered with?It wasn’t just that I’d seen it. It was that I couldn’t unsee it. Dirt doesn’t lie the way people do. It shifts, it settles, it holds marks. It shows you wh

Chapter 39Jordan POVThe Mercer conference room smelled like coffee, electronics, and panic pretending to be professionalism.Panic has a sound, too. It’s not always screaming. Sometimes it’s the way people clear their throats too often. The way chairs scrape when no one actually needs to move. The way a grown man stares at a screen like if he looks hard enough, the numbers will stop meaning something dangerous.I stood at the long table with my laptop open, legal pad out, pen in hand, and a very deliberate expression on my face.Inside, my brain was doing something far less professional.It kept replaying Maddox opening his bedroom door in boxers like my mind had decided to sabotage my career for sport. It kept remembering the heat rolling off him, the way he’d looked instantly awake when I said “warrant,” like danger was the one thing that could pull him fully into the present.And—worse—it kept remembering the way my body had reacted, like I’d forgotten how to be a rational adult.