All Chapters of NOT THE BRIDE HE WANTED : Chapter 51 - Chapter 60

The courthouse steps were already crowded with reporters by the time their car pulled up, three weeks of careful preparation suddenly feeling thin against the reality of cameras flashing and questions shouted from every direction. Temi caught fragments of shouted questions through the glass, her name tangled up with Sallow's in ways that made her stomach tighten before she'd even stepped out of the car."Eyes forward, walk steady," Naomi said from the seat beside them, her voice calm and practiced. "Don't answer anything. Don't stop. We go straight through."Adrian reached for Temi's hand as they stepped out of the car, the morning sun sharp and unforgiving against the marble steps, and together they moved through the crowd exactly as Naomi had coached them, measured and composed despite the chaos surrounding them on every side. Temi felt her pulse hammering beneath her carefully neutral expression, one hand resting instinctively against the small, still barely visible curve of her st

Vivian arrived within the hour, her expression grim as she listened to Adrian recount the phrase Graham had used, the old family saying that had no business surfacing from a stranger's mouth on a phone call eleven years ago. She set her bag down slowly, clearly turning the implications over in her mind before offering any response at all."I need to be careful how I say this," Vivian said slowly. "That phrase could be coincidence. Old sayings circulate. Someone could have heard Elias use it once, at some function, some negotiation, and adopted it themselves without any deeper connection at all.""Or it isn't a coincidence," Adrian said, his voice tight. "And someone close to my grandfather, close enough to have heard him say something that personal, is the one actually controlling everything Sallow did."Temi watched him pace, old fear and fresh dread tangling together across his face. "You don't actually believe it's him. Your grandfather. The man who told us the truth about Marcus's

Temi did not sleep. She lay beside Adrian until the ceiling turned from black to gray, listening to him pretend to be asleep, both of them holding their breath around the same terrible question.At six, she gave up and made tea she didn't drink. By seven, Naomi's security detail had swept the penthouse twice. By eight, they were in the back of a car heading toward the courthouse, and Castillo was on speakerphone telling her what she had been telling her for three weeks."Listen to the question. Answer only the question. If you don't remember something, say you don't remember. Ellison will try to make you angry, because angry witnesses talk too much.""I know," Temi said."You have the best story in this courtroom, Mrs. Voss. Just tell it like it happened."She had not told Castillo about the foundation. Vivian had been firm about that. Until they knew whose hand had signed those payments, nothing about the ledger could leave the circle of

Adrian did not want her to go.He said so four separate times between the estate and the city, in four separate tones, ending with one so raw that Temi turned in the back seat and took his face in both hands."He put the note in my hand," she said. "He asked for me by name. If I'm not there, he walks, and we lose the only person who seems to know where the bodies are buried.""There are people who would rather bury the bodies with you in them.""Then I'll be careful. I'll wear the vest, I'll stay behind you, and I'll be in the car if Naomi says run." She held his eyes. "We started this together, Adrian."He closed his own eyes and let his forehead rest against hers for a moment. "I hate that you're right," he said.Hartwell Garage was a squat concrete structure on the west side, mostly empty at midnight, its lights humming and half dead. Naomi's team had been inside since ten. Two operatives sat in a parked van on level two. A third watched the stairwell. A fourth crouched with a long

Adrian made the decision in the elevator."We don't go home tonight," he said, thumbing a message to Naomi with his free hand. "Not until we know what's listening.""You think someone bugged the penthouse?""I think a man I have trusted for twelve years knew about a meeting that I told exactly seven people about." He pocketed the phone. "I think I'd like to find out how."He told Naomi they were exhausted and going straight to bed, and thanked her for the night's work. Her reply came in four seconds. Of course. Sleep well. Both of them read it twice, and neither mentioned that Naomi had never once, in all the weeks they had known her, sent a message with a full stop and no instruction attached.They didn't go to bed. They went to the penthouse and sat on the floor of the living room in the dark with their shoes still on, and at one forty in the morning the doorbell rang.Adrian was on his feet before the second chime. Temi caught his sleeve. Through the peephole she saw a tall, stoope