Free Give in to Me by K. M. Scott Page A

would it? The problem my father would want to cover up was that she killed herself because of Taylor, not the way she did it.”
    Daryl silently agreed. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes. “We’re missing something here. I say we have to look at the obvious first. Your places are being ransacked for something, but what? Karl’s looking for evidence, and he wants that tablet enough to make the copies he got from Nina’s sister not good enough.”
    Leaning forward, I rested my elbows on my thighs. “You’re missing the big question. We have no idea if Karl knows what’s in this notebook. Maybe he just thinks what Kim gave him wasn’t the entire book.”
    Daryl stared at me with a look of confusion. “But why would he think that?”
    “I don’t know. I can tell you that he doesn’t have everything. I don’t know why, but Kim didn’t have copies of the pages about the drug investigation her father was pursuing. When Karl showed me what he had, there was nothing about Cordovex or anything like it. He only has the pages about Amanda’s and her father’s deaths.”
    Daryl leaned forward toward me, his eyes wide. “Then that’s it. Karl worries there’s more, and he knows what it’s about. What do we know about this Cordovex?”
    “Nothing. I’ve never heard of it. All Edwards says over and over is that he associates it with death.”
    “Let me see that notebook,” he said, reaching out his hand. “I want to see what he’s talking about with this Cordovex.”
    I handed him Joseph Edwards’ notebook opened to the page where he had detailed the information he’d uncovered. Daryl’s brows knitted as he read it over before he flipped to the last page of the tablet. Running his finger down over the metal coils holding the pages together, he made that clucking nose with his tongue he often did when he was thinking.
    Looking up at me, he held the notebook up in front of him. “There’s a page missing here. Did you tear any out?”
    “No. That’s how I found it in Edwards’ safe deposit box.”
    “What about Nina’s sister? Any chance she took out a page?”
    I shook my head. “No. I saw the copies she had and none were about anything but Taylor and my father.”
    “Damnit! Why did she give those goddamn copies to Karl in the first place?”
    “Because I told her to.”
    “Why?”
    “I didn’t want her or her family to get hurt. I knew if Karl found out Joseph Edwards had kept any notes from his investigation of Stone Worldwide, he’d go after her and Nina. I could protect Nina, but not Kim. So I told her to give him everything he asked for. Then I got her and her family to safety as soon as Karl left. If I didn’t, they’d probably be dead right now.”
    Daryl looked unimpressed. “I guess, but she’s made this much easier for Karl.”
    “She did what I told her to do. Not that she didn’t fight me tooth and nail. I could barely get her to speak to me at first. It was only when I told her what I’d found out about what Taylor and my father had done that she agreed to even talk to me about all of this. I guess I don’t blame her. She probably thought if two Stone men were heartless fucks, why wouldn’t the third be?”
    I sat back on the couch, tired from trying to convince myself that I wasn’t just like them. Kim hadn’t made it easy, and by the time I explained everything to her, I still didn’t think she believed I wasn’t just what she’d always thought I was.
    A bad man who shouldn’t be anywhere near her sister.
    Even when I promised to keep her and her family safe on the island where Nina and I were to be married, protected by guards and catered to twenty-four hours a day, she still looked at me like I was some criminal.
    “Well, speaking of that, the last time I checked, they were fine. The guards tell me that they’re enjoying a wonderful vacation on St. Vince and the girls love it.”
    “Good. Speaking of being happy, I’m to understand Nina isn’t, if her text