Free Billionaire Misery by Lexy Timms

Katie had; she’d fallen into a chair and she sat there, silent and unmoving, shock carved deeply on her face.
    Katie said something, cleared her throat, and spoke again, “No.”
    Morgan put a hand on her arm. His own face wore an expression of utter disbelief and hatred. Jessie’s heart lurched. Was that hatred directed at Craig? It shouldn’t be...or, should it? Her eyes went to him. His expression was impassive.
    Katie asked, “You put him in foster and told us he was dead?”
    Wilkes smiled... a nasty and vicious curl of his lips. “I needed to protect my son. I kept tabs on him, always.”
    Jessie’s heart quivered, literally quivered. What kind of monster did that? She couldn’t speak, and, what was more, she couldn’t even think. How had Wilkes pulled it off? And why? Why would he put his only son into an unforgiving foster system?
    Katie asked that question for her. “Why would you do that to your own son?”
    Wilkes said, “It’s very simple. I’d angered a few men. They wouldn’t come after me personally, but they swore to wipe my seed from the earth. Now, they might have waited ten years to do it, or even twenty. I needed him to be safe, and I figured as long as there was at least one Wilkes heir, they would take that one, and when it was over I could bring Charles back in, without anyone ever being the wiser.”
    Jessie’s gut dropped. He’d forced his wife to allow him to bear another child solely so he could allow her to be killed? Her eyes went to Katie, to the ghostly white pallor on her face, and then to Craig’s face. Dear God, he’d known, and he had never said anything!
    This was the son of the man who’d destroyed her father, and who had sent her into the same foster system he’d assigned is own son to. The sheer wickedness of that man threatened to overwhelm her. How could anyone do that?
    But Craig wasn’t evil.
    He was still Blake Wilkes’ son, though.
    Craig said, “I didn’t know, Katie. He came and told me right after Lisa died. He thought I’d want to join up with him.”
    Morgan asked, “Was he wrong?”
    Jessie’s heart thumped painfully in her chest. Her whole body tensed. Craig could not be trusted, and she knew it. She’d always known it. This might just be another move on the chessboard for him and Wilkes.
    She had no doubt he was Wilkes’ son. Looking at the two of them, she had no idea how she hadn’t seen it before. She’d studied Wilkes’ face for years, and she had seen him in Katie’s features. But she had also seen him in Craig’s, and now she understood all too clearly that she had seen it, but that she’d been too blinded by the powerful emotions he created in her to truly comprehend what it was that she was seeing.
    She should have known. He had had access to places Blake Wilkes would never have entrusted anyone with access to. He had had knowledge of things that he should never have known.
    The only explanation was the true one, and she had not even considered it because it was just too far-fetched and impossible to grasp.
    Craig said, “No, I didn’t join up.”
    Wilkes snorted. Craig glared at him. Wilkes, completely calm, and believing he was in full control of the situation, said, “You betrayed them often. You betrayed them by buying into that deal I asked you to buy into...”
    “I didn’t know you were setting them up for murder!” Craig’s face was scarlet with rage.
    Wilkes rolled his eyes. “I kept you out of it, just like I promised. I had no idea you were going to come here to try to rob me, or whatever the hell it is you’re doing. You bastard; you’re my son!”
    The files. Jessie’s eyes went to them. The copies were safely tucked into Craig’s jacket that she wore. Her heart beat even faster. They had to get out of there, and alive. What was more—and as much as she would have liked to put a bullet right through Wilkes’ black heart—they had to get out with him still alive.
    There were literally over a hundred