Chapter 13

Finding herself face down in a toilet two days in a row put a serious damper on Piper’s mood.

There’d been moments the previous day that she’d completely forgotten she was pregnant. She loved that. Ignoring what was going on in her body was exactly what she intended to do for as long as humanly possible.

Only Mother Nature had other plans.

Ones that involved emptying an already empty stomach every morning.

Kit sat on his haunches, whining at the bathroom door and tilting his head in concern.

When the worst seemed to subside, Piper flushed the toilet and slowly stumbled to her feet. Over the sink, she turned the water on cold and looked at her pale reflection in the mirror. “This sucks,” she said to herself.

Kit let out a husky bark.

“I’m not sure why anyone would choose to do this.” Piper washed her hands and splashed water on her face.

Saved by a late-start day and the fact her boss wasn’t going to be in, Piper moved slowly throughout her morning and packed the crackers that had saved her the day before. Wearing jeans, sneakers, and a simple button-up top, she glanced down at her feet at her companion. Either Kit knew what was happening to her, or he’d just become spoiled when she was out of work. The dog hadn’t left her side since that first night the double lines on the pregnancy tests showed up. Truth was, Piper appreciated his concern. Even if Kit was a dog.

Kit walked to the front door and looked back at her.

“I gotta go to work, Kitty.”

She’d unlatched the doggie door that led to the backyard and knew she could count on Mr. Armstrong to check on him throughout the day if needed. Kit loved their elderly neighbor and was often found on Mr. Armstrong’s couch when she came home late from work.

Piper opened the front door, and Kit darted out before she could give the command for him to stay.

Moving quickly added to her nausea, so Piper took her time following her dog.

“Kit? What are you doing?”

He sat by her car, panting.

“I have to work.”

Maybe the casual clothes gave off a walk in the park vibe.

“Kit?”

He barked and stared at the car.

Piper sighed and thought about what her plans were for the day.

She was going to be at the Stone Estate by herself for many hours. She’d agreed to meet with the grounds staff, who she didn’t know . . . not that they gave off an untrustworthy vibe, but it wouldn’t hurt to be safe. Karina was going to come in for a few hours, but . . .

Piper turned around and walked back into the house. She grabbed a couple of dog essentials and returned to her car. “Okay. You win.” She opened the door, and Kit jumped into the passenger seat with what could only be described as a smile.

After settling behind the wheel, she sent a quick text to her neighbor, letting him know it was “take your dog to work day.”

The drive was easier than it had been the day before. With the window half-rolled-down for Kit to sniff every passing scent along the way, the cool air seemed to settle her stomach.

She couldn’t help but feel like she’d somehow elevated in life when she pressed the button on the remote to open the estate gates. She parked her car behind the closed garage doors to give space for the staff in the circular drive.

Piper rubbed the top of Kit’s head. “This is a fancy place, Kitty. Stay off the furniture.”

Kit stopped panting briefly, as if understanding her and not liking her words . . . but then quickly went back to panting.

Piper opened the door, and Kit bounded out behind her and immediately ran to a patch of green to sniff and relieve himself.

She grabbed what she needed from her car, especially the crackers that were saving her life, and called Kit to follow.

The alarm beeped the moment she opened the front door. Using the keypad, she turned it off and proceeded deeper into the house. Everything looked exactly as it had the night before, except for the absence of the broad shoulders of the man who’d been with her all day.

Kit quickly moved around the house, his sniffer working overtime.

Piper set her purse, dog treats, leash, and crackers on the massive island in the kitchen and took a good look around. This space alone rivaled that of her living room, kitchen, and eating space combined. If you added the walk-in pantry and the nook for casual dining, that would be her entire house.

She heard Kit’s metal tag clink against his collar as he jogged around the kitchen and then out into a hall.

Piper let him explore as she followed behind. Truth was, she wanted to look around a bit herself.

She and Chase had pretty much isolated themselves in Aaron’s office, with an occasional visit to the kitchen, a bathroom, and the back patio space for their late lunch.

While Chase didn’t seem to want to look around, Piper’s curiosity was piqued.

Following Kit, as if the dog offered an excuse for looking around the house, Piper walked past the doors of Aaron’s office and down a hall she’d not been in. She found a home theater, complete with sofas and recliners, along with tiered levels so everyone in the room had a perfect seat. A spotless popcorn machine sat on a bar, along with a caddy filled with supersize candy that you would expect at a theater.

Another bathroom, this one without a shower or tub, but complete with a commode and a bidet. Down the wide hall from the home theater, she found a guest room with a masculine flair of dark colors and big wooden furniture. This entire wing felt filled with testosterone. Like a space where the man of the house would go when he’d been told to sleep on the couch. The thought of a billionaire sleeping on the couch made Piper laugh. Down another smaller hall, she found a laundry room and a back door. Instead of going outside, she followed Kit back through the way they’d come and spilled into the kitchen. A formal dining room, with seating for ten, that she’d seen passing through, and the bathroom she’d used the previous day. The columned great room with massive ceilings and windows that took up most of the back wall was the only part of the house she’d been in repeatedly.

When Aaron Stone had been alive and she’d needed to come there, she set up shop on a small seating area with a table that had a height she could work on. It was somewhat tucked in a corner, which helped Piper blend into the space. She looked at the table now with a passing thought that the man who’d bought it, or the woman, for that matter, no longer was here, and yet she was.

Kit scrambled out of the oversize room and up the stairs.

Now was when Piper felt the hairs on her neck tingling. She had no need to be on the second floor of the house, but up she went anyway.

An open balcony looked down on the great room below and wrapped around in both directions. Following her dog, she found bedroom after bedroom. Each slightly different in style than the last, each having its own bathroom.

She found what had to be Melissa’s bedroom, based on the size and décor of the room. If the tone-on-tone white everything with a dash of light blue wasn’t enough of a giveaway, the fact that the room appeared stripped sealed Piper’s assumption. The walk-in closet was breathtaking. Floor to ceiling built-in cabinets with glass doors . . . nearly all empty. Only a few forgotten articles of clothing hung from the bars were left, along with scuff marks on the walls, which had likely been hidden by the clothing that once hung there. The bathroom was ridiculous. A tub surrounded by windows, a vanity mirror and separate makeup area that rivaled what you’d expect in a greenroom in a Broadway theater . . . all granite, or marble, or whatever the stone was. Piper didn’t know the difference. The shower, again, fit for a small dinner party, opened to the room without a door. One entire wall of the bathroom was a rough horizontal stone in off-white, with a few pieces that stuck out with candles perched on them.

Kit had already tired of Melissa’s bedroom and had moved on to the next.

The tone changed in Aaron’s space. Where Melissa had tone-on-tone white, Aaron’s was shades of dark blue. And nothing had been touched. At least not that she could see. This room was larger than Melissa’s, with a fireplace directly in front of the bed. French doors led out on a patio with a view of the backyard. The bathroom was similar to Melissa’s, but instead of a makeup station, there were two sinks. Piper couldn’t help but wonder if Melissa and Aaron ever shared that bathroom.

Aaron’s closet was a darker version of the other. This one was filled.

Suits, ties . . . more shoes than Piper knew a man could have. She itched to open drawers and snoop deeper but refrained.

Kit continued out of the room and paused at the doors to yet more guest rooms, another smaller media room with an oversize sofa and big-screen TV. A back staircase emptied her into a billiard and game room. This also had access to outside and onto the grounds. She hadn’t opened every door, and was pretty sure she’d missed an entire hall, but her curiosity about what the rest of the house looked like was sated. At least for now.

Piper eventually stopped Kit from roaming any longer and made her way to her former boss’s office to start her day.

As she made herself comfortable at Stone’s desk and turned on the computer, she let out a big sigh at the same time Kit settled close by. “I never thought I’d be here doing this,” she said to her dog.

Only Kit wasn’t listening.

He’d already closed his eyes to take a morning nap.

It was Busa popping his head into Chase’s office at CMS to say good night when he realized the day had gotten away from him. For the first time in weeks, he’d managed to bury his head in his world and forget about his father’s. It felt good.

“Are you back in tomorrow?” Busa asked as he shrugged into a leather jacket.

“No. I’m meeting with the estate attorney in the morning, then back to Stone Enterprises . . . probably end the day at the estate.”

Busa lifted his chin. “This commute is going to get old before long.”

“About that.”

“What are you thinking?”

“There’s an entire floor at Stone Enterprises that’s vacant. Three times more room than we’ll need right now but enough to give CMS the ability to expand. We can rent the space from Stone, add profit to the bottom line there, and give me the opportunity to be in two places at one time.”

“We can afford a fancy place like that?”

Chase laughed. “I know some people. I’ll get us a good deal.”

Busa folded his hands over his chest and cracked a smile. “Is that your father’s bank account talking?”

“Technically, it’s mine now, so . . . yes.”

“Can you do all this before you find you know who?”

“I need to speak with the attorney, but yes . . . I think so. We’ll be able to grow faster. That’s good for all of us.”

Busa slowly started to nod. “We’ll get some pushback from employees that won’t want the commute.”

“Let’s consider the added cost for the average employee and try and make this profitable for them. Flextime in and out of the office to offset heavy freeway traffic. The Stone building is secured, from parking to entrance into the offices. If you can crunch the numbers so we can minimize any exodus of employee loss in this move, that would be great.”

“I’ll get on it.” Busa tapped his hand on the wall he was standing by. “All right, then. I’ll call if anything comes up.”

“I appreciate it. I couldn’t juggle everything without you here.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Busa waved him off and walked away.

Chase looked at his inbox and knew he had at least another hour before he could call the day done. He hadn’t spoken to Piper all day and wondered if she’d gotten any further in finding the mystery mama.

Using his cell phone, he dialed her number and put the phone on speaker.

“Piper Maddox, private investigator, how can I direct your call?”

Chase tilted his head back and laughed. “That has a great ring to it. Are you changing professions on me?”

“Depends on how big my bonus is.”

Chase appreciated how freely Piper talked to him. “How did it go today?”

“Tedious. But I did find something.”

“I’m listening.”

“Your father had an unaccounted-for checking account that he closed out about five years ago.”

“What do you mean, unaccounted for?”

“I found the files with his personal taxes over the last ten years. Once the oxygen returned to my brain from the sheer shock of those numbers, I double-checked the bank accounts he accounted for on his taxes and found this one missing, so it made me dig deeper.”

“If the account wasn’t accruing interest, I’m not sure it would be on a personal tax return.”

“I don’t pretend to know tax law. It felt off to me, so I followed the numbers. A recurring amount just under ten thousand dollars a pop was transferred into this account on a fairly regular basis. The deposits were from him to him but at a different bank.”

“That definitely sounds like what we’re looking for.”

“Right. If you’re going to send someone hush money, you’re going to do it from an account that isn’t traced by the tax man. We need to get into that account. See who was taking the money from it.”

“How hard can that be?”

Piper laughed. “I haven’t done my PI in-service on hacking into a bank, but my guess is, the estate attorney can request old records. You might even be able to do that yourself since you inherited everything from Aaron Stone.”

“Excellent. I’m meeting with the attorney in the morning. If you can send me the account and routing numbers, we’ll get on it.” Chase tapped a pen on his desk as he talked.

“I also found a locked box in the back of a file cabinet.”

Chase felt his heart skip with that information. “What was inside?”

“No idea. I searched the office for a key, didn’t find one. Rummaged through the catchall drawer in the kitchen . . . nothing. I was going to dig around in his bedroom but thought I should check with you first.”

“Feel free.”

“You sure?”

“Absolutely. And let me know if you find a safe.”

“Isn’t that what I found?” she asked.

Chase shook his head and tossed the pen in his hand on his desk. “A locked drawer in an office . . . no. A safe will have a combination or a biometric lock. It will be too heavy to drag away and bulky enough to withstand a fire.”

“Ahhh, a rich-person thing.”

Chase ran a hand down his face and felt the tired seep in. “A smart-person thing.”

“I’m smart, but I don’t have one.”

“Where do you put your passport, birth certificate . . . bank cards you’re not using?”

Piper laughed. “That gazillionaire thing is showing again. First, I don’t have a passport. I got out of Ohio, not the States. The only bank cards I have, I use. And my birth certificate is in the bottom drawer of my desk.”

With everything she just said, the thing that stuck out was the lack of a passport. “You really don’t have a passport?”

“Where am I going?”

“What if you wanted to go on vacation to Europe?”

She snorted. “How big is that bonus going to be, Mr. Stone?”

The woman made him smile. “We need to get you a passport.”

“Is that so?”

“Of course. My dad has holdings all over the world.”

“You have holdings all over the world.”

The enormity of it all hadn’t settled in. “Right. Alex and I and . . .” Chase tripped on his words, nearly blurting out confirmation on the mystery brother. “And you’re our assistant. I’m surprised you never accompanied my father abroad.”

“I wasn’t about to get on a private jet with your father.”

“Oh, right.” He closed his eyes, then opened them when her words sunk in. “Private jet?”

“Yeah. Technically, the company owns it, but yes. Wait, you didn’t know about that?”

“Of course I did.” He had no idea. Or maybe a hint of an idea but hadn’t put two brain cells on the subject since his father’s death.

Piper started to laugh. “You’re a terrible liar.”

“You just called your boss a liar.”

“Fine,” she said. “You’re challenged at relaying inaccurate information in a convincing way so as to make someone believe it’s the truth.”

Chase’s belly started to shake with a laugh that wanted to erupt. “Oh, that’s corporate speak if I’ve ever heard it.”

“Thank you.” She sounded proud of herself.

“There is no way you talked to my father like that and kept your job.”

“Technically, I lost my job. And since I did while I was corporate speaking out of my eyeballs, I figured it was time for me to change it up. Hope you don’t mind.”

He adored it. “I’ll let you know if it goes too far.”

“Good plan. And do so before you hand me a pink slip.”

He didn’t see that happening. “Now . . . about that passport.”