The Rogue (The Moorehouse Legacy #4)(48)

“Amelia?” he drawled.

Mad cursed, realizing she’d been played beautifully. By all of them. Spike included.

“You know something, Richard? I should never have come here and I’m never coming back.” She yanked the door out of his hold and slammed it then pushed her foot into the clutch. But before she threw the gearshift into first, she put the window down. “Oh, by the way. Do yourself a favor and don’t raise any objections about my trust.”

“Why must you be so unreasonable—”

“Did I mention I’ve hired a lawyer? Mick Rhodes. Ever heard of him?” As Richard’s mouth closed up tight, she smiled grimly. “Ah, I see you have. Good. Those shares are mine and I’m going to vote them. Back the hell away or get run over. It’s your choice.”

“Madeline, wait—”

“Not a chance.”

“But what about Spike?”

“He’s fine. Amelia’s taking care of him.”

Mad hit the gas and popped the clutch, spraying pebbles all over Richard’s linen pants.

*

Richard watched the Viper take off and realized he might have miscalculated his style of play.

He’d never seen Madeline like that. Ever. She’d been enraged to the core yet deadly calm.

It made him respect her a little.

And while the dust over the drive settled, he churned the implications of what she’d said. Mick Rhodes wasn’t a lawyer. He was a paving machine. The guy had leveled more opponents than any other attorney on Wall Street.

How the hell had Madeline gotten access to a man like him? Rhodes’s clients were Fortune Fifty companies…but maybe she’d gotten an in through one of her big-money sailing contacts? There were plenty of hard-core corporate players who liked boats—and say what you would about Madeline as a woman, she was, evidently, one hell of a sailor.

Richard crossed his arms over his chest and shook his head. Damn it, with Rhodes on board, the fight to hold on to those shares of hers was going to be a nasty one.

Except maybe all wasn’t lost. Clearly, Amelia had worked her magic on that chef, bless her heart. And Madeline was furious right now, riding a wave of anger, talking a good game. But later, when the fury bled out of her, she would know only rejection and hurt and she would revert to her normal state, forgetting about the shares and the trust. Without Spike in her ear prodding her toward independence so he could get his hands on her money, she would let everything return to where it had been.

Richard glanced back at his house, then refocused on the driveway.

The key of course, was making sure Spike stayed away from her. That man might have been momentarily blinded by an attraction for Amelia, but he wasn’t stupid. If he were looking for cash, Mad was a much better ATM candidate. Amelia needed money because she spent it constantly and a woman like that, with expenses of her own, would be a much harder target for bilking. Spike was going to figure this out quickly and then he’d go back to working on Mad.

And she was just enough of a sap to let him back in the door. So the mission critical would be cutting that avenue off.

Fortunately, Michael “Spike” Moriarty, had a hell of a history as it turned out. And Richard knew all the gory details thanks to the phone call that had come in late last night from his lawyer. The report on Moriarty’s background had been thorough…and thoroughly illuminating.

Surely there was a way to use it to his advantage.

Richard thought about the way Spike and Madeline had behaved around each other and suspected they couldn’t have spent a lot of time together. And regardless of her maintaining they were just friends, it was obvious they were having sex; any idiot could have read that over the breakfast table yesterday morning. Clearly, though, it was early in the relationship. Very early. They were cautious with each other still, batting that friends word around and ducking glances. To the guy’s credit, Spike was playing the cautious suitor brilliantly…while he was no doubt counting the ways he could finance his restaurant ambitions with Madeline’s trust.

It was a great thing that Amelia had come between them already. But there needed to be another wedge in there so Spike didn’t think he could come back.

“Where did Madeline go? Did she leave?”

Richard turned around to Amelia and had to smile. “Of course she did. And I have to give you credit, you work fast.”

“Excuse me?”

“Please, don’t be coy. It’s boring. I must say, Moriarty’s a bit of a roughneck for you, but I imagine a little change is good.”

“You think I…She thinks I was with Spike? Oh, God, Richard—”

“Weren’t you?”

“No!”

Well…that was a surprise, on a lot of levels. “The tattoos kill it for you?”

“Mad is with him!”

“Hasn’t bothered you before, has it?” he said offhandedly.

Richard started to worry but then told himself everything was still okay. Even if the deed hadn’t been done, the effect was the same. Madeline would be hard-pressed to get over the perception, however it had come about, that Amelia had been with yet another man of hers. However, the fact that nothing had happened made it even more imperative to convince Spike there was no shot at redemption.

Abruptly, a look of purpose came into Amelia’s eyes and that was the last thing Richard needed.