Pride, Prejudice, and Other Flavors (The Rajes #1)(118)
That made her smile. She loved having information Trisha wanted, loved having something, anything, Trisha wanted. “Did you think you could just throw me out like garbage and then have Yash saunter into the governor’s mansion without consequences? Do you have any idea what my life’s been like for the past fifteen years?”
With the amount her family had paid her, Trisha guessed it couldn’t have been too bad, but Julia’s eyes glittered with satisfaction as though she’d been dying to tell Trisha. This was why she was back; she’d seen Yash’s news as the perfect time to seek redemption from Trisha for having wronged her.
“I’ve been married four times. I’m trapped in what therapists call a pattern, because of the trauma you caused me. Do you have any idea how expensive divorces are?”
Trisha knew a million ways to lobotomize a human. Could she please use just one of those on this woman? “Hasn’t your business of stealing from the terminally ill helped pay for them, though?”
“I don’t steal. I work hard and I take my share. You think it was easy to put up with Emma Caine? But you better believe it’s going to pay off.”
Trisha walked around her desk and loomed over Julia, for once glad for her giraffelike body. Julia gave her a bored slow blink. “You’ve released Emma’s video without her permission. That’s illegal. You also misled the donors about her being terminal when you knew she wasn’t. That’s fraud.”
Julia laughed. “Who said I don’t have permission to release the video?” She reached into her bag and slid out some papers. “Oh, did Big DJ betray Little Trisha?”
Trisha snatched the papers and studied them. “This has today’s date.”
Julia snatched them back. “So?”
Ma was right. It was such a lucky break to have a stupid adversary. The release wasn’t signed by Emma. It didn’t count. Trisha laughed. “DJ doesn’t have power of attorney over Emma.” Trisha was pretty sure Emma hadn’t completed the paperwork for that before she went into surgery and she was an adult.
Julia stopped lounging in her chair and straightened up. “You’re lying.”
“Is that what my fishbowl face is telling you?” Trisha leaned back on her desk; two could play the bored game. Fifteen years of guilt she’d suffered at the hands of this woman. She would never hurt anyone Trisha loved again. “Listen to me very carefully. Because I’m only going to lay this out for you once. I’m no longer the easy prey I once was and if you go up against me I will make sure you end up behind bars. You’ve fraudulently pocketed the money from the video. Our lawyers already have a criminal suit against you ready to go. Unless you’re particularly keen on jail, you will leave my family alone, and you will withdraw the video and return all that money to the people you stole it from.”
Julia opened her mouth, but Trisha held up her hand and she closed it. “And if you do one thing to harm DJ”—because suddenly Trisha was sure Julia had something on DJ; her nineties-Bollywood-plot theory didn’t seem so farfetched—“I will make sure that every one of the families you’ve preyed on to make money off their tragedies gets together and sues your ass until every penny you’ve ever leeched is gone. Now get out of my office. Get out of my building—which by the way is private property. Soliciting business here is illegal. So the next time you think of setting foot here, know that I will have security throw you out on your cowardly, pathetic ass.” She walked to the door and held it open.
Julia stood; there was still a flicker of fight left in her face. “Fine. But DJ isn’t what you think he is. And he doesn’t even want you. Why would he have signed if he did?” And with that last swipe she slunk away like the weasel she was.
Chapter Thirty-Three
DJ enjoyed the graveyard shift. Truly he did. Four in the morning was when his brain was sharp, his senses entirely focused on work. He usually went to the farmers’ market at five every morning anyway. Now he just went two hours before that and got to Curried Dreams a little before four so he could vacate the kitchen by eight for Ashna’s renter.
The deliveries alley was still dark when he pulled into it and got out. Every single time he saw those steps he saw Trisha standing there, her unusually shiny hair catching the light, her unusually long neck held high, the flames in her eyes flashing all sorts of secrets at him that she didn’t know how to hide.
It was all his imagination, of course, because he hadn’t seen her in a couple of weeks. Two days after Emma had woken up, Trisha had handed her care over to Dr. Entoff and disappeared to somewhere in Africa. Not a word of good-bye to him. Which was expected after their last conversation.
She had stormed into Emma’s room and asked him why he’d signed Julia’s release. There had been such beautiful hope in her eyes. “What’s she holding over your head?” she’d asked, as usual laying all her cards on the table.
Which was exactly why he’d had to say what he’d said. “We need the money.”
And he’d walked away from her. Because Julia was right, Trisha wouldn’t care about his history and he couldn’t let her be the cause of putting her brother’s career in jeopardy again. It would kill her.
He pushed away the mix of regret and yearning that lurked close to the surface all the bloody time. The fact that he had found everything about her unusual should have been a sign. The fact that he had noticed every little thing about her should have been another. But those three words, the hired help, those three words had destroyed his rice-paper-thin ego and he’d lost all sense of how to deal with his own awareness of her and how she brought everything inside him to the fore in big disruptive waves.