Diamond (Rare Gems #2)(52)
“You like him?” Jane said she did and thought he was a good fit. “Then give him the job and tell him that in a few weeks I’ll need him to come up here and help with the layout of the new plant. Also, make sure you have him keep an eye out for his replacement. If he’s that good, I want him with my best team up here with us.”
“Okay. There is the matter of the family that your brother murdered. I’ve sent the money, as you’ve asked, as well as paid for whatever they had in way of a funeral. They want to meet with you as well. Thank you for everything, they said. Before you ask, yeah, I’ve made sure that they keep all the information about the donations and money to themselves too.” Thad decided that Jane needed a raise and wrote that on his list at the top. “I’ve been looking at houses and was wondering if they really are that cheap up there. I mean, the place I have now is about half the size as the ones up there, but they’re nowhere near what I paid for mine. Seriously?”
“Seriously. When you come up in a few days, we’ll take you around. You can stay here while you’re looking, and that way you can take your time. Besides, Diamond wants to get to know you. She said she’s never met a vamp before.”
After he hung up the phone with her, he went to find Benson. He was starving. Before he could ask, Benson handed him a platter of food and told him to sit. He was about halfway finished when he sat across from him.
“The missus said for me to call her Diamond. I was wondering how I can tell her that it isn’t done.” Thad looked at his cook of the past twelve years and smiled. “You’re going to tell me to call her Diamond and be done with it, aren’t you?”
“I think you’ll live longer if you do.” He picked up the glass of tea that Benson handed him. “I don’t know how I lived without her before this. And while we’re on the subject, I think if you call me Mr. Thad once more I might brain you. It’s Thad…it’s always been Thad.”
Benson nodded. “The matter of the house, sir. I’m not sure—” After a heavy sigh, Benson shook his head. “I will move in as soon as the painters are finished. Your missus is hard to reason with, is she not?”
“No, not really. I don’t reason with her at all. She says what she wants, and I do my best to get it for her. She’s not really demanding and asks for very little, so when she asks, I know it’s something she really wants.” Thad sat back in his chair and looked around the kitchen that was in various stages of remodel. “Like this kitchen. You said it was fine. What changed your mind?”
Benson flushed and stood up. “I’ll be picking up the missus from the hospital at two, sir. Then from there we are headed to the mall for some shopping. She said she needs my help on a dress to wear to the ground breaking on Friday.”
Thad let it go, knowing that Diamond had convinced Benson that he needed a nicer kitchen by simply smiling at him. It worked on him as well. Thad remembered the fundraiser.
After about an hour of going over what was going to go into having a fundraiser here at the house, Thad went out onto the deck and looked at the woods. He wanted to run again. Yesterday, after they’d made love twice before coming downstairs, she’d taken him out and helped him shift. It was the most amazing thing he’d ever done. Then they’d run through the woods for an hour before he’d needed to come in for a call. It was still amazing to him how much his body had changed, and so much for the better. He felt her touch his mind.
There have been some problems at the mall. Turn on the news. He moved to enter the house again as Benson was coming out. The television in the kitchen was already on. He pulled out his cell phone to call her.
“They’re saying they have a lead on who it was. I’m talking to a friend of mine at the police station, and he’s telling me it’s a man by the name of Galloway, as if we didn’t already know that. He signed everything he did. What a moron.” He watched as the camera crew walked around all the destruction his brother had caused. “There were some break-ins in two of the restaurants as well. Apparently, when he couldn’t find whatever it was he was looking for, he turned on the fryers and had himself a meal, then set fire to the kitchen area in one of the places.”
“Money. He’s been looking for money. Are you still at the hospital?” She said she was. “Please stay there. I don’t know if he’ll come there or not, but I’d rather you were someplace safe.”
“I’ll stay, but you have to do that as well. If he was looking for money and didn’t find any, he might come looking for you next.” He thought she was right. “Thad, do you think he’ll kill anyone else?”
“I don’t know, honey. I really don’t.” He watched the news for another twenty minutes before he went back to his office. Benson told him he’d keep him updated on things, and Thad started looking over the plans for the new building. Groundbreaking was in just a few days, and his brother was going to f*ck it up, he just knew it. As he was sitting there trying to work out one of the issues that kept coming up in his other plant, Benson walked in. Thad started to say something when he realized he wasn’t alone. Ward had him at gunpoint.
“Hello, brother dear. I bet you didn’t expect to see me here.” Benson sat down in the chair across from his desk, and that’s when Thad noticed the blood. He asked him what had happened.