Liam’s Lily Read online

  Liam watched as Jim turned tortured eyes to Lilianna.

  She grabbed her father’s hands. “Steady. We’ve spent a lot of time getting you to this point. We have help now. We’ve caught this in time. Let us sort it out. You just stay strong.”

  Liam wished it would be that simple. But he had given up believing in fairy tales a long time ago.

  Chapter 10

  Lilianna couldn’t believe how fast things were moving now. The lawyers were into heavy discussions. The specialist was getting everything tidied up so her father could go to Gunner’s place. She looked to Liam. “Do we go to Gunner’s too?”

  He shook his head. “What I really want to do is search your sister’s house. But I need permission.”

  Jim looked up and said, “It’s my house. You have my permission.”

  Liam turned to both lawyers, then back to Lilianna. “Would you feel better if you followed your father to Gunner’s home?” He leaned over and grabbed her hand. “And that’s okay if that’s how you feel. But, at the same time, I do need to go through the main house.”

  The lawyers at that moment split apart. “We’ll draw up a document right now, giving you the right to enter the premises. The property still belongs to Jim.”

  “Damn right it does,” Jim said, his voice strident, angry. “And they sure as hell better not have done anything to have changed that.”

  “We’re working on it,” Harry said. He brought out a pad of paper and drafted a simple document. He handed it to Jim. “Sign this.”

  Jim read it, signed it and handed to Lilianna. She looked at it, saw she was required to sign it and did so. Then Harry and Eric signed as witnesses.

  “So that covers everybody except Brianna,” Liam joked. But it fell flat in the air.

  Lilianna shook her head. “She won’t like this.”

  “Doesn’t matter if she does or not,” Harry said. “We need to investigate the last two years of the sanctuary’s business dealings to see if she’s done anything else, like steal funds.”

  “The accountant should be able to tell us that,” Lilianna said.

  At that her father raised his head. “Please tell me Joseph is still handling the accounts.”

  She shook her head. “No, Joseph retired, Dad. We have McCormick and Sons handling it.”

  Her father stared at her. “Oh no. Joseph has to handle it. I can’t trust anybody else.”

  “Dad, when you went under, Joseph struggled to do anything. He was so upset. He was already over sixty, and he didn’t want to do it anymore.”

  “Call him,” Jim said. “We’ll get him to take a look at the books to make sure there’s been no shenanigans since he handed them off.”

  Lilianna pulled out her phone. “Here. I’ve dialed Joseph’s number. You talk to him. It’s on Speaker.” She handed her father the phone.

  He took it hesitantly, but, when Joseph’s voice rang through, he smiled. “Joseph, this is Jim.”

  There was a shocked silence on the other end, and then Joseph said, “Oh, my God! Is that really you?”

  She listened as the man did a quick welcome back.

  Then her father said clearly, “I need you to take a look at the sanctuary’s books. I’m afraid something may have gone wrong since you stepped down.”

  “I’m retired. You know that, right?”

  Her father nodded. “So Lilianna says. But I’m afraid my daughter’s done something wrong.”

  Joseph groaned. “And that would be Brianna. If there was ever one who would cause you trouble, it was that one.”

  “I know, and you warned me about it. But I’ve been out of circulation for a couple years now.”

  “Yeah, and that was the damnedest thing,” Joseph said. “I have to admit, my heart wasn’t in handling the books after that.”

  “I really need you to give me a hand getting back to life. I’m only now feeling better, and I find out I’ve been drugged for four months, at least, if not for two years, and now I’m trying to regain control before my daughter steals everything.”

  “Can you send me the log-ins?”

  Her father turned toward Lilianna, and she shrugged. “I can try to find them, but Brianna’s probably changed them. I have some paper copies, or at least they’re at the office.”

  Liam stood. “We’ll go to the office now,” he said quietly. “And then we’ll search the house so we can get at least that much information. And I don’t give a damn who is there.”

  Lilianna looked up at him. “I’m coming too. I want to check on the dogs, and I’ll check the bank records while I’m there.”

  Her father, his voice low, said, “Email them to Joseph, please.”

  Joseph thanked everyone.

  “I can do that.” At that she stood. “I need my phone back. We’ve made our plans with Joseph. We’ll get you a phone too, Dad. But, in the meantime”—she extended her hand, palm up, and her father handed over her phone—“Joseph can use my phone as a contact for you. Until we get a full picture, I don’t know how bad things are.”

  “I’ll stand by,” Joseph said, his voice invigorated. “Damn, Lilianna, your father is back!”

  She chuckled. “And honestly that’s the best gift ever.”

  She bent down, kissed her father on the cheek, turned to glare at Harry. “You promise he’ll be safe?”

  Harry nodded. He turned to Liam. “Send in my men, will you? They are out in the parking lot, waiting for me.”

  Liam nodded. “Will do.” He waited for Lilianna to join him at the doorway, where, outside stood four uniformed officers. Liam acknowledged them with a silent raise of his chin, and Liam and Lilianna walked to the front entrance. Katie was still at the reception desk.

  Lilianna walked over to her. “Don’t you get to go home today?”

  Katie groaned. “Maria quit. I finally reached her by phone, and she said she was sick. Then I said Lilianna wanted to talk to Maria, about Mr. Howell.” Katie sighed. “Maria seemed okay with it. Then she called back and handed in her notice.”

  Liam stepped forward. “The police will want to speak to her about the attack on her.”

  Katie bit her bottom lip. “Police? Isn’t that a bit extreme?”

  “No, not at this point. It needs to be addressed.”

  Lilianna added in a low tone, “I don’t know what’s going on here, Katie, but it’s bad news. So please, don’t say anything to anyone.”

  Outside Liam walked to the large black car and tapped on the heavily tinted window. The window rolled down. “Mr. Stein wants you inside,” he said.

  The driver nodded and turned to look at the passenger. Both hopped out, and the closest one asked, “What room is he in?”

  “Room 104,” Lilianna said. “He’s with my father. Please take good care of him.”

  Both men nodded. “Will do.”

  She turned to look at Liam. “Where is North, and where is the truck?”

  Just then North came out the front door. “Jeez, you two are always on the move,” he said with a smile.

  Liam gave him a droll look. “Yeah, we moved from the room to the front entrance. That’s it for how many hours now?”

  North motioned toward the truck. “Where we going?”

  “The office first,” Lilianna said. “I need to get whatever accounting stuff I can find and collect the dogs too.”

  Liam added, “We have a signed letter giving me permission to go into the main house and the office and search them. Not to mention pull financial information.”

  “Wow.” North whistled. “That’ll be fun. And by the way, there is a record of your mother coming in to visit your father, just before he supposedly attacked a nurse.”

  Lilianna gasped. “That would make more sense than anything. She always set him off. Use Maria to file a complaint and it’s a done deal. When the doctors see my father, he’d still be agitated.”

  “A perfect situation to take advantage of and further their agenda,” North added.

  “Makes s
ense,” Liam said. “Still shitty though.”

  “I don’t know what the deal is with this Carlos,” North said. “As far as I can see, he’s a ghost.”

  Lilianna turned to look at him in surprise. “Isn’t that who you saw last night at my cabin?”

  “I don’t know who I saw last night.” He turned to look at Liam. “Gunner’s man brought a bug detector for us too.”

  “Oh, good. While I’m checking out the office, you can test the office and then maybe do a run-through of the cabin.”

  “Will do.”

  “I thought you had something with you,” she said.

  “No. We didn’t bring it with us,” Liam said. “We also don’t have any place to put all our stuff, including yours, Lilianna, which is now in the truck.”

  She looked in the back to see the bed was full and sighed as she pulled the cover closed. “My entire life has boiled down to this.”

  The men nodded but didn’t try to make light of it. After all, what could anybody say? Her life had come to this, not easily and not fast, but it was a mess.

  They made it back to the sanctuary property in no time. Lilianna was surprised to see the speed with which they got her home. But instead of going around to her cabin where the dogs were, Liam hopped out at the office.

  “Who else is here?” he asked.

  “There’s the usual staff looking after the elephants,” she said. “The question is whether my sister is here or not.”

  “Let’s go find out,” he said.

  They walked into the tourist building and found Daniel stacking brochures for visitors. He looked up and smiled. “Wow. It’s been hard to round anybody up today.”

  “Sorry, I’ve been off the premises all day.”

  Daniel chuckled. “That’s okay. I’m used to it. It’s a good thing we didn’t have any tours or anything.”

  “How are the elephants?”

  “They’re fine. I’m just running out for some fresh food. We got a delivery from one of the markets, a couple wagons full of watermelons and squashes.”

  She clapped her hands with delight. “Oh, my goodness! They’ll love that.” She turned to look at Liam. “They adore melons.”

  Daniel said, “I can wait half an hour or so if you want to come out with me.”

  She sighed. “I’ve got so much going on right now, so that’s not happening. Can you hold back some of the melons for tomorrow or the next day?”

  He nodded. “They’re not all that overripe yet. I’ll take some today. I don’t know, maybe sixty or seventy, and see how they do.”

  “Sixty or seventy?” Liam asked.

  Daniel laughed. “You haven’t seen these elephants eat.” He headed out the back door.

  Liam asked in a low voice, “You don’t want to ask where your sister is?”

  She frowned and raced to the door. “Daniel, do you know where my sister is?”

  He shook his head. “I saw her head off about an hour ago. I haven’t seen her come back yet.”

  She gave him a wave goodbye.

  Liam nodded and said, “In that case, I’m heading to the house. Let’s take a quick look at the office first.”

  She went into the office and pulled out ledgers. “These are all blank.”

  “Keep looking,” he said urgently.

  She searched the office files. “There’s nothing here.”

  “Check online.”

  She logged on to the computer. “I’m still locked out of the accounting program. Brianna said she would reset the password.” She frowned. “I gather it was foolish of me to believe her.” She called Daniel. “I can’t get into the accounting program. Can I use your log-in?”

  “Sure.” He recited it for her, and she punched in the information.

  “Okay, it’s letting me in. Thanks.”

  “No problem. Double-check your access. You probably just need to change your password, and it should be fine.”

  Lilianna disconnected the call. She’d check that later. Right now, she was in, and there was the information she sought.

  “Print that off,” Liam said over her shoulder. “You want both a hard copy and a digital copy.”

  Following his instructions, she printed several pages from the last six months and then created a PDF of the whole thing and downloaded it in her Excel program so she had something she could import into another program. “Okay, got all that.”

  “Email it to Joseph.”

  That took a little bit longer, but finally she said, “Okay.”

  “Now get into the sanctuary’s bank account and download as many statements as you can covering the last two years. Three years would be better, so we could see what the normal revenue should be as compared to now. We need to get an idea of what’s going on.”

  “I’ve been in here lots,” she said bewildered. “I just never thought to look for anything untoward.”

  “Exactly why there’s a problem,” he said. “When you’re not expecting anything to go wrong, you aren’t looking for problems. But once they happen …”

  She nodded. “I’m almost done here, but I’d like to spend a few minutes and go through some of the emails.” She looked up at him. “Are you okay to go through the house on your own, or do you want me to come?”

  “Better that you don’t come,” he said with a smile. “In case you hadn’t noticed, North has already scanned the office, and he’s gone up to scan your cabin now. But, if you see your sister, call me. If you hear anything, send me a warning.” Just then his phone went off. He pulled it out and raised an eyebrow. “It’s Detective Olson.” He walked a few steps away. “Liam here.”

  The conversation was short but intense before he turned back to her, his face was grim. “He spoke to Maria who confessed to taking a payout to lodge a fabricated complaint against your father.”

  Outrage whipped through her. “That’s just so wrong.”

  “She didn’t want to say who paid her, but, with some pressure, she admitted it was Carlos.” He gave her a quick hug. “Don’t dwell on it. We’ll get this all sorted.”

  There was nothing anybody could say that could take away the pain of such a betrayal hitting her. She nodded in acknowledgment. Biting her lower lip, she walked with Liam to the back door and watched as he headed to the main house.

  She held no ill will toward her sister, although a part of her wondered why she didn’t. Her sister needed to get the hell off the land and go find a life of her own though. Then again, maybe Lilianna should take her own advice.

  Just then her phone rang. She glanced down, seeing it was her mother. Frowning, she answered, “Mom, what’s up?”

  “You mean, I can’t just call and say hi?” her mother asked in a testy voice.

  Lilianna pinched the bridge of her nose. If there was one thing about her mother, the answer to that question was no. This woman always wanted something.

  “So why did you call?”

  “Brianna has been telling me all kinds of horror stories. She was in tears, I tell you, tears,” her mother cried out. “Do you realize she was almost arrested?”

  “No, I didn’t realize that,” Lilianna said smoothly. “Hopefully she got it all sorted out. I’ve been with Dad all day.”

  “Why do you want to sit beside that old empty bag?” her mother snorted. “He didn’t have a whole lot in the years when I was married to him, which made it easier to get out when I wanted, but now he’s completely useless. Honestly he should have just committed suicide instead of costing so much money by sticking around.”

  Lilianna pinched her lips together. “I happen to love my father very much,” she said, gritting her teeth with unnecessary force. “Did you have a reason for calling?”

  “Pfff, course I had a reason for calling,” her mother yelled. “I want to know what you’re up to. Brianna says you’ve gone completely against her.”

  “I haven’t said two words to Brianna in the last twenty-four hours. What are you talking about?” Inside she wished she could get
her mother to say anything that would give her an idea what was going on.

  “Well, that’s not what Brianna says.”

  “And of course, if Brianna says something, Brianna is telling the truth, and I’m not.” Lilianna sighed. “Same old story, Mom. So why are you calling me if you’re not pumping me for information?”

  There was a long silence on the other end. “Is that what you think of me?” her mother said with a false hurt tone.

  “Mom, get to the point.”

  “The point is, somebody is trying to hurt Brianna, and I want to make sure it’s not you.”

  “Why would I do anything to hurt my sister?”

  “I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking.”

  “Did you ask Brianna if she’s done anything to hurt me?” Lilianna asked.

  “No, of course not. Your sister would never hurt you. Nor would she hurt anybody.”

  “Really? That’s why she slept with my fiancé, right?” Lilianna winced. She should never have mentioned that to her mother. It just gave her mother an opening to pounce on.

  And sure enough her mother cried out, “You’re not still holding that against her, are you? You can’t stop true love, honey. I’m so sorry you’re feeling heartbroken and lost without him. But he obviously wasn’t yours to begin with if she could take him away from you so easily.”

  “Whatever, Mom.”

  “Is this what this is all about? Is it that you’ve finally got an opportunity to pay your sister back?” her mother cried out, her voice rising in a crescendo.

  Lilianna rolled her eyes. She rose and paced the office, going down the hallway and out to the tourist area where they had all the brochures on the elephants and on how to set up for the tours. “No, Mom, this has nothing to do with Brianna.”

  “What does it have to do with?” Her mother sniffed. “I can’t believe you’d do something to hurt your sister.”

  “I haven’t done anything to hurt my sister. You’re not listening to me,” Lilianna said, her voice hardening at the end. “You never listen to me. Maybe you should be telling me what Brianna is up to. But then again, maybe you’re up to the same damn thing?”

  “Don’t you swear at me,” her mom said in an ominous tone.