Total pages in book: 114
Estimated words: 109368 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 547(@200wpm)___ 437(@250wpm)___ 365(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 109368 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 547(@200wpm)___ 437(@250wpm)___ 365(@300wpm)
Ramsay.
I tried again, pushing my eyes open and blinking rapidly against the lights that stung. Eventually my vision unblurred, and I stared into Ramsay McRae’s rugged face.
Those wolf eyes were alight with concern.
“You feeling all right, Silver? Just give yourself a second. I’ll go get the nurse.” He stood up.
“Nurse?” Confusion had me turning my head on the pillow. My body felt heavy, my brain sluggish. Where was I? “Ramsay …” But he was already half in and out of the door and calling for a nurse.
A nurse.
The beeping.
I turned my head, my hair crinkling overly loud in my ears as I saw the machines next to the bed.
The bed.
I was in a hospital?
And like a rush of memories, it all came flooding back.
The masked figure.
The burning pain in my stomach.
The blood.
The fear.
Ramsay holding pressure on my wound.
Keeping me calm.
Then there was nothing.
“Am I okay?” I asked fearfully. “Ramsay …”
He returned to my side, taking my hand between his. “You’re all right, Silver. You’re all right.”
A few minutes later, a doctor introduced himself. He told me about my injury, the surgery, and my recovery time. That I had to stay in the hospital for a few days so they could monitor my situation.
And he kept referring to Ramsay as my husband.
It sounded nice.
Really, really nice.
“Water,” I’d said in response. I needed water and to wake up properly. I still felt sluggish.
They let me angle the bed up but warned me I had to be very careful with my stomach and sutures.
Then the nurse told me and Ramsay the police would want to talk to us as soon as I was able.
Eventually, thankfully, they left us alone.
My gaze moved over my … Ramsay. He was wearing someone else’s shirt. It fit too tightly. I remembered him taking off his own to put pressure on my wound.
“I told them I was your husband so they’d keep me updated.”
I huffed. “Isn’t that illegal?”
“They should’ve checked my ID.” He shrugged. “Tomorrow, when you’ve had some rest, I need to know if you know who did this.”
I didn’t want to wait until tomorrow.
I took another sip of water, my hand shaking so much, Ramsay reached out to steady it for me. Smiling in thanks, I nodded when I was done, and he put the cup at my bedside. “I was … I was going to tell you. Everything. Today.” I frowned. “Is it still today?”
“It’s still today.”
“I was going to tell you,” I repeated, my throat a little hoarse. “I didn’t want to keep it from you anymore.”
“You can tell me tomorrow after you’ve rested.”
“No. Now.”
“It wasn’t a robbery, was it?” At my furrowed brow, he explained, “The perpetrator stole your handbag to make it look like a robbery.”
Shit. My wallet and car keys were in that purse.
I met his fierce stare with my own. My brain still felt fuzzy, but I needed to get the words out. “Last year, an investigative reporter from the New York Chronicle approached me. Perri Wilcox was investigating the death of her colleague. He was in the middle of several investigations, so she was trying to narrow down if one of them was connected to his death.”
Ramsay frowned but nodded at me to continue.
“He was working with my mom and dad.” Tears burned my nose. The trauma of what I’d gone through hit me and the tears spilled over before I could stop them.
“Silver.” Ramsay’s voice was gruff as he reached out to stroke my cheek. “We can talk about this later. You’ve been through a lot today.”
I cried a little longer, trying to get a handle on my emotions. “I’m sorry. Must be … the anesthesia.”
Ramsay held out some tissues. “Silver. This can wait.”
“No, it can’t. I th-thought I could handle it. That the threats were desperation … I underestimated him.”
His expression hardened. “Underestimated who?”
I wiped away my tears and snot, balling the tissue up in my fist. “My parents were on the board of the Silver Group. Over the years, my dad’s family sold off more and more of their shares in the hotel empire. Dad gave up being CEO and sold even more. But they still owned a twenty percent share, which doesn’t sound a lot but that’s a big stake in a publicly traded company. It’s worth hundreds of millions of dollars. And he still had great influence with the board. He voted to appoint Halston Cole as the new CEO.”
Ramsay waited patiently for me to continue.
“Unbeknownst to me, around three months before their deaths, my parents were approached by a woman called Adila Binti Aziz. The Silver Group has resorts all over the world. After my father stepped down as CEO, he was like any board member. He had to trust Halston Cole was informing the board of all important company decisions. But he wasn’t. They bought land on an island off the coast of East Malaysia to open a luxury resort. But it turned out the local government had allowed the Silver Group to displace some of the Indigenous people of the island from their village on the coastline. Their village was mowed down to make way for the hotel. If that wasn’t bad enough, once construction began, it became clear that the new construction involved rerouting the islanders’ water supply to fill the fucking pools in the resort.” I jerked with my anger and hissed as pain ricocheted across my stomach.