Page 104 of Earned Husband

“Andrew?” Her entire face contorted into a scowl-frown-glare thing that could’ve brought entire armies to their knees. “God, I should’ve known he was somehow wrapped up in all of this.” She smacked a hand down on the table so hard that it trembled. Then she brought both hands to her face and covered her eyes. “Fuck, I can’t believe I didn’t see it. Of course, it was him. What did he do?”

“It turns out that Mallory convinced our dearest uncle after Dad’s arrest that she was pregnant with another little Thayer.”

“But the DNA tests proved?—”

“That was way after this,” I said gently. “I’m talking about in the early days. Long before we finally got concrete evidence that baby Court Thayer isn’t a Thayer after all.”

Jane shoulders were trembling with shock as she peeked at me through her fingers. “So Andrew thought he was helping Dad’s baby?”

I nodded slowly. “She convinced him that child needed protecting, so he decided to create what he thought was a trust fund.”

“Our uncle set up an offshore account in a fake name? He can barely reset his phone.”

“Exactly.” I let out a tired laugh. “He genuinely believed he was protecting his future nephew, so he dipped into a few reserve business accounts that were already almost tapped out, transferring small amounts in multiple transactions from each account. There was no huge, lump sum transfer.”

“So nobody noticed,” Jane finished for me, groaning into her hands again. “Oh, Andrew.”

“I eventually managed to trace the payments to the account number she gave him. After that, Mallory took over. Within days, she’d transferred every cent into another offshore account with her boyfriend at the time, and then, as far as I can tell, he locked her out of the account almost immediately.”

Jane’s eyes widened. “She couldn’t access the money?”

“Nope.”

“So she stole it and then got robbed herself?”

I shrugged. “Personally, I’m finding it remarkably difficult to feel sorry for her.”

“I think I may have the same problem.” She held my gaze. “How the hell did you know where to look?”

“I didn’t. I spent two days tracing money from the operating accounts to Andrew’s original account, then from there to the supposed trust account.”

A slow smile spread on my sister’s lips. The relief pouring off of her was palpable. “They can prove Mallory was behind it all. She lied about Court Jr., manipulated Andrew, and transferred those funds with her boyfriend.”

“Exactly. She orchestrated it, so they’re charging her with extortion, fraud, money laundering, and tax offenses at the very least. Along with whatever else the US Attorney wants to stack onto the indictment.”

“What about Dad?” she asked after a few long seconds of just staring at nothing. “This doesn’t clear him, does it?”

“No, it doesn’t. This part was all Mallory and Andrew, but Dad’s sentence is up in three years anyway.”

For almost a decade, every decision I’d made had somehow led back to cleaning up after my father, but as of today, there was nothing left to clean. I let out a slow breath as I finally leaned back in my chair. “It’s over.”

“Our side of it, anyway.” She refocused on me after another moment. “Are you going to Mallory’s trial?”

“No. I have absolutely no interest in seeing her ever again.”

Relief flickered across Jane’s features. “Okay. If I hear anything else, I’ll keep you updated.”

We were interrupted by a soft knock on the door and one of the executive assistants cracked it open a moment later. “I’m so sorry to interrupt, but there’s someone here asking for Colin.”

I frowned. “I don’t have any other meetings today.”

“I know, sir. They don’t have an appointment.”

Jane raised an eyebrow at her. “Who is it? You should tell them?—”

“It’s fine,” I said, pushing my chair back and standing up. “We were done here anyway and my ass is numb. I could use a walk.”

My sister laughed but nodded. “For the record, I never need an update about the state of your ass, but okay, let’s go.”