“If you speak to Marc, tell him to have faith. In me. I know what I’m doing. I’m going to fix this. I’m going to fix all of this.”
“I don’t know what that means, Peanut. How are you going to fix this? What are you going to do?”
I swallowed as tears threatened. But then I pushed them back. I needed to be stronger than this. I would be stronger than this if it meant saving Marc.
“I’m going to get married.”
Benfield Estate
Long Island
Marc
“Take the deal.”
I stared at Entwhistle after he’d laid out the evidence in front of me. It was all there. My account at the hedge fund. The withdrawal of two thousand dollars. The purchase of two plane tickets. The hotel bill. All of it.
“I earned that money.”
Benfield, who was sitting on another sofa in his living room, nodded. “You did, and quite impressively. When all of this is behind you, I might consider hiring you myself. I’m less squeamish about people with criminal records.”
Criminal record. I was going to have a criminal record for life.
If I took the deal Entwhistle suggested. He basically confirmed what the prosecution knew, which was the only money they could prove in a court of law I took, was the two thousand dollars. The records of my account showed a twenty-million-dollar deposit and a twenty-million-dollar withdrawal, but the money itself was never substantiated. Where it came from, where it went. Just a stupid line item in the account record.
A flimsy frame-up. One that coincided with me legitimately withdrawing two thousand dollars in an effort to save Ash. Which I failed to do. George told me when I talked to him yesterday.
Ash was getting married in two weeks, on Saturday.
“Take the deal, Campbell,” Entwhistle repeated. “We’re talking fifteen months in minimum security, most likely out in twelve with good behavior. I’m not saying it’s a cake walk, but it’s the best deal we’re going to get. It takes the unpredictability of a trial off the table. People hear twenty million dollars, and it doesn’t matter if we explain they can’t prove you took it, people will think you did it anyway.”
I looked at Benfield. “I do this, and that delays me from getting the evidence you want on Landen.”
He nodded once. “It does. But it also gives you plenty of time to come up with a plan on how you’re going to do it. A plan you’ll be motivated to execute as soon as you get out.”
“It’s not just Landen. It’s Sanderson, too,” I pointed out. “I’m bringing them both down.”
And somehow, somehow, I was going to save Ash, in the process.
“That’s fine,” Benfield said, taking a sip of the aged Scotch he’d poured for both of us. “Sanderson is the puppet master. Take him down, you take his puppet with him. He likes to pretend he’s a dangerous and powerful man. But he’s a man with secrets and secrets are always vulnerabilities.”
“What secrets?” I asked. Other than he was a psychopath. I already knew that one.
Benfield shook his head. “Not sure. There’s just talk around town that something is not right about him. However, given his money, his family background, no one looks too closely. It makes sense why he chose Landen’s daughter to marry.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because she’s got an air of innocence about her. Purity. He’s using that to try to clean himself up. Will it work? Maybe in the short term.”
I had to force the words out.
“Are you going to the wedding?”
It was purported to be a major New York society event. Everyone who worked in high finance had received invitations. Benfield’s had come yesterday. Ash was getting married again in two weeks.
“To watch a young woman sacrifice herself for love? Of course, I’m going. It’s all very dramatic. You go to jail, she gets married. But how is it going to end?”
I looked back to Entwhistle. “That soon? Jail, I mean. Doesn’t this stuff take months to sort out?”
He shook his head. “Only if we drag it out, and there’s no point in waiting. We tell the prosecutors we’re taking the deal. They’ll schedule the court date, which, in all likelihood, will happen in the next week or two. I’ve already put together the list of prison recommendations. Then we’ll offer to surrender to custody as soon as possible.”
Prison recommendations. I dropped my face into my hands. What the fuck had I done? How had this happened to my life? Captain of the State Championship soccer team, top of my class, Princeton early graduate. Summa Cum Laude.
Now, my lawyer, who I couldn’t afford, was compiling prison recommendations.
Because of Ash. Because Ash had been in trouble and I couldn’t not try to save her.
“Fifteen months,” I said quietly.
“Twelve potentially. If you’re a good little boy,” Benfield reminded me. “It’s nothing, Marc. It’s a blip in your life. You’ll be, what, twenty-three, twenty-four when you get out? Then, assuming you can fulfill your part of our agreement, you’ll have my support when you get out.”
I shook my head. My part of the agreement. What he meant was using Ash to get dirt on her father. Now that she was actually going to marry Sanderson, she would probably be in good shape to get dirt on him, as well. A solid plan, only it meant putting her at risk.
“No doubt you’ll begin to resent that she brought you to this end, then start to hate her. By the time they let you out, you’ll be so happy to have what’s left of your life back, you’ll never think about her again.”
I’d thought a lot about Sanderson’s words. About whether I resented Ash. If I could ever grow to hate her. It didn’t make sense. Hating Ash would be like hating my right hand. She was a part of me. An integral piece of the makeup of who I was.
There were times I railed against her. Times I ignored her. Times I fucked her so hard I thought I would never not be deep inside her pussy.
Now, I was going to prison, and she was going to marry a psychopath. For anyone else, it would have sounded like the end of the story. Only, I knew it wasn’t. This was just another thing we both had to get through.
Like her father shipping her off to Switzerland. Had I known, had I listened harder, I might have kept her there despite the cold. At least there she’d been safe. At least then I wouldn’t have gone to work for her father so he could set me up.
There was no point in replaying the past. Nothing could be changed about the decisions we’d made. The only control we had over our lives was what we did going forward.
She would survive Evan. I would survive prison. And then we would go from there.
“Okay. You win. I’ll take the deal.”
Entwhistle nodded, satisfied. Benfield stood and walked over to slap me on the shoulder.
“I know it doesn’t seem like it now, but this will pass,” he said.
I had no choice but to believe him.
Harborview Country Club
Two weeks later
Ashleigh
I stared in the mirror and thought maybe the reflection wasn’t me. Maybe that was someone else in this ridiculous white dress, with her hair slicked into a tight bun, which made my face look slim and waifish.