Unraveling an Enigma Read online

  “First, Isaac saw us together at Destiny Records. Now, he’ll see me walking into your apartment.”

  “You think he’ll react?”

  “I’m not assuming anything, Izzy; he will react. It just may not be in a way either of us are prepared for. He’s naturally dominant, but when it comes to you, he’s beyond saving. I’ll come up if you want me to, but you need to make sure that’s a step you want to take.”

  I take a moment to contemplate. I want Isaac to interact with me, but not because he’s coerced to. I want him to talk to me because he wants to, not because he's banging his chest in an alpha male turf war.

  I return my gaze to Hugo, who’s watching me intently. “Thanks for the lift.”

  He dips his chin, only just hiding his smile. “If you need anything, you have my number.”

  “Thanks, Hugo.” I press a kiss to his cheek before curling out of his car. My backside is halfway out when a question I should have asked at the beginning formulates in my head. “Do you know why Isaac was arrested?”

  He shakes his head. “I figured if anyone would know, it’d be you.”

  “I'm as clueless as the rest of us.”

  With a shrug, I exit his car and make my way to my building. Hugo waits until I'm in the lobby before pulling his car away from the curb. His engine is so loud, I can hear it even when he's halfway down the block. While exiting the elevator on my floor, I ruffle through my handbag hunting for my keys. When I lift my gaze, a squeal erupts from my lips. Agent Theresa Veneto startles me from stepping out of the nook in the entryway of my apartment.

  I skirt past her and walk to my door. “I'm not talking to you without a lawyer present.”

  Fiddling with my keys, I fight them into the lock. My hands are jittering so badly, I can’t get the darn key into the small hole.

  “I’m not here on official business.” Theresa’s whole composure is pretentious and mocking. “I'm here to talk to you, woman to woman.”

  Ignoring her no-doubt lie, I jam my keys into the lock, sighing when the lock mechanism clicks in the uncomfortable silence of my hallway.

  “Isaac Holt isn’t who you think he is.”

  My slitted eyes snap to hers. “No, he isn’t who you think he is.” I turn to face her, standing eye to eye. “Isaac’s file leads you to believe he's a terrible man, but when you look past the highly fabricated documents, you'll see he isn’t close to that.”

  She grins an evilly mocking smile. “I heard you were stupid, but I didn’t realize you were also naïve. You're swimming way out of your depth, little girl.”

  I plaster my best fake smile onto my face, striving to portray that her words didn’t bruise my ego. They did, but I’d rather she didn’t know that. After returning her mocking stare, I walk through my apartment door, closing it behind me.

  “Isaac attacked his last girlfriend's brother so horrifically, he spent weeks in the hospital, recovering from the multiple injuries he sustained.”

  That halts my swift movements. The pulse beeping through my body is nearly deafening when it clusters in my ears. I had to hear her wrong—surely. Isaac isn’t a violent man. He’s just misunderstood. Isn’t he?

  Sensing that my reluctance is slipping, Theresa pushes open my door, then steps inside my domain. Her lips twitch, preparing to talk, but I beat her. “CJ was in a traffic accident with his sister, Ophelia.”

  As her lips crimp, she shakes her head. “CJ’s injuries were not sustained in a traffic accident. Isaac inflicted them.”

  “I don’t believe you.” I’m not lying. Our exchange earlier today reveals she’s out for blood, meaning she’ll do or say anything to get her target. I’m not falling into her trap.

  She smirks again. It’s a mocking, condescending smile like the one she gave me earlier today in the conference room. “I thought you might say that.” She digs a yellow envelope out of her handbag, then hands it to me. “As I said earlier, I'm here warning you, woman to woman. What I'm about to show you must stay between us. This isn’t an official visit.”

  After swallowing to soothe my dry throat, I nod. She’s not the only one willing to lie if it gives her the upper hand. My hand trembles when I pull out the paper inside the envelope. I’m not concerned Theresa has anything incriminating on either Isaac or me, but it’s from spotting the date and time on the bottom right-hand corner of the photo inside. It's dated an hour before Ophelia’s traffic accident.

  I suck in a deep breath to get over my shock before studying the photo with the eyes of an agent. Isaac’s sweat-drenched body is in the middle of a boxing ring. He's fighting a gentleman of similar age, or perhaps a few years older than him. It looks like a brutal battle, although most of the damage has been endured by Isaac’s competitor, who happens to look oddly familiar to CJ Petretti.

  Although things look damning, I’m not willing to pass judgment until I know all the facts. “The Bureau is aware Isaac was a participant in an underground fighting ring years ago. This doesn't make him a terrible man. Fighting is a professional sport.”

  “No, it doesn’t make him terrible, but what about this?”

  She hands me a second photo. It's similar to the first one, but it's zoomed out, showing the spectators surrounding the ring—the most imperative, Ophelia. She’s standing at the side with tear-stained cheeks and wide eyes. The devastation on her face twists my insides. She's much braver than me as there's no way I could watch my boyfriend fight my brother.

  Before I can work through half my confusion, Theresa snatches the photo from my grasp, returns it to the envelope, then snags her cell phone from her handbag. Her fingers fly over the screen of her phone for three heart-thrashing seconds before she pivots it around to face me. There’s a video displayed. It shows Ophelia being held back by a large brute of a man. She’s crying.

  “Please, Isaac, stop.” She somehow manages to get away from the man holding her hostage, her escape conceding with her climbing through the ropes. “Please, Isaac, don’t do it. I’m begging you.”

  My hand shoots up to cover my mouth when the screen flicks to Isaac in just enough time to witness him complete a gruesome roundhouse kick to CJ’s left temple. CJ crashes to the ground with an almighty thud, his eyes closed, his body lifeless. Tears well in my eyes when Ophelia screams a bloodcurdling cry before she rushes to her brother sprawled lifeless on the dirty mat where she tries in vain to wake him up.

  When the video freezes at her staring down at her lifeless-looking brother, I push Theresa’s phone away from me. “That doesn’t show the full version of events that happened that day.”

  The evidence looks horrid, and my heart is pained for what Ophelia went through, but you need both sides of a story before forming an opinion. Theresa’s video doesn’t give me that. It’s as one-sided as she was during my interrogation earlier today.

  Theresa glares at me like I'm an imbecile. “I may not know the full story, Isabelle, but neither do you. You think you know the real Isaac Holt, but you don't know him at all…”

  Her words fall short when I slam my door into her face while murmuring, “That's why he's an enigma. He's supposed to be misunderstood.”

  Chapter 9

  Isaac

  My breaths are jagged, my body is slick with sweat, and my heart is pounding against my chest. The perspiration and panted breaths are from the intense workout I’m currently undertaking at an old, derelict warehouse I own on the outskirts of town. The last statement, my pounding heart, is from seeing Isabelle again.

  Today is the first time I’ve laid eyes on her since my less-than-stellar reaction to her arrival at my home Friday night, but she's the reason I’m working out in freezing temperatures in only a pair of running shorts. I’m aimlessly trying to replace the sexual energy coursing through my body with adrenaline because even knowing her secret didn’t dampen the fire that raged inside me when I saw her. It will never be doused. It’s irrepressible. My hands itched to fondle, probe, and explore her seductive body when I saw her in the f
oyer of Destiny Records. Her beautiful chocolate eyes were burning through to my soul, begging for forgiveness.

  It took all my strength to walk away from her. Every step I took was taken with trepidation. With all the women I’ve bedded the last six years, the chase grew weary, my interests waned within days, if not hours. That never happened with Isabelle. It never grew old. The more I had her, the more I craved her. Her beautiful cupid’s bow lip on mine, her hands touching and exploring me with as much interest as I studied her. I couldn’t get enough. I never yearned for anything or anyone when Isabelle was in my arms. Now, I have to find a way to move on—to live without her.

  Just knowing I’ll never taste her again has me swinging my fists harder at the bag hanging precariously from a steel beam by a large chain. Blisters started forming on my knuckles over an hour ago, but my swings haven’t dampened. When I entered the warehouse, I threw on a new pair of gloves. I could have forgone the hassle and worn my run-down pair hanging over the fraying ropes of the boxing ring, but I needed a distraction, and I wanted to feel the pain that comes from breaking in brand new gloves. If I feel pain on the outside, it may lessen the ache I’m feeling on the inside.

  Another thirty minutes pass before my focus shifts from punishing the bag. My distraction is caused by a cell phone shrilling through the abandoned warehouse. It isn’t my sleek, modern phone stopping the swing of my fists. It is the one that only rings during an emergency.

  After grabbing a white towel dangling from the chain above the sagging bag, I swipe it over my head to absorb the sweat running down my face while heading for my gym bag lying unzipped on the dirty concrete floor. My burner cell hasn’t rung since the morning I got arrested. The last call I took on that phone was in Isabelle’s apartment. She was sitting straddled on my lap, nibbling on my earlobe. I was so immersed in her, I didn’t consider the repercussions of continuing my conversation in front of her. Call me a fool, but even only knowing her for six months and being in a relationship for a month, I trusted her. I trusted her from the moment I saw her.

  I was a fucking idiot.

  “Yes,” I bark into the phone, my gloomy mood heard in my voice.

  “The price has gone up to one point five million dollars.”

  My grip on my phone tightens. “I told you I didn’t care about the price. I want it done, so get it fucking done.”

  My caller breathes heavily down the phone. “All right. I should have an answer by the end of the week.”

  Not bothering to reply, I snap down the screen of my phone. A ragged breath escapes my lips when my eyes wander around the warehouse. My muscles are deliriously exhausted, which has dampened the fire roaring through my veins, giving the effect I was striving for when I arrived hours ago, but something is still off. I don’t feel myself.

  Being betrayed does that to a guy.

  When I dump my unregistered cell back into my gym bag, I notice I only have an hour before my reservation with Cormack, meaning I’ll have to shower in the locker rooms instead of driving back to my apartment. I could go home, but I haven’t been back there since it was trashed by the Bureau. Catherine organized a cleaning crew to come in the following day, and all the furniture and broken items have been replaced, but I can’t bring myself to go back there. It was my private oasis, my home, but now it feels like an empty shell.

  After stripping off my shorts, I step into the steaming hot shower. The scorching water pumping out of the mildew-coated showerhead kneads and massages my weary muscles. Closing my eyes, I flatten my palms on the dirty, mold-covered tiles before lowering my head into the stream of water. The pressure gives relief to the headache that’s been plaguing me for the past three days.

  I generally survive on approximately four to six hours of sleep a night, but even that amount has eluded me the past few nights. My hands instinctively dart out to pull Isabelle toward me, then when my hands come up empty, the complexity of the situation dawns on me, and my endeavor for additional sleep is lost.

  Climbing out of the shower, I dry myself with a white gym towel I have in my bag. Its material is so stiff, it scratches my skin when I run it over my body. It reminds me how Isabelle’s nails raked my back when she's in ecstasy, or how she clawed at my thighs while sucking my cock.

  Ignoring the erection I’m now sporting, I place on the suit I was wearing when I arrived, but forgo my vest, tie, and jacket. My body is still overheated from the intense workout, so I don’t want to be constrained by a tie. I also don’t want more uncomfortableness added to the choking feeling that’s been clutching my throat since my arrest.

  After snagging my bag off the ground, I make my way to my car, where I make the usually forty-five-minute trip to Ravenshoe in under thirty.

  The restaurant hostess’s lips curve into a lusty grin when she notices me heading her way. “Good evening, Mr. Holt.”

  “April.”

  I continue on my quest, not bothering to wait for her to usher me to the booth Cormack and I frequented every week for the past five years. Our routine only faltered because Isabelle was in the picture. Although I was more than happy to make things official, I couldn’t risk taking her out in public for fear Col would see us together.

  This restaurant charges exorbitant prices for the most minuscule portions of food, but the whiskey is top-shelf, and its cigars are unsurpassed. I wouldn’t expect anything less from its owner. Our tradition of eating here started a few months after I earned my first million dollars. I invested every cent I made fighting heavily into stocks. Some weeks, I made seven thousand dollars fighting, but I lived as if I were a poor student who didn’t have a penny to my name. I kept my grades up, so my scholarship remained valid and ate ramen noodles and canned spaghetti for supper like every other student around me. No one, except Cormack, knew my bank account was growing at a rapid pace.

  With how turbulent the stock market was, it took a little longer than I would have liked for my bank account to show its first million-dollar balance, but once it was there for all to see, the achievement was incalculable, and we had reason to celebrate.

  When Cormack and I first burst through the doors of this very restaurant, we were only young. I was just shy of my twentieth birthday, and Cormack was only twenty-one. We dressed in what we thought was respectable clothing, both wearing long-sleeve dress shirts and black trousers. We even rustled up two ties from the clothing Cormack grabbed in haste when he left his family estate with the intention never to return.

  The restaurant manager took one look at us, then attempted to have us thrown out. I say attempt as I didn’t take his rejection sitting down. After scuffling with two security guards, and leaving one with a broken nose, I told the manager that I intended to buy the restaurant and fire his ass on the very first day I owned it.

  I did precisely that eleven months later.

  My hunger for success was embedded in me from a very young age. When I was four, I was diagnosed with an aggressive form of Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. My only chance of survival weighed on extensive chemotherapy combined with a stem cell transplant. My parents were tested, and neither was found to be a genetic match, which isn’t unusual. Most genetic matches only occur in siblings, and those odds sit at only one in four. Luckily for me, Nick was a perfect match. That may have had something to do with the fact he was conceived in a test tube to save my life.

  With a high dosage of chemotherapy and the stem cells from Nick’s umbilical cord when he was delivered eight weeks early, I survived, and my fighting spirit was unleashed.

  People say childhood memories are configured from stories you were told while growing up. Mine aren’t. I remember I felt invincible when Nick’s stem cells were transplanted. I knew at that precise moment I was going to live, and I promised myself to live my life to the fullest. I also assured my baby brother that one day I'd repay him for giving me the gift of life. Every day I actively pursue that promise.

  Nick is apprehensive to accept my generosity. His reluctance is spawned from watching
our mother be a mooch a majority of his life. My parents were already separated before Nick joined our family. He glued them together for a couple more years, but like all glue, it eventually dried, and their marriage failed. My mother wanted possessions. My father wanted love. It’s very rare to achieve both.

  After sliding into the booth Cormack is already seated at, I greet him with a jerk of my chin before signaling for the waiter to bring us our whiskey and cigars.

  “Izz—”

  I cut off Cormack’s comment with a stern glare. “Can I at least get a glass of whiskey before you mention her name?”

  Cormack is my one and only true friend. Most people I associate with are acquaintances, business companions, or staff, but I class him as my friend—a very dear friend—but even he's treading a fine line by mentioning her name to me. After I was arrested, I banned Isabelle’s name from being mentioned. Not once has my demand been met.

  Cormack chuckles, not the slightest bit fazed by my infuriating glance. “You might want to ask them to leave the bottle as I plan on mentioning her name more than once.”

  Chapter 10

  Isaac

  “Hey, boss, I’m surprised you're still here.” Tina prances into my office before propping her backside onto my desk. “You haven’t stayed back this late for weeks.”

  She’s not lying. Before Isabelle, my nights were spent in my office, watching the sales roll in. Thousands of transactions are made each night in my clubs, yet not one patron bats an eyelid at the inflated prices I charge. They’re willing to pay for the privilege of drinking in an establishment as sophisticated as mine. The Dungeon is my greatest business achievement thus far. It’s an over-eighteen dance club that grew to the number one dance club this side of the country within two months of opening. It was designed with sex and sensuality in mind. That old saying will never die. Sex does sell, and I use it in my business adventures at every given opportunity.