Chapter 223: Rotten Candidate

A reluctant smile crept across her face.

"That’s my first fight ever."

"That wasn’t a fight. That was a beatdown." Dorian moved toward her and reached out.

Naomi immediately grabbed one of the pillows from the stripped bed and shoved it between them like a barrier. "Shower!"

"Seriously? Babe..." He sighed. "Drama queen." Dorian shook his head and started unbuttoning his shirt. "Fine."

"I need to check something in the office." Naomi gathered the sheets she had stripped from the bed and headed out. She carried everything downstairs, dumped the bedding into the laundry bin and then hurried toward the office. She reached behind her and pulled out the flash drive as she moved.

She entered the office, switched on the computer and inserted the drive.

The files loaded.

Naomi leaned closer. She clicked the first folder.

Then another. And another.

A couple of minutes later, she sat frozen in front of the screen.

Naomi stared at the information in front of her, hardly believing how far the woman had been willing to go.

How long had this been happening?

Dorian walked in, freshly showered, his hair still slightly damp. He had changed clothes too. He looked preoccupied. "Hey, babe." He walked farther into the room. "I was just going through the SVR system. Camille’s car profile was added two weeks ago. How is that possible? I didn’t add it, and I sure as hell know you didn’t."

"I think I know who did." Naomi turned the monitor so Dorian could see the screen properly.

He stepped closer. "What is it?"

"I found the flash drive in her bag." Naomi pointed toward the folders she had already opened. "Everything about your daily schedule is on here. Your meetings, court times and dates, the loan documents I gave you... everything."

He reached for the mouse and started clicking through the files himself.

With every file he opened, his eyes grew colder.

Naomi watched the transformation happen beside her.

His shoulders locked, his jaw hardened and the fury building inside him became visible.

By the time he reached another folder containing information that should never have left his office, his blood was boiling.

"I know who did this."

Naomi nodded. "Yeah, me too. Fake Adrian." She folded her arms. "She must have added Camille’s car to the SVR the day she brought your car home from the office."

That made sense.

Mara had access to his office, his schedule and enough of his administrative systems to move through his life without attracting immediate attention. She had also had the perfect opportunity to add Camille’s vehicle when she returned Dorian’s car.

Dorian stared at the screen again.

She had been feeding Camille information directly from inside Heathcliffe & Associates.

"Good job, babe."

Naomi smiled proudly.

Good thing she had taken the flash drive. Technically, stealing evidence out of another woman’s handbag probably wasn’t going to earn her any awards for ethical conduct, but after the evening they had just survived, Naomi was comfortable living with that.

"What do you think she wants with my loan documents?"

Dorian leaned against the desk, thinking. "Probably digging for dirt."

"Does fake Adrian know about the contract?"

"No." Dorian answered immediately.

He was certain.

The contract had never been information Mara should have had access to, and Dorian had been far too careful with something that private to leave it lying around in ordinary office files.

At least that was one thing Camille had not gotten from inside his firm.

Dorian pulled his attention away from the monitor. "You head on and get some rest. I need to put some things in place before morning."

That tone usually meant somebody’s life was about to become extremely unpleasant.

"Okay." She got to her feet.

Dorian removed the flash drive from the computer and kept it with him.

They walked out of the office together, and as Naomi passed him, Dorian bent and pressed a kiss to her hair.

He wanted to remind her that he was still very aware of her.

Naomi continued toward their bedroom.

Dorian headed into his own office next door. His mind started racing backward.

The hiring process. Something about it no longer sat right.

He had interviewed dozens of candidates for that position.

Yet somehow, out of all those candidates, he had chosen Mara. The one person apparently feeding information to Camille.

Dorian sat slowly behind his desk.

Someone had made sure she would be hired. But how? That was the part that bothered him.

Dorian trusted his instincts when it came to people. They weren’t perfect, but they were rarely this wrong. He had interviewed dozens of candidates for that position and still ended up picking the rotten one.

That was unusual of him.

Mara had been the most capable.

No, that wasn’t quite right.

She hadn’t simply been the most capable candidate. She had been the only capable candidate.

Out of dozens of applications and interviews, somehow every other person had fallen short in one obvious way or another.

Then there had been Mara. Exactly what he had needed. At the time, choosing her had seemed obvious.

Now it felt engineered. The pieces began arranging themselves in his head. Someone must have screened the hiring process before he ever got to it.

If the strongest candidates had been filtered out before they reached him, if weaker applicants had somehow been pushed forward alongside Mara, then Dorian hadn’t truly been making a choice at all.

He had been guided toward one.

Manipulated into making the wrong decision while believing it was entirely his own.

He was absolutely sure he knew who would be arrogant enough to pull something like that.

Considering Alistair’s track record, Dorian was beginning to wonder whether the man was screwing his third wife too.

At this point, nothing would surprise him. All of this remained in Dorian’s head while he quietly made arrangements for Mara to be held the moment she entered the building in the morning.

He didn’t have proof yet.

Maybe, just maybe, this was finally what he needed to kick Alistair off the board.

"Dorian?"