His Rival Fixed What He Broke novel · Chapter 11 of 24

Chapter 11: Brubaker & Whitcombe

"Put it back," Elias said from the bed.

Margot did not put it back.

She stood at the dresser in his shirt with the silver frame in both hands.

"Brubaker and Whitcombe," she said. "You were partners."

"We were."

"You told me your father died and you weren't there. You said I'd get the other half from someone who wasn't you."

"I did."

"Somebody could have mentioned that you were Otto's partner."

"I said I wouldn't lie to you." He sat up, and the sheet fell to his waist. "I didn't say I'd know where to start."

"Start at the beginning."

He looked at the ceiling again, and then at her.

"We met at twenty-two. We bought a run-down motel in Gary with money from my father's house, and Otto did the books while I did the walls."

"Your father's house?"

"He put it up as security. It was all he had."

"And?"

"We opened a second place, and a third. The first year was good." His voice was flat. "Then the loans came due, and the signature on them was mine."

"You signed them?"

"Not once. Otto signed my name forty-one times and cashed the money out through an account I'd never heard of."

She sat down on the edge of the bed with the frame in her lap.

"The company went under," Elias said. "My father lost the house. He died eight months later in a rented room, and I was in a lawyer's office being told the handwriting was mine."

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