Married to the Billionaire Who Betrayed Me novel Chapter 30

Chapter 30 Exposing The Stolen Millions

I pulled the chair out and sat down. The seat cushion was flat and uncomfortable. The computer monitor looked ten years old. It

was perfect.

Eduardo watched me for a moment. He waited for me to complain about the mess. He waited for me to ask for an assistant or a

clearer directive. I gave him nothing. I reached for the first stack of crumpled invoices. I began sorting the paper into chronological

piles.

Eduardo gave a single, approving nod. He turned and walked back into his glass office.

I plunged into the chaos.

The work consumed me. It functioned as a shield against the memories haunting my mind. I forgot the Grand Hawthorne Hotel. I forgot Celeste Whitmore. I forgot the crushing weight of Christopher Winslow’s cruel laughter. I focused entirely on the numbers.

Numbers told no lies. Numbers held no hidden motives.

By noon, I established a system. I bypassed the outdated accounting software installed on the computer. I built a custom spreadsheet using the raw data from the shipping manifests. I tracked every truck leaving the loading bay. I cross-referenced the weight of the outbound cargo with the fuel expenditures logged for each specific route.

The bullpen around me buzzed with idle chatter and ignored ringing phones. The employees took long breaks. They surfed the

internet. They complained about the cold.

I did not move from my chair. I ate half a saltine cracker to keep the nausea at bay. I drank tap water from a paper cup. I typed until

my fingers cramped.

The pattern emerged around three in the afternoon.

I stared at the glowing screen. A cold thrill of victory spiked in my chest. Eduardo was right. The firm was bleeding cash, but the

drivers were not stealing inventory.

A specific set of delivery routes stretching into the northern suburbs showed consistent anomalies. The trucks logged full fuel tanks and maximum cargo weight, yet the invoices from the receiving warehouses reported half-capacity deliveries. The remaining cargo vanished. A ghost company, registered under a vague LLC, billed Valdez Distribution for the missing freight, claiming spoilage and

damage fees.

The floor managers were signing off on fake damage reports. They were siphoning the inventory, selling it on the side, and using a shell company to cover the financial gap.

It was a primitive, sloppy scheme. A mid-level Johnston Group auditor would catch the discrepancy in an hour. But here, buried under disorganized paperwork and lazy management, the scheme worked for months.

I highlighted the irregular routes in red. I printed the spreadsheet and gathered the corresponding falsified invoices. I needed to

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Chapter 30 Exposing The Stolen Millions

show Eduardo the hard proof.

I stood up. My lower back screamed in protest. I placed a hand against my spine, stretching the tight muscles. I gathered the files and walked toward Eduardo’s glass office.

The vertical blinds hung closed, obscuring the interior. The heavy wooden door sat cracked open. A sliver of light spilled onto the concrete floor.

I raised my hand to knock.

Eduardo’s voice drifted through the narrow gap. He spoke on the telephone. His tone lacked the rough, commanding edge he used in

the diner. It sounded low, deliberate, and cautious.

“Yes, I sent you the security still from the hotel lobby,” Eduardo said.

I froze. My knuckles hovered inches from the wood.

“Run the image through the facial recognition database,” Eduardo commanded. “Her name is Minerva. Late twenties. Dark hair. She

carries a scar on her left cheekbone, looks like a fresh laceration. No last name provided.”

The air in the hallway turned to lead. My lungs seized.

He was investigating me.

“She is not a street vagrant, Eduardo continued, his voice a low rumble. She sorted three months of corrupted manifests in six hours. She operates with the precision of a corporate auditor. She understands supply chain optimization better than the men I pay

to run this floor.”

I took a silent step back. The files trembled in my hands.

“A woman with that level of strategic training does not end up shivering in Port Sterling wearing canvas shoes by accident, Eduardo said. The sound of a chair squeaking echoed through the cracked door. “Someone broke her. Someone powerful enough to strip her resources and send her running. I want to know what kind of predator drove her to my doorstep.”

My heart hammered a frantic, terrifying rhythm against my ribs.

He hired a private investigator. He wanted my history. He wanted my secrets.

“Start with the major conglomerates in the capital,” Eduardo instructed the voice on the other end of the line. “Cross-reference her first name with any recent executive terminations. Check the shipping firms. Check the banks. And check the Johnston Group. They dominate the trade routes she seems so familiar with.”

The Johnston Group.

He spoke the name. He pointed his investigator directly at the center of the blast zone.

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Chapter 30 Exposing The Stolen Millions

If the investigator searched the Johnston Group network for a woman named Minerva, the corporate espionage press release would

flood his screen in seconds. Eduardo would not see a brilliant strategist. He would see the face of a convicted thief. He would see

the articles branding me a desperate, unhinged mistress who tried to steal proprietary data from a billionaire. He would see the

exact same lies Christopher Winslow saw.

Eduardo hated thieves. He hired me to root out the corruption in his own company. If he believed the Johnston narrative, he would

throw me out onto the street before the sun set.

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