Chapter 97

DORIS

The liquor store next to the Italian restaurant had a narrow fake hallway between the two stores. Interestingly enough, there were peek holes in the wall that allowed us to see from the liquor store into the restaurant.

This worked out well for us because Nathan, Arthur, and I all got to peek out and look at Nina while she had dinner with Dr. John and Jeff.

Nina looked absolutely gorgeous, and Dr. John and Jeff were entranced.

We could see Dr. John and Jeff's faces completely and see Nina face in profile. We could hear them clearly thanks to the wire that Nina had stuffed down her bra.

She had plied Dr. John and Jeff with liquor and flirtatious comments throughout dinner, staying clear from any serious topics.

I perked up when she got to the good stuff.

"I can get a job with Arthur's pharmaceutical company as they rebuild," Nina said, "and I bet I could find out any secrets and new formulas they have." She let that offer hang in the air. The implications were like a tempting fruit she didn't specify, but they probably couldn't pass up.

I could see Jeff's facial expression turn skeptical. "And why would you do that?"

Nina raised one eyebrow. She licked her lips in a way that was just slightly sexual. "I don't know for sure how the fire that happened…" It wasn't so much what Nina said but how she said it. Somehow she made it sound like it was a deviously good thing that there had been a fire. "After a fire like that...it could leave room for somebody who's very intelligent," Nina paused dramatically, "to swoop in and make a lot of money."

Nina put one finger on top of Jeff's hand and stroked it, just for a second. "Just think…" Then she looked at Dr. John and repeated that stroking finger move on him. “If you had the right woman on the inside and you managed to get all of Arthur's formulas to market before he did. Instead of a millionaire, we could be billionaires. It's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity."

The guys were silent, but I could see they were thinking about it, and then Nina did something that I thought was brilliant.

"I'm recording everything," she said and tapped her forehead, but didn't say anything about the fact that she was implying that she was recording it in her memory, but she was actually physically recording it.

"Clever," Arthur whispered beside me, so quietly only I could hear.

"John, Jeff, you can count on me," Nina said. “Every word you say, it'll be remembered. It'll be recorded right here," Nina tapped her head again, "and right here." She tapped high up on her chest.

"And that fire," Nina said, her voice filled with admiration. "Think about it. The fact that it was the office, the labs, and the factory. If that was you two, then I know you are the kind of guys who get things done. That's the kind of guys I want to get in…" Nina's voice dropped to the most seductive tone I've ever heard, "get in bed with."

Nina paused dramatically again, "That is, if it was you."

Dr. John said, "It was us. It was actually Jeff's idea."

Jeff looked at Dr. John. "Shut up. We don't know her enough to trust her."

Nina held Jeff's hand. Then she kissed his knuckles. "You can trust me. A woman will do a lot if she can get $1 billion."

"Setting the fire to the drug company to set Arthur back some, that's nothing. I want to get Doris. I want to own her," Jeff said. "And it's not that I care about Doris. I care about destroying Arthur. If you can get me Doris to sweeten the deal, then, yeah, I'm in."

Nina went in for the kill. "OK. Guys who are devious enough to start a fire, steal a girlfriend, steal formulas, ruin a guy's life, and become billionaires by stepping over somebody, I'll be a linchpin on that." Nina paused, the picture of both a femme fatale villain and sexy innocence. "I just have to know who is your person on the inside?"

Jeff's voice went down to a whisper. "That's the part that will absolutely drive Arthur insane when he finds out. It's his pregnant ex-girlfriend, Cathy. I was able to swing her loyalty for a measly hundred thousand dollars."

Jeff laughs evilly, and the sound sends shivers crawling down my spine. "Cathy started the string of events that will put the final nail in Arthur's coffin." Jeff laughs again in a sick, maniacal way.

"Well, boys," Nina said, "here's to the start of a beautiful friendship.”

I knew Nina well enough to know that she was gloating on the inside, even though she looked calm, cool, and collected.

Nina did it, I thought. She's got irrefutable evidence on recording. She even said she was recording it. It'll stand up in court.

Get out of there, Nina, I thought. Get out of there before anything goes wrong.

Just then the bill came. Nina left, and before I knew it, we were all back in the penthouse.

The four of us were high on life from the excitement of Nina's grand adventure.

Ethan had stayed in the penthouse getting a recording of the meal between Nina, Dr. John, and Jeff.

Ethan told us everything went well, and he had forwarded it directly to the police, Ethan took the wire out of Nina's bra.

"Dr. John and Jeff are going to jail," Nathan said firmly. Nathan gave Nina a loud smack on the mouth. "Because of you, two criminals are getting what they deserve. Dr. John will lose his doctor's license, and Jeff will never work again."

Nathan and Nina practically crackled with the sexual tension between them. After a few minutes, they excused themselves, and Arthur and I assumed they were going back to Nathan's place to have sex. Arthur gave me a look that meant he was roaring to do the same. I certainly wasn't going to stop him.

He picked me up and carried me to the bedroom, and I was looking forward to blowing off some steam. I had been worried about Nina and then excited that Dr. John and Jeff would get what they deserved.

Arthur and I had sex. It was fast and furious and then we took a lovely shower together. We finished just before Mia got home with her friend Becky in tow.

"Mommy, Daddy, you won't believe it. I got an award at school!"

"That's great, pumpkin," Arthur said. "What kind of award?"

"I wrote a short essay about how we went to Europe to solve a mystery, and I got an award for best story." Mia took a certificate out of her backpack that said 'best writer in the grade'.

"And I got 2nd place," Becky said, taking out a matching certificate that said 'silver medal award winner'. "I wrote about the good and bad of moving to a new city."

Arthur took Mia's certificate from Mia. "I'm going to put this on the refrigerator," he said, looking appreciatively at the certificate. "Girls, this is great. I'm very proud of you both."

"I am, too," I said. "I bet you worked hard on those essays. I think you picked excellent topics. Becky, I'm sure your parents will also want to hang your certificate."

All in all, it was a very good day. I'm glad the girls had good news to share because then the fact that we were so happy looked like we were excited about their news, and we didn't have to make an excuse about why we were so happy.

The next day, the good news continued. I had given Arthur permission to buy the gift for me about my family tree, and the company that made it had made the large painting scroll of my family tree history. It was beautiful with everybody's names. I was surprised to see that my great-great-grandfather had founded a town in the southern United States that was a haven for people who had been persecuted because of their religion. One of my grandmothers had invented a drug that helped people with skin diseases.

"Look at that," Arthur said.

My mother's mother was a singer who had invented a new way to make recordings.

"This is amazing," Arthur said, "I guess the apple doesn't fall far from the tree. Now we know where you got your singing talent and your desire to help people from."

I had to agree with him. "Arthur, this is one of the best gifts I have ever gotten."

This gift also came with a family medical history and a list of inheritance money that hadn't been collected. When ancestors of mine had money that they hadn't collected, that money would be mine; all I had to do was fill out forms to get it.

Not that I needed money now that I was with Arthur, but having my own money was always good.