Page 86 of The Attercop

And so it was that she’d reconnected with her son Tyler six months before his thirtieth birthday. At first, he’d been angry with her for abandoning him, but she had lied. She’d told him that she’d been locked away in a mental institution for a long time, and had only recently rejoined society under a new name. She’d also let him know that she had access to money and wanted to help him, but on the condition that he didn’t tell his father that she was alive.

Jasmine had gotten Tyler a job, and Tyler had grown closer to her. He didn’t have many friends. He said he had been ostracised because he was gay. Tyler had told her how he was trying to make his way, but he kept sleeping with co-workers and getting fired. He needed money. He’d also revealed that his father had said that if Tyler didn’t make something of himself by the time he was thirty, he would be cut out of the will. Jasmine had taken note of this fact and arranged for William to have a tragic accident, not long before Tyler’s birthday. Tyler had inherited a lot of money.

Jasmine had loved the fact that she was so many people at once. She was the housekeeper who was discretely pulling strings for Monarch, and at the same time she was secretly keeping a different relationship with her son.

Next, Jasmine had reached out to her daughter. She’d gotten in touch with the minimum-security facility where Julie was being held, and arranged for her to get out of prison.

As she’d done with her son, Jasmine had built a bridge with her daughter, helping her with money and bringing her in on some small tasks for Monarch. Jasmine had told the same lies—that she’d been locked away and was unable to reach out to her children until now. Her daughter had swallowed the story, hook, line and sinker.

Julie had shown promise. She looked much younger than her actual age, and people trusted her easily. She wasn’t book-smart, but she had strong intuition and she was good at conning people.

Jasmine had hoped she could groom her two children into becoming members of the Monarch family that she could be proud of. But things in the past year had gone awry. Declan Hunt and his assistant Charlie had kept nipping at the edge of Monarch’s wings. And last winter, they’d gotten too close. In fact, they’d worked their way right into Simon Griffin’s home. While it was true that their discoveries had helped her ascend to a higher position in Monarch, Jasmine had worried that they would cause her more trouble, and she’d known they had to be disposed of.

She knew that Tyler had an obsession with Declan, and she’d decided that she could use that to her advantage. Julie was happy to do anything for money. And so, Jasmine made a plan with her son and daughter. If they would do her bidding and get rid of Declan and Charlie, then they could sit beside her near the top of the Monarch pyramid. They would all fly away and work some place far from Calgary. Monarch would reward them all forgetting rid of two troublesome investigators that seemed to stir up trouble for the organisation.

At first things had seemed to go well, but the plan had come undone due to Julie’s carelessness. When Jasmine discovered that her private phone had a message on it from Charlie Watts looking for ‘Jules’, she knew the game was up.

Tonight, Jasmine had sent someone to the Monarch Bakery location to watch from a distance. If Tyler and Julie walked out without any indication that the police had caught on, then they could pick up their luggage and join her on the plane. But if there was any sign that the police had uncovered the game, then her children would be left to fend for themselves.

The plane flew westward over the Rocky Mountains. Jasmine, soon to be Samantha, took one last look. She would never see her children again. She would never see the Rockies again. But she would move on, and she would maintain control over her own life. She would build Monarch’s operations in the far east. It was enough. It was her destiny.

Epilogue

Charlie woke up and reached for the other side of the bed expecting to find Declan beside him, but he wasn’t there. Declan was gone. Charlie’s heart raced.Not again!

His moment of panic subsided when he heard someone climbing the stairs to the apartment. Declan appeared with a couple of cups of coffee and a paper bag in his hands.

“Oh, thank god,” Charlie said, flopping back down on the bed.

“Bad dream?”

Charlie nodded.

“We’ve been through a lot, Charlie. It’s going to take a while to get over it, but things will settle down…eventually. If you want, I can set up an appointment with Michael for you. She’s great with trauma cases.”

“So that’s what I’ve become—a trauma case?”

“No,” Declan said. “You’ve just proven that you’re a real live person. Now here,” he said, passing Charlie the bag, “these will help.” Inside were a couple ofpains au chocolatfrom Gwen’s café.

Declan put one coffee on Charlie’s bedside table, then crossed around to the other side. He stripped out of his T-shirt and dropped his jeans.

“Ooh. Shopping commando. I like that,” Charlie said.

Declan climbed into bed and pulled the covers over him. “Hey, scoot over to your side and give me a little bit of room.”

Charlie moved, plumped up his pillows and sat up beside Declan. They sipped their coffees, and in no time Charlie’s chestwas sprinkled with pastry crumbs. He pointed to them and Declan leaned over and cleaned them up with his tongue.

“So,” Charlie started, “not that I’m dwelling on the subject, but do you think they’ll ever find Jasmine?”

Declan took a sip before replying. “It’s hard to say. They’re sure she’s left the country, and she’s obviously smart enough to head somewhere like Indonesia or Vietnam where they can’t be compelled to send her back. Hopefully we won’t have to worry about Jasmine for a while. In the meantime, Interpol’s keeping an eye out for her.”

“What if she uses her Monarch connections to get revenge?”

“Well, for starters, I don’t think we’ll have to be concerned about Tyler and Julie. They’ll be out of circulation for a long time. And with the information Harold Vanstone was able to track down on those other properties where Monarch operated illicit businesses— I think they’ll be too busy to worry about us, for the next little while at least. Without really trying, we managed to put a big dent in organised crime in this city.”

Charlie passed Declan a big chunk of pastry. He absent-mindedly popped it into his mouth.

Charlie stared off into the distance.