Resume Of Romance

Chapter 14

Chapter 14

Rylie’s adventurous weekend spent with Chace looking for her sister and his brother is at an end.  They went back to Jayson’s loft together on Sunday morning but he still wasn’t there.  Chace found on Jayson’s kitchen counter a notebook containing names of prominent business men, their company addresses and estimated wealth.  Some of the names had asterisks by them.  Neither he nor Rylie knew what the list or asterisks meant.  

Chace took the list then he and Rylie went back to the clinic.  He saw a couple of women leaving it he recognized worked at the Mansion.  One of them looked like she was far along in her pregnancy maybe seven or eight months.  Rylie wanted to go back in but he refused not wanting to take any chances of someone recognizing her from the day before.  They spent the afternoon gathering more information about the adoption agency and clinic afterward Chace took her to lunch at a fabulous restaurant.  He was adamant that she was flying back to Virginia with him they left late Sunday afternoon. 

 It’s Monday, Rylie is continuing her morning routine of getting up extra early it’s becoming routine to her now.  Going to her closet she searches through it for a dress to wear finding another one her Aunt Katie sent her.  Raspberry in color it has a square neckline, falls just above her knees the sleeves are elbow length and it hugs her small waist and curvaceous hips giving her room to walk with its back kick-pleat. 

Walking around barefoot going through the shoes in her closet she looks for a specific pair of grey suede t-strap heels to match.  She eventually wonders down the hall too Monique’s bedroom finding them still in their shoe box in her closet.  Rylie bought them three months ago on a business trip to Seattle she has never worn them.   

Yanking them off the shelf of her sister’s hiding place, she takes one out of the box turning the shoe over checking to see if Monique wore them when something green rolled up in a bundle falls out of the shoe.  Picking it up it’s a wad of cash with a piece of paper wrapped around it and held together with one of the bracelets from the Mansion.  The same kind of bracelet found in Chace’s black box. 

Rylie pulls the other shoe out, it’s empty.  Picking up another shoe box that has another pair of shoes neither of them has worn she finds another balled up wad of bills with another piece of paper round them sealed together by another Mansion bracelet.  Pulling all of the shoe boxes down from the shelf she goes through them finding bales of rolled up cash hiding in each pair.    

She puts the grey shoes on then uses the empty shoe box to put the wads of money into.  Rylie takes the box to her sister’s bed dumping the cash all in the center of it then goes back into the closet to get the rest.  After she gets it all on the bed she notices the bracelets all have similar types of coding on them.  She remembers seeing the same thing on Chace’s bracelets. 

The names written on the papers are some of the same names listed in the notebook Chace found in Jayson’s loft.  It occurs to her the wads of cash she found must be how some of the customers pay the girls.  Sitting on the bed holding her head in her hands she rocks back and forth hoping and praying that what she has found isn’t the payments for all of the men her sister has slept with at the Mansion.  She suspects Jayson knows about the money she doesn’t know if he found out on his own or if Monique told him what she was doing.  

Going into her bedroom she grabs her phone coming back to Monique’s room she uses the calculator on it to add up the amounts written on the pieces of paper.  There’s over one-hundred-fifty thousand dollars laying on her sister’s bed if she believes the amounts written on each slip.