Chapter 56 : The Truth Uncovered Part 1

The air was thick with the tension that filled them both. They still stood facing each other, looking at each other as if contemplating their own thoughts.

Aishleen felt the storm inside of her calm down, drop by drop, after she let the words come out of her lips. She finally let some of her secrets surface. Meanwhile, Keenan looked more and more tense. The wrinkles on his face became more obvious. The careful gaze he had once had was now replaced by a look of shock, and his eyes were wide open.

He opened his mouth to speak, but stopped himself. He turned his face away for a moment, trying to process all the information. He wanted to make sure he actually heard the words coming out of his wife's mouth. He closed his eyes for a moment and took a deep breath to calm his shock. Moments later, he licked his lips before finally looking back into her eyes and asking, "You know?"

His tone was filled with admiration and a hint of confusion. Annoyance also seemed to be implied by the furrow in his brow.

Aishleen remained silent, not giving an immediate answer. This made Keenan even more curious and he asked again, "What do you mean? How did all this happen?"

With a long sigh, Aishleen let her mind drift back to when she discovered the dark secret that had been hidden from her, and she told him everything. "I found some discrepancies in the data I got from Darrel's files after he died. At first I thought it was a system error, or maybe a report that wasn't integrated with the main data. So I didn't think much of it. But then—"

She bit her lip, showing frustration. "Then I started to suspect something and checked everything more thoroughly. I compared all the data manually, even looked at every production and sales breakdown for the past year, even the data from before I joined the company. And that's when I found it—"

There was no need to say it out loud. Perhaps the look in her eyes said it all as her husband expressed his conviction.

"You found out that Darrel changed the data himself."

"Yes," her voice began to shake. "And that he stole money from—" *My father.*

Anger crept up on Aishleen. She imagined how proud her father had been when Darrel had announced their engagement. How her father had always been so passionate about the future of the company, with Darrel's involvement in every plan. But now Aishleen realized that it was all just Darrel's way of distracting her, of keeping her from discovering the secret he was hiding so deeply—a secret that would keep her from ever coming out.

"What about the order—how did you know he was sent to take your life?" Keenan asked her more calmly. His hands went into his pockets and he refrained from rushing to embrace the woman. He felt confused as to what to do in the face of everything his wife had told him. He was unsure if he should be angry at Aishleen—or at himself for taking so long to find out everything—or if he should try to calm her down, seeing so much pain on Aishleen's face as they stood in the same room.

So he decided to wait, giving himself time to listen for more information that Aishleen would share.

"Liliana, his sister, gave me the keys and access to his apartment right after our engagement party, and—" She clasped her hands and chin, letting the memories flow through her mind. She thought back to the night when she first walked into Darrel's apartment and home office and noticed that everything seemed untouched. The place was so clean—too clean, almost as if someone had come before and meticulously cleaned everything. But she felt the need to make sure the place was safe before she actually used it. Aishleen changed the locks, installed some security cameras, and spent days and nights checking every nook and cranny of the place to make sure there were no hidden wires or recording devices.

And that is where she found the secret compartment hidden in his bedroom.

"That's where I found it. Different types of weapons, devices I didn't recognize, and so many files that were foreign to me. But what caught my attention the most was one folder among them. It helped me to understand it all."

"What's in that folder?" Keenan asked Aishleen.

"It was about me," Aishleen exclaimed, her voice shaking. She took a deep breath to calm herself. Saying it out loud would only make it more real, that it wasn't just something in her head. And even though this revelation came on the same day she learned all of Darrel's secrets and hidden intentions, hearing herself say it still hurt just as much as when she first realized the truth.

"All the data about me. Copies of my birth certificate, medical records from the hospital where I was treated, records from school and university-including copies of every achievement report I've had over the years. Everything that shows how he has studied me over the years."

Aishleen paused for a moment before reaching the most poignant part of the story, "And there were photographs of me. One of them was marked, with a note about how it should—" Her words were cut short by her own tears as the pain in her chest grew as the truth was revealed, "-should have taken my life, in other words, killed me."

Keenan paused, giving himself time to process everything in silence. He gasped briefly and then, when she remained silent, he finally spoke in a choked voice, "Is there any information about the people who sent him?"

"No, not at all. Not even fingerprints other than Darrel's have been found," his body stiffened as he heard his wife's last words.

"Fingerprints?" he frowned and bit his lip impatiently.

"How far did you dig for them? How did you manage to—"

"I have my own way, Keenan. So do you," she cut him off firmly.

He sighed. "Who do you think is behind this?" Aishleen took a deep breath, but her words caught in her throat as she answered, "Everyone."

"Who do you mean by *'everyone'*?" He asked, his eyes narrowing sharply.

"Everyone in the company, all customers, partners, competitors, my father, and even you," she replied without hesitation.

"Me? Am I part of this vendetta?" His voice sounded lower as he spoke with a sullen expression. "Is that why you agreed to this contract?"

She paused, unable to stop her words from coming out before she could stop them. "Part of it is."

He bit his lip. In fact, he was not the only one who was surprised by this answer. "Is that why you agreed to your mother's plan?"

"I never said I completely agreed with it, Ken." Once again Aishleen's words came out without her realizing it, this time her voice was softer.

Keenan let out a long breath, his hand rubbing his face to remove the wrinkles from his forehead and to ease the headache that was appearing. He tried to control his anger as much as possible as his patience was running out.

"Then I want you to explain it to me. What did your mother really want?" He raised his face to look at her, his hands in his pockets. "What is she going to do?"

"I don't know—"