Bad Deeds (Dirty Money #3)
Lisa Renee Jones
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Dear Readers,
I am thrilled to finally be able to share Bad Deeds with you. If you haven’t read Hard Rules and Damage Control, you need to before you delve into Bad Deeds, as we are going to be starting our story the moment after Damage Control ends. Also, please don’t read on, as I’m going to not-so-quickly recap Damage Control.
We started Damage Control by finally getting the details on Emily’s identity and her big secret … that she was a witness to her brother, Rick, (who is MIA) killing her stepfather. Both of whom we found were part of an elite and very dangerous hacker group, the Geminis. Shane and Emily both see that their lives are too dangerous and hesitate to bring each other deeper into the twisted webs of deceit, murder, and threats. But when Emily ran, Shane couldn’t let her go. He needed to know she was safe, and he needed her. Needed her warmth and her in his arms where he’s come to know that she belongs.
As Seth (Shane’s right-hand man) and Shane try to discover just how much danger Emily is really in and try to clean up the shoddy mess her brother created of her fake background, more complications arise with the Martina cartel, which Brandon Enterprises has gotten into bed with. As a reminder: Shane’s older brother, Derek, had agreed to let the cartel run cocaine through the Brandon Enterprises trucking division and a new performance-enhancing drug (Sub-Zero) through Brandon Pharmaceuticals, the last of which led to Brody Matthews’s (Major League ball player who was using the drug) wife threatening to out the drug. Adrian, the son of the cartel leader, confronts Shane. He tries to force Shane’s hand into bringing Brandon Pharmaceuticals fully into business with the Martina cartel. Which Shane continues to resist. Enter Nick Snyder, known by Seth from their CIA/FBI days. He’s brought in to help Shane and Seth extricate the Martina cartel from any and all involvement in Brandon Enterprises. Together they set up a fake FBI raid on Brandon Pharmaceuticals to spook Martina and agree that Shane needs to meet with Brody Matthews to find out more about the drugs. However, before Shane can meet with Brody, he dies suspiciously in a car accident followed shortly by his wife’s suicide. Playing dumb about the FBI raid, Shane visits Adrian, and finds Derek with him. When Shane tells Adrian about the feds and shows him a picture of Derek paying off an FBI agent, Adrian stabs a knife through Derek’s hand and tells Shane to either find another route for his drugs or he’s staying infiltrated in BP and won’t be going anywhere.
Meanwhile, Emily has a very uncomfortable yet revealing lunch with Shane’s mother in which she uncovers that Maggie is having an affair with Mike Rogers, a sports team owner and stockholder in Brandon Enterprises, and the worried-about swing vote when it comes to vote either Shane or Derek in to replace Brandon Senior when he can no longer operate the company. Shane and his father conspire to buy the sports center that Mike’s team currently operates out of, which they would then use to control Mike’s vote on the board.
At this point, Shane finally comes clean with Emily about everything. But she doesn’t run like he expects her to. She decides the way out is to build an incorruptible division of Brandon Enterprises, and she comes up with a fashion and makeup line, which Shane thinks is an amazingly brilliant idea, and he wants Emily to head up the division herself.
Shane and Emily later head to dinner at his parents’ house, which leads to the news of an experimental drug trial in Germany for his father’s cancer, leading to more tension between Derek and Shane as one of them will be running the company in his absence. Derek throws out a threat to Emily, at which time Brandon Senior reveals that Emily is protected by his order, causing an even greater rift between Derek and Shane. Emily has overheard yet another threat to her from Derek and can’t see a way out for her and Shane. As they stand outside his parents’ house he promises to lay down his own life to protect her … and that spot is exactly the moment we pick up with.
I hope you enjoy Bad Deeds, and thank you so much for all the love and excitement you’ve shown the Dirty Money series!
Lisa
XOXO
CAST OF CHARACTERS
Emily Stevens (27)—Heroine in the series. She is Brandon Senior’s newly appointed secretary. Learned after landing her new job that the one-night stand she had the night before turns out to be her boss’s son Shane Brandon. Emily has secrets and she’s running. But Shane will not let her run from him. During Hard Rules, the two had a lot of push and pull about their relationship, his family, and her secrets.
Shane Brandon (32)—Hero of the series. Shane Brandon is the only one with a moral compass in his family. The good one. The one willing to risk everything to play this game on the up-and-up and keep his brother from ruining the family empire, Brandon Enterprises, by getting in bed with the Martina family drug cartel. But Shane is treading on thin ice as he brings his legacy back from the brink of corruption. He is also dealing with Emily Stevens. A woman who breaks through his defenses and brings an innocence to his life that he can’t have as a distraction. He wants and needs to protect her, possess her, and be worthy of her. She is already making him a better man and keeping him grounded. But she has secrets, and she could be the one to ultimately send his world crumbling harder than he ever anticipated.
Derek Brandon (37)—The older brother. While he’s brilliant and good-looking, his greed for power drives him to make rash decisions. He and Shane were close as kids, but once they became adults and Shane joined Brandon Enterprises, that shifted. Everything became about who would control the empire. Derek has gotten the family corporation into bed with the Martina drug cartel, and Shane will do everything in his power to stop his brother.
Maggie Brandon—Shane and Derek’s mother. Seemingly befriending Emily, yet we are uncertain about her ultimate motives concerning the current struggle between her sons for control over Brandon Enterprises. Married to David Brandon (Brandon Senior). Maggie is having an affair with Mike Rogers, a shareholder in Brandon Enterprises.
David Brandon—The head of Brandon Enterprises and the Brandon family. Father to Derek and Shane. Husband to Maggie. He is dying of cancer but wants to leave a legacy and hold on to control of Brandon Enterprises as long as possible. He’s a bastard and pushes Shane and Derek in all the wrong ways. He is gruff, cold, and hard at every turn. He enjoys watching his sons battle for power. It entertains him.