‘Five years, Zara, five fucking years you were locked up. Seriously, neither the Regans nor the Lanigans sussed out that it was your own brother who’d betrayed you. Well, whether you like it or not, you need to face facts because if it was Mike Regan who had gone missing, you would have found him, wouldn’t you? I mean, your own brother was pushed out of the business, but there he was, living in this mansion of a house, and no one thought to look at him. Seriously, if I’d been searching for you, this home is the first place I would have come to, and Ismail would have been at the top of my list of suspects.’

Unexpectedly, Zara burst into tears. He had just verbalized so succinctly all those haunting thoughts she assumed she’d buried many years ago. After all that time spent locked away and hidden in the basement, she’d struggled to understand why the Lanigans hadn’t properly checked out her brother. Of course, she would have. He would have been in for a fortune eventually. Izzy had passed the business over to her and virtually ignored Ismail in the will; it was common knowledge and not a decision that everyone in her Jewish community felt was fair.

‘Hey, come on,’ whispered Victor, as he put his arms around her and pulled her close. ‘You’ve been through a lot, and it’s okay to cry, but you have to be objective. The Lanigans have always had a reputation, and I, for the life of me, couldn’t understand why they’d still put money into your accounts when you were off the scene and presumed dead.’

She stopped crying and wiped her nose with her sleeve before she pulled away from him. ‘Well, that goes to show they cared and lived in hope. Surely, that’s not the hallmark of a traitor, is it?’

A wicked, sarcastic grin appeared on his face. ‘Stop being naive, Zara. From everything you’ve told me lately, I can look at things as an outsider. They told you they put fifty per cent of everything into your account but how the hell do you know it was? You need to face facts. You’re worth a lot of money. Certainly, you can buy your muscle, you even own enough businesses to run the manor. But there are other firms out there ready to wipe you out. And another thought. Do you seriously think the Lanigans, who, I admit, are a strong firm, will have you running their operations? Ask yourself why they would? And if you think it’s because you’re friends, then think how your father would respond to that statement. There are no friends in business, and that goes for the Regans too. Things are not adding up, and the question is, are the Regans involved with this new drug?’