Anastasia’s POV
A week has passed since I was discharged from the hospital. I was still reeling with shock as I recalled touching a lifeless body. My father’s body at that. So many bad events had happened all at once.
Ever since our conversation, I had been pretty sure that even a kid would be able to deduce the heartlessness shown by Blake. He had messaged me twice, the first time being him asking me about the divorce.
And the second seemed like a somewhat persistent demanding response from him. I wondered how someone could have the nerve to walk up to a person and discuss divorce after knowing what they were going through.
I had no time to tell him off the proper way. So I messaged him replying that I wasn’t interested in giving myself a headache because of him and that he could keep the discussion till later.
Mike, my dad’s manager didn’t even make an effort to contact me again after our brief yet agonizing discussion. Which I found strange, but maybe he had felt the need to back off after Sophia had told him off at the hospital earlier when he had dropped the once again heart-wrenching bombshell.
My thoughts kept drifting back to my mom. I wasn’t able to stop thinking about her ever since the whole incident at the hospital. I had to go see her this morning before resuming the activities of the day.
I grabbed my keys from the counter, my mind chastened with worry. I opened the door and slid into the driver’s seat. Revving the car engine, I made my way to my dad’s house.
As I pushed open the door, I made my way to my mom’s room down the hallway. I walked into her room and found the nurse checking up on her vitals.
I came closer and tried talking to her, a slight hope in my voice that she’d respond. Which she didn’t. After a brief moment of silence in the room the nurse finally spoke up.
“Your mom’s doing better, she’s been responding to treatment well so far”. She said, trying to lighten the mood. A pause followed as she spoke.
I sighed, glad that there was nothing serious.
“I am relieved that it didn’t escalate, I hope she will be able to talk to me soon,” I said, confiding in her.
“I was worried that the trauma of my dad’s passing would have a grave impact on her health.”
“Well she’s been traumatized, but you can be glad that everything’s alright.” She said reassuringly in response.
I really wanted to be able to hear her thoughts and unending sermon about how Jesus is everyone’s lord and savior.
“I’ll be in the kitchen if you need me,” she said, excusing herself to leave.
“Ok then, thank you” I smiled, waiting patiently for her to leave so I could have a moment alone, as I sat in deep thoughts.
My parents have always been close. The stereotyped wives of marriage always seem to have a female friend they confide in and gossip with. And for my mom, that friend was my dad, I didn’t have to ask them to know how much they loved each other, it was always evident in their actions.
The love and care between them was so deep that it gave me hope for how the future with whoever was to be with me would turn out. Except it didn’t turn out that way with Blake. It was about to end soon.
After brooding over what could have gone wrong, it was time to head to the office. My dad’s.
———
Stepping out of my car and walking into the office, I felt a dull pain in my chest. The weight of responsibility was on me.
As I walked into the office doors, I almost immediately caught sight of Mike heading towards me. “Mrs Sinclair, Good morning” he greeted trying to set the mood in the office.
“Morning to you too, Mike” I replied curtly.
“I have prepared the records you requested for, it was sent to your mail” he added.
“Alright, I’ll get them checked and get back to you,” I said.
As Mike and I started walking towards the office, I couldn’t help but be in awe as it dawned on me that I really inherited a whole company after being fired as a CFO.
“Miss Anastasia, you got some new mail,” Mike said, his speech seeming like it was meant to bring me back to reality.
I nodded in response, unsure of what to say. I walked over to the plush Eurotech Apollo chair right in front of my dad’s desk. The whole office atmosphere was a testament to his humility and his warm inviting personality.
I lifted my gaze to look at Mike, who well, in his eyes you could tell that he was pained that he was gone as he looked around and if not with caution could seem to start crying. After some time, he seemed to have taken notice of my intense gaze, because he quickly regained his posture, sense of confidence, and professionalism.
“Okay, anything I need to treat urgently” I replied wondering what he had to say.
“Not really, it was posted to Mr. Harry’s office for you some days ago. It seemed more personal,”
Personal? Well, that’s strange, especially now, who could have posted that mail when they could have told me whatever they needed to via text messages or emails? But there was one thing I was sure of, it wasn’t anyone I knew. Besides I wasn’t in the mood for any sort of drama so I told him to keep it aside, for now.
“Alright, thank you,” I said, politely dismissing him.
A few hours later, I started checking the new records I had asked Mike to generate for me. It all felt wrong.
The practices of about 3 months ago were different from these.
“Something seems off about this, it feels like, after this change, the issues of the company started even Dad’s illness started deteriorating around this time too. What was going on?
I reached for the telephone and called Mike into my office. “What’s going on? The logs for April didn’t correspond to the ones in May. Why the new implementation of these charts?”
“Oh, about that, it was finalized and changed by the finance controller with authorization from Mr Harry,” He says.
“My dad finalized this?” I asked, my voice slightly raised,
“Affirmative ma,” he says with confidence.
“Well that’s strange,” I murmured under my breath. “Get me the file of investors that invested during that period,”
” Yes ma,” he says leaving the room.
I walked to the cabinet to get a manual when I noticed a safe. “Has this always been here? How come I never noticed it?” I muttered under my breath. I dropped the manual.