Morris tried to focus his attention on the blinking laptop in front of him but it was not working. His mind kept on wandering over to the mission he had sent Raymond to handle.
Did it turn out successful? Had he been able to get a hold of the detective lady? This was the only way he could gain total control of the situation. If he acted slow or made any mistake right now, he would pay for it. And if Raymond failed in this mission to capture Sophia, it would become harder to ever capture her. She would become more careful and observant.
Morris released a long sigh of deep frustration and pressed a few buttons, shutting down his laptop. He needed some fresh air, the oxygen in his personal library suddenly didn’t seem enough.
Getting up from his chair, he started walking towards the door and just at the same time, Raymond stepped into his library, a worried expression etched on his face.
“Raymond…” Morris muttered, completely startled as he almost bumped into him. He stepped back and cast a glance at Raymond and just by looking at him, he knew there was a problem.
“Did you get her? Where is she?” Morris demanded, his voice shaky from all his pent-up frustration and his lack of sleep these days.
Raymond bent his head, his hands shook slightly and a fresh bead of sweat gathered on his forehead and around his neck. After what seemed like ten whole hours, he finally answered with a shaky voice. “We failed to get her. We fo-”
“You what?” Morris yelled, a surge of rage spiking through his body. “So incompetent! What exactly can you do right?! What exactly am I paying for?!! Don’t you understand how serious this situation is?”
“Pardon me, sir…based on how everything went, it was clear she knew we were after her from the beginning”
“Really?” Morris sneered, narrowing his eyes. “Did you give yourself away?”
“No sir. We dressed like random men and we kept our distance but somehow, she caught us and tricked us to escape”
Morris clenched his jaw so hard his teeth could break. “How didn’t I think about the fact that she might have experienced this before? She obviously knows when she is being followed. At the end of the day, she is a detective indeed!”
“Should we try again and go after her? We’ll make sure to get her this time around? We can do better, give us another chance.”
Morris waved his hand in disapproval. “Don’t bother with that. There’s no need for it. Right now, she’ll have her guards up and be ready for anything. It’s our loss”
The more he thought about it, there was something very strange going on in this villa. Everyone had been acting weird lately; from Rachel who was still pretending and acting like she didn’t know he was the one behind her father’s downfall….
And then there was George who seemed too quiet these days. Morris couldn’t really tell what he was doing, what he was up to. He didn’t even know if George knew anything about what he did to Rachel’s father. George was not showing any sign of anger or revenge, at least for the moments he had been able to see him lately.
And finally, Patricia…
He couldn’t tell what she was up to. Normally, for all the years he had known, she has been crazily in love with him, ready to give anything up to win his heart. She did everything he wanted, listened to everything he said. She was always trying to be around him, seeking his attention….
But lately, there was something different, something strange about her. He couldn’t exactly point out what it was yet. Firstly, the whole action of chopping her hair to a short length….
She had always kept it long because he said he preferred it that way. For her to suddenly chop off the ‘length’, didn’t that mean she didn’t care what he thought anymore? And not just that, but she didn’t even bother coming to see him these days, she just stayed away. It wasn’t like he cared or wanted her around anyway but he just found her new behavior strange.
He had a strong feeling she was hiding something from him but what could it be? There was no way she knew about his ‘crimes’. He knew that Rachel would never tell Patricia such a thing when it could put her in trouble and mess up her plan of getting justice for her father.
Morris glanced up sharply as an idea popped in his mind. Why was he even stressing himself out trying to get the ‘hacked’ evidence destroyed when there was a better, smoother way to handle this kind of problem?
Turning towards Raymond, he asked “Do you still remember the policeman who helped us the other time with Arthur Reeves case? He is now the head deputy of that popular police station?”
Raymond narrowed his eyes for a moment “are you referring to Mr Cochran, the police that prevented a court case for Mr Arthur Reeves and threw in jail instead?”
“Yes, he’s the one” Morris smiled, his eyes lighting up with the spark of his new ‘escape’ plan. “I need you to send an important message over to him. I need his help and we need to meet soon.”
Morris smirked after ordering Raymond on the steps to take. Mr Cochran’s police station was the best in this town and Morris knew that was the police station that Rachel would try to use to bring him down….
Instead of stressing himself trying to catch the stupid Sophia lady, why not just put his energy into frustrating their plan?
There would always be those people who would do anything for money and in this world, money answered a lot of things and good for him, he had lots of it!
Bribing his way through the investigation of any evidence wouldn’t be so hard after all.
~~~~~*~~~~~
Patricia turned the box filled with documents upside till every piece of paper fell to the ground. She sat down on the floor of her bedroom and skimmed over each document, looking for a particular one….
Behind her was nanny Juliet, carefully folding and arranging the scattered documents from the previous box she had emptied. She cast a glance at Patricia on the floor, wondering what was wrong. Why was she suddenly interested in her old documents?
“Pass me the other box behind you” Patricia ordered as she stacked a few pieces of paper and placed them aside.
“Is something going on? What exactly are you looking for?”
“A way to get my company back!”
“Whattt?!” Nanny Juliet blinked, not sure she heard correctly
Patricia paused what she was doing, looked at her and frowned a little “I said I am looking for a way to get my company back from Morris! Did you hear me now?”
“Pardon me…” the nanny replied “… but is that possible? It doesn’t seem so. Legal contracts can be very messy”
“I am aware of that. But if you think about it, Morris hasn’t exactly fulfilled all the conditions I stated. He has not willed the company over completely to George, he still has a strong hold over the affairs of that company. And I don’t want that anymore, I want my son, George to have total control over it!”
“Ma’am, I understand, but Mr Morris hasn’t actually come out to say he wouldn’t fulfill the final condition. Isn’t it only if he outrightly says he won’t, that you can take it to court? If you jump to a conclusion so fast, wouldn’t that put you in a difficult spot?”
Patricia kept the stash of documents aside and breathed deeply, trying to think straight. “Well, I know you’re trying to help me make a good choice and I understand what you’re saying. At the same time, I want to make sure I have the necessary documents I need to bring him down just in case something happens soon.”
“You seem to be on edge lately, Mrs Patricia” the nanny said as she pushed the ‘tidied’ box aside.
“I don’t know, I just feel so uncomfortable here recently. It feels like Morris can attack me at any moment from now. I have to be prepared. By now, he must have noticed that I am different, he probably has his eyes on me. It’s getting harder to pretend and play along when I know who he really is.”
“It’s alright, okay? Everything will be fine. At least, I hope so”
“I still need to take out some time to see Rachel and apologize for how I treated her before. I was so wrong” Patricia said. “Whenever I think about it, I feel terrible.”
“I’m sure she will understand. Besides, if you plan to get your company back, you have to do it quietly. If Morris finds out, it’s going to get bloody. You know how badly obsessed he is with this company”
“I know. Especially that annoying bodyguard that follows him almost everywhere, always looking for fresh news he can bring to his master. That bodyguard is the one I need to stay away from” Patricia chuckled…
Glancing around at the mess of scattered papers around her, she whispered “let’s tidy this mess. I have finally found what I was looking for.”