Chapter 10- Something is off

*Kat's POV

It took another hour for me to reach at least 3/4th of the design. If it were not for Richard dragging me out, I would have still continued my design till the sunrise. Well, I can’t blame him since it was literally 10pm and our working time was from 8am-8pm. Though in one thing I didn’t let him win, and that was for taking my designs with me. I knew he had a point because he said I would lose it or something might happen to design cause I can be pretty messy when I am at home. But I have to complete this and so the design came to my home with me.

I gave the key to Richard, who was shaking his head, looking at my hand full of papers. I entered my home and saw Mandy on couch sleeping with a tv on. She must have slept waiting for me. I went to my bedroom and kept the papers and stuffs on my table and walked back to my living room and woke Mandy up.

“Mandy, wake up.” She groans and shifts, not waking up. Well, she is a deep sleeper I expected nothing less from her. “Mandy, go sleep in you room.” Though she groaned, she opened her eyes and looked at me.

“Kat, you are late do you want coffee or something. I ordered pasta and spaghetti for dinner and kept it in fridge do you want me to reheat it?”

“No, Mandy, I am not hungry and even if I can do all those things.” I said and turned her around to walk her into her room. I made her lay on her bed and switched off the lights after closing the door, I came back into the living room. All this time Richard had been leaning on the kitchen counter doing something on his phone.

“Thankyou Richard for your help I will see you tomorrow.” I said and walked him to the door. I wanted to ask him to stay since he helped me a lot I have to show some kindness but Mandy wouldn’t appreciate it. She already hates me for fooling around with Richard.

“Hey don’t thank me it’s what I should do as.. ah.. your friend. Okay see you tomorrow.” He walked away and with that I closed the door. I knew the reason behind his stuttering but didn’t act on it. He has shown it at multiple occasions to ask me out as a girlfriend or something more than what we are doing right now. But I try to change the topic. I may seem to be a whore right now, but I don’t care. In my heart only Ryder had, has and will have a place. No one can replace him.

With those thoughts in mind, I went to my bedroom and walked straight into the bathroom to change into pyjamas. After freshening up a little, I walked to my bed and sat on it. I looked at the table on my left and saw a pile of papers. God, I will have to wake up early in the morning like 4am, so I will have only 4 hours left to sleep. I just had to keep my head on the pillow and I went into deep sleep.

---

I was woken up by the sound of the alarm. I cursed myself for not doing my work on time. I just saw a beautiful dream where I saw my parents and me in a beautiful house surrounded by lots of flowers. He was about to tell me something after lifting his laptop, but suddenly the laptop started beeping and that’s how I woke up. Panting, if I may add. Well, you can’t blame me I thought the laptop was going to explode with that noise. Though it was me itself who put that tone for alarm or else I won’t wake up.

I went to the bathroom and washed my face. As I looked into the mirror, I saw bad under my eyes. That’s what you get for not sleeping properly. When I am in office, I do office work but when I am at my apartment; I search for clues leading to reason behind my parents’ accident and till now I have found none. Only if I get my dad’s laptop from the police, will I get any, at least a small clue. I know it won’t be a big clue cause my dad is smart enough to make sure his laptop won’t be in the police station because when I went to station in search of his laptop I found it but the problem was it was the one he used to teach me the codes and store company stuffs in and not the one I see my dad working on most of the time. So if that laptop is not with the police then it means something is there in that and that’s the reason why police don’t have it because dad didn’t want them to, meaning he hid it somewhere .

What is there in it that he had to hide it? It just proves that my parents’ accident was not any accident it was a planned murder because he hid it and made sure his other laptop was with police. Even if I don’t have that hidden laptop using the laptop which is with the police I can find the hidden one but to get it from the police I need something. To be more exact someone. I need Ryder because he has the power to take the computer without being found out. Well, he is a powerful CEO after all, and that’s the reason why dad said I will need him to find the answers to my questions. But how will get to him if he doesn’t want me to find him?

Shaking those questions from mind, I went to my table and started to work on my designs. After 2 hours, I was done with my designs and was packing it when Mandy came in yawning.

“Good morning Kat, did the sun rise from west cause you never wake up this early. What happened?” she asked. I walked out of my room, “I had to complete my design today is the day we have to submit it. But hey, I do wake up early in the morning.”

“Ya, but only after I had to shout in your ears to wake up or else you wouldn’t be going to office because you would have been fired because of being late.”

“Whatever. Do you want coffee?” I asked her as I walked into the kitchen and she went to the door and opened it to take the newspaper from our doormat.

“Yeah.” She says as she walks into the living room holding newspaper.

“Well, make for me too.” I say as I make pancake.

“Typical Kat-” she stops talking all of a sudden and when I look up, she stands there shocked and when she notices me looking at her, she hurries to hide the newspaper. Too late.

I walk to her and snatches the paper from her. While I am faster than her, she is stronger than me but too weak at reflex when the action is from me. “Kat don’t” she says.

I look at the paper and regret taking it from her. It’s the news of Ryder with some model claiming to be his girlfriend. With tears in my eyes I walk off to kitchen to continue making pancake not wanting to show it to her though she has already seen the weak me. There goes my thoughts of wanting to see him. She says nothing, instead makes coffee for both of us, which I am very grateful for; I mean for coffee and silence.

The rest of the morning went as none of us spoke and ate silently, and soon it was time for me to get ready. Today I added a little more makeup than usual to hide the bags underneath my eyes and to add colour to my pale skin. The skin that became pale after the news to be more exact. I had the perfect skin tone that I didn’t have to tan nor add any makeup, and that’s the reason why I wear less makeup. But since today I have to be presentable, I wore more makeup than usual and wore my dark blue suit with updo hairstyle

Mandy insisted that she will drive me to work and then she will go to her office. Mandy is the CEO of her dad’s company. And so I went to office with her with no complaints and tried to cheer up since I didn’t want a gloomy face while presenting my designs and trying to get the deal.

I went in and put on an invisible mask in which I smile like nothing had happened and wished everyone like usual and went to sit in my office. It took everything in me to not cry. And I powered up my computer to see at what time our client was coming and waited for the representative of Waynst Ltd. to come while rechecking everything to distract myself from the morning events and to prepare myself to get the deal no matter what.

How I wish I knew no matter how much I prepared myself, nothing would be enough for what happened next.