Chapter 8

Today we’ll have our monthly meeting where we update the CEO about the progress we made. I, on the other hand, decided to dress to impress. I’ll be bringing a thermometer to monitor when his blood boils.

Everyone was already in the boardroom waiting for the boss himself. Quinn wasn’t able to come, again with the wedding planning. Tyler was a busy man. With a little time he had, Quinn adjusts her schedule to fit in with his. She might not be here but Isabella was now here with me.

“You should really put down your feet, Kur. I don’t think mister Veselov would be happy to see you dirtying his table.” Belle smirked in amusement. She was much more relaxed and tolerant than Quinn. Considering she grew up with a strict father, she somewhat got his conventional ways. I was her number one headache.

“He’s not always happy.” I smirked.

She eyes my close to gothic look today. I was wearing a loose black t-shirt with an abstract print, black pants and black boots. There was a chain dangling in my pants, a black accessory decorating my wrist, a cap covering my head. “What’s wrong with you today? Quinn will lose her wits if she sees you like this.” She chuckles.

I didn’t have a chance to explain when the door opened, and the big boss finally graced us with his presence. His eyes travelled to the people in the room who settled themselves upright the moment he came in. I slowly brought down my feet when Belle pinched my side. He caught the movement. His eyes shifted towards me and his permanent frown deepened. There’s always an automatic scowl whenever he sees me.

He sauntered towards his chair and sat down with elegance, his eyes never leaving mine. I smirked when he kept his glare. His jaw ticked as he eyed me with complete contempt. My plan was successful once again.

I sensed Belle staring at me. “What?” I asked as I turned to her. She didn’t answer but only shook her head with a hint of amusement.

---

“What was that about?” She asked as soon as we got inside our temporary office. The meeting took longer than expected. That’s because we, including the CEO, were too meticulous. I expected it though considering his aggravating personality.

“What was what?”

“That thing with you and the boss.” We both take a seat on the chair behind our desks.

“Right. You weren’t here when that jerk insulted me.”

“Insulted you? How?” I raised a brow in response. “Oh.” Finally getting the idea. She laughed when I told her what happened the first time Nile Veselov and I crossed paths.

“You should really listen when Quinn tells you to change. Maybe this is a lesson for you.”

I scoff. “No. Why do you think I’m making an effort to annoy him?” I pointed at the outfit I was wearing.

She snorted. “You’re lucky you haven’t been kicked out.”

“No one can kick out Kura Kunoe with her awesome skills and talent.” She laughs at my statement. My grin fell when I noticed her suddenly quieted down and had this pensive look. “What’s wrong?”

“I need to tell you something.” My ears instantly perked. “I didn’t voice out or object during the meeting…”

“What is it?” I asked with a growing concern. My elbows propped up on the table while leaning towards her direction, all ears.

“You know I always handle the numbers in our company.” I nodded. “And every budget we have for every project.”

“What are you saying?” I didn’t like where this was going.

“Is it possible that someone’s stealing here in Veselov Industries?” I inhaled a quiet gasp. “You know how I’m always particular with numbers, especially the budget given to us. I check every report you’ve given me while I was away. I’m annoyingly meticulous because even with the smallest things like down to the food budget, I always oversee it.”

“Tell me.” I said impatiently, knowing she was stalling.

“The numbers just don’t match with their report, Kur. I mean it looked like it did. I mean I don’t know. I guess you sent a different list?”

“It really looked like it did.” I shook the thoughts away. I was perplexed that this would happen. “I don’t make mistakes. You know that, right?” She nodded vehemently. She was not the only one who’s meticulous about details. I always send her reports everyday just so she could check everything.

We started doing this when one of our men started stealing from us years ago. We were too trustful and only checked the financial reports once in a while. We were booming and we were too confident. Out of nowhere, Belle started checking financial reports thoroughly, matching every number she could get. She was able to find out who had been stealing from us when her boyfriend, now her husband, did some hacking. He investigated every account of our employees and was able to discover who had the most deposited money every month. I don’t think the method will work right now since this isn’t our company we’re dealing with.

We learned that lesson the hard way. Still, through the years, with that strategy, we’ve proven to ourselves that we hardly make mistakes.

“Is it possible though?” She asked again.

“I don’t think Kyle’s hacking skills would be useful right now. It could send us straight to jail. And besides, with the number of employees working here, it will take a huge amount of time.” She nodded.

“I feel like there’s this gut feeling you know. I know mister Veselov had his own team for handling the budget. Even though we don’t need to, we still have one as well. Well, secretly that is.” It was hardly called a team when there’s only two of us working in the background.

“That’s always the best move we ever have. We can’t be too trustful.”

“He is.” She shrugs. “I guess when you have too much money, you never notice. What should we do?” She asked in concern.

“I’ll investigate for now. What if I did make mistakes when I sent you the report? Or you miscalculated.”

“Hardly. We’re talking about hundreds of thousands, Kur. There’s a reason why they didn’t let us handle the budget.”

An idea suddenly crossed my mind.

---

I knocked on Adam Wilson’s office who was in charge of their team’s finances. When I heard him say come in, I welcomed myself in.

“Oh, Miss Kunoe. How may I help you?” His hands clasped together on the table. I let myself sit on the chair in front of his desk.

“I’m here to ask for a copy of the project’s financial report.”

His greying eyebrows raise in surprise. “What for?”

“When I saw your report this morning, I don’t think our numbers matched.”

He emitted a frown. “I don’t think I follow.”

“You don’t actually think we only rely on this team to calculate this project’s expenses. We also did our own math. Unfortunately, our calculations didn’t match and that makes me wonder why. I mean it could have been a mistake in our or your part. That’s why I’m asking for a copy of it and recheck everything.”

“I don’t think it’s possible, Miss Kunoe. Financial reports are very confidential.”

“Even for the director of this entire team?” I retorted.

“Yes, I’m afraid. We are talking about money released by Veselov Industries.”

---

So my plan failed. Should I seduce my way to that aggravating CEO himself? What if it did work? Won’t he question my motive? What if Belle and I made a mistake? And if he finds out we’ve been fooling around his company? He’ll surely kick us out this time. I have made too many strikes and this will be the biggest for sure.

But Belle never made a mistake. As I said, she’s too careful.

I sigh. The whole afternoon was spent with me pacing back and forth in my office, contemplating on what to do. Belle had to reprimand me countless times because I was distracting her. I ended up staying late to finish my work that got delayed because of my meddling affairs.

It was about nine in the evening when I got out. I was still thinking about how to solve this problem. Ha. I always find myself in situations like this. It reminded me of three years ago when I went solo flight and answered the problems myself. I ended up almost going to rehab for letting them find out about my addiction, sacrificing it just to cover up something that would surely break my best friend’s heart.

I don’t know where I got this heroic tendencies but I sure do it a lot. Did it do me good? No, but it did for my friends.

This walking makes me think about a lot of things. But too much thinking made me distracted and unable to sense that someone had been following. I realized too late when I was in the middle of the area that there was no one around.

My footsteps grew quicker, hurrying towards wherever there were at least a few people passing by enough to help me.

He noticed my plan when I heard his footsteps grew faster and louder. He lunged at me from behind.