SPIDERWEB

Mr. Cloud smirked, "don"t tell anyone or don"t tell him specifically."

Gradis flinched and unconsciously played with the tips of the folder in her lap, "whatever you make of my comment, just don"t go around gifting people with knowledge that can take us down."

"Gift them?" Mr. Cloud chuckled, his smile settled into a thin line, "I"ve haven"t sent a good gift to someone. Well, at least one that they actually got to open and see."

Gradis forced the corners of her mouth into a grin, "good, don"t change your ways now." She hated this. She could see the emptiness in his smiles and how targeted his words were, yet she had to smile back so, at this point, their smiles had lost their meanings and only held hostility in them.

"Name?" Mr. Cloud asked, playing with a pen in his hand, "I"d like to know who"s the unfortunate one this time."

"Regan Duran," Gradis replied without hesitation, "it wasn"t like she was unfortunate, she was just a bit late to the party."

Mr. Cloud"s eyes sparkled in amus.e.m.e.nt, as he recognized the name, "then I suppose he is the one that got to the party first?" he nodded towards the direction of the door.

"Yes, so I had to get rid of her when the job was done," Gradis shrugged.

"Well isn"t that a bit mean," Mr, Cloud laughed.

"I do what I need to do to get where I am right now," Gradis replied, "and next up is the Stones and Lims."

They sat in silence for a few moments, each of them gathering thoughts on each other and trying to fit pieces in two different puzzles. Gradis stared at Mr. Cloud, hoping to poke holes through him with her glare. There was something going on this time, he was too persistent, too curious in what she thought and her current situation. She needed to be on guard now.

"Which company are you taking first? Stone or Lims," Mr. Cloud asked, breaking the tension.

"Both at once," Gradis sighed, "I know them both from childhood and are on somewhat good terms with them."

"Good terms?" Mr. Cloud asked, slight annoyance showing through in his voice, "good terms isn"t enough for this. You need to be better than good terms in order for this to work, their companies consist of finely grouped bonds and every trading deal they do is planned to near perfection. Good terms aren"t going to get you into their system and bring them to shreds, complete trust is the way you need to go."

Gradis let out a chuckle, "there"s no such thing as complete trust in business, especially not at this level. It"s called manipulation and it"s the only solid move that goes on between two people in our field."

"Then create the closest thing to trust and take advantage of it. I have a list of both company"s most trusted allies in that folder, so make good use of that," Mr. Cloud smiled, "there are things I need to say to you but you have a guest so you can"t keep him waiting so in our next meeting, we"ll be talking about that."

"Then why don"t you just invite me to a place where you are instead of dragging me up to their long hallways just to see a computer screen," Gradis snapped.

"As you said, there"s no such thing as complete trust and I"m sure you can see that with us," Mr. Cloud let out a chuckle, amused by Gradis" need to see his true location, "I have to keep a few things secret or else things won"t be fun will they?"

Gradis gave a small nod in reply, feeling no motivation to do anything else, she was already drained. The cold back of the seat she was in was starting to get to her and she needed to leave soon.