Daniel was sitting in the office and glumly glancing at the headlines of the morning papers."Hmm, not bad, not bad. And Rick really knows how to surprise. Well, let"s see who will win this race in the end."
The young man closed his laptop, leaned back in his chair, closed his eyes, and lost himself in thought.
A loud knock at the door made him give up his deep thinking.
"Come in," he said.
The secretary opened the door carefully and hesitantly entered the office. "Mr. Anderson, the a.n.a.lytics department sent a report on tracking the last transaction."
"And what is it?" Daniel asked, not even looking in the direction of the girl.
"They tried to track the transactions that were carried out on the stock exchange. Also, several shareholders put part of their shares for sale. As a result, all these shares were bought out by one person."
"And how many shares?"
Lily had a lump in her throat for fear. The girl collected the last bits of courage and replied, "T-twenty-five percent, sir."
Daniel turned to the secretary, and a terrible tremor broke through her entire body. His look was so scary at that moment.
"Who?" the young man asked in a metallic voice.
"The... The deals were made through offsh.o.r.e companies, and then," Lily"s voice trembled, and she felt that she was about to faint from the tension, "And then the funds were transferred through cryptocurrency accounts. Tracking the final recipient is not possible."
The young man looked at the girl spitefully and hissed, "Get out."
The secretary, without hesitation, immediately left his office.
Daniel closed his eyes, then loudly banged his fist on the table.
"F*ck!"
The melody of the cell phone caught his attention. He glanced at the display, "Hmm, just in time," the young man thought and put the phone to his ear.
A loud scream on the other end of the wire instantly stunned him.
"Oh, brother, h.e.l.lo! I"m glad to hear you. How are you?" He asked cheerfully.
"Hmm, are you not happy about me? You know, I"m a little busy here, maybe we"ll talk later... What? I got into your business? Sorry. You have your plans, I have my own... You wanna kill me? Ahaha, you"re so kind! All right, bye, I"m on a date right now, I can"t talk anymore. h.e.l.lo to the parents! Cheerio!"
But he heard the usual sounds of beeps in response. Daniel sighed and looked out the window thoughtfully, "So, it seems, I need to check my health insurance. I"m not sure that it will be able to cover the bills for treatment," the young man grinned, closed his eyes, and again plunged into his thoughts.
. . .
Two days of laziness and silence ended, and David was looking forward to reaching the house so that he could take his phone. It was quite unlike him to be off the Internet and cell phone connection for such a long time. Although, objectively speaking, it was no more than two days.
Any sensible person would have twisted a finger at the temple, condemning this dependence, but the whole world has long lost its freedom from gadgets. Just as electricity once burst into our lives and subjugated all its spheres.
Having gotten up to his room, the young man checked all the things again but did not find the phone. After some thought, he decided to take a shower first and then begin a full room screening.
Madame Anderson, while her son was in his room, quickly ran into the kitchen, pulled out David"s phone from a drawer, and then put it on the table in the living room.
She already knew that as soon as he found out about her conspiracy with Daniel, it would not even take an hour for him to leave this house. The only thing she hoped with all her heart was that David would understand why the woman did this.
"Mom, did you find my phone? Thank you so much! And where was it?" David asked, going downstairs and finding his phone in the most visually accessible place.
"Oh, son, it turned out to be under the chair. I accidentally noticed it myself," Dina answered with a smile, but in her heart with every word she said there was only a growing feeling of guilt towards her son.
David gently hugged his mom and kissed her cheek, "Thank you so much! You saved me!"
Smiling, he went back to his bedroom. The woman sat down on a chair, closed her eyes and sighed heavily.
David plugged the phone to the charge and was waiting impatiently for it to turn on. Noticing that the charge indicator is almost full, he was a bit surprised, "Hmm, that"s weird. The battery is not discharged, but the phone is turned off..."
The system was loaded, and dozens of missed calls and messages immediately appeared on display. A contented smile lit up the face of the young man,
"Wow, how many calls are from Elena! Mmm, did she really miss me so much?"
Antic.i.p.ating to hear the voice of his girlfriend, David made the call... but there was no answer. He called Elena again, but the subscriber was still unavailable.
Grinning with displeasure, he began to leaf through the call log.
"h.e.l.lo, Rick? Why did you call? I have more than ten missed from you...," David began his conversation.
"Oooh, who do I hear? Were you kidnapped and brainwashed by aliens? Did you forget how to use the phone? Or was your bride so fascinated by you that you lost touch with reality?" Rick answered sarcastically.
"W-what? What aliens? Stop... what bride are you talking about? Do you even know that you are saying some kind of nonsense?" David asked, feeling utterly perplexed.
"My friend, the only master of saying and DOING nonsense, is you. Do not be offended at me, that I have to clean off the s.h.i.t after you in such a way," Rick"s voice sounded unusually cold.
"Hey, what the...," David wanted to argue, but was immediately interrupted.
"I advise you to think carefully about your alibi and how you will apologize to Elena, you, moron," Rick said everything he wanted and hung up.
David looked at the phone in confusion, "What the h.e.l.l has just happened?"
Suddenly, an incomprehensible feeling of anxiety arose in his chest. The young man opened the browser and began to flip through the news feed for the previous few days. With every minute David"s face grew darker and darker.
When he reached the official release of Greenline Inc., his rage knew no limit. "I"m going to bury you alive!" he thought viciously and dialed his brother"s number.
"What the f*ck are you doing? Did you loose your mind? ... To h.e.l.l with it! I warned you not to bother me? So, be prepared for the consequences!... I advise you to find a lawyer to help you make a will," David said in a hissing voice and hung up the phone.
Then he made a call to the airport and transferred his flight to the nearest available time. The young man packed his things quickly, sat on the bed and opened the stock reports.
Running his eyes on the current charts, he opened the application on the phone, pressed a few b.u.t.tons and closed it.
Then, as if noticing something strange, he looked again into the call log. Scrolling through the list of incoming and outgoing calls, he stopped at the last incoming call. It was a call from Elena.
David looked at the date, time and duration of the call. The young man closed his eyes and sighed. Then he left the room and went down to the living room.
An adult woman was sitting on a chair, and her whole body was tense. Seeing her son"s serious expression, Dina Anderson tried to smile, but it didn"t look natural at all.
David, staring at his mother with a piercing gaze, asked coldly, "Do you want to tell me anything, huh, mom?"