JAMARCUS'POV
My eyes meet the grayest pair of eyes I have ever seen and instantly whatever reply I had wanted to say had disappeared almost instantly.
They were the oddest shade that was for sure and in the clear bright lighting of my office it seemed silver… almost metallic even and in them bore plain undisguised fury as she stared at me.
At that moment in walks my receptionist running in all face flushed and scattered looking. She looks between me and the woman and her face turns an even darker shade of red.
She bends over and tries to put her head in between her knees in a bid to stabilize her breathing. When she finally comes to she turns to face the lady that had just walked in. "Ma'am please, I told you that you are not supposed to be here!" She says with each word punctuated with her panting as she gasps for air. My guess is that she must have chased the woman at the door all the way from her desk.
She turns her attention to me "Sir…sir I am so sorry.I had told her, several times that she could not go in but she would not listen to me and she eventually forced her way in before I could even do anything to stop her. Don't worry sir I am going to call security right this instant and I promise that this will never happen again. I will personally over see that she is thrown out"
I raise a hand, partly to stop her from rambling on and partly because her voice was slowly beginning to irritate"It is alright Britney, I can take it from here. You can leave now."
"But sir I…" She starts to speak but on seeing the deadpan expression on my face shuts her mouth back.
"You can leave Britney." I repeat.
My secretary looks at the woman who was beside her at the door with an angry look on her face before heading out the door and I could have sworn that for a brief moment I saw the woman smirk at her retreating figure.
"Uhm… Luke would you mind getting my guest some refreshments?" I say turning to my personal assistant.
"Coming right away sir." He replies and with that he leaves as well.
Now once alone with the stranger I take my time to study the woman. The two of us are silent, each one watching the other as though we were trying to uncover the other person's flaws.
Covering those silver eyes were a pair of thick framed tortoise shell glasses and on her body was an long oversized gown which from the looks of it clearly did not belong in this century and did no justice to her shape but it rather made her look quite oversized. She was not exactly beautiful per say but she had an aura around her that made her seem so distinguished that if not for the position we were in currently, I would have felt myself drawn to her
"You said wanted to see me?" I ask her,my eyes never leaving her face.
"Yes…are you the manager?"
Manager?…. What is this?
"No, I am the CEO." I say to her so authoritatively that she flinches subsconciously.
A look of surprise crossed on her face but she hides it almost immediately and if I had not been watching her so intently I would have missed it. I guess that she must be used to hiding her emotions becaus
"That's even better." She says to me sarcastically.
"I have something to discuss with you." She repeats again
"Well then get on with it." I say to her, already annoyed.
She walks to me in a slow motion, each step was punctuated with click clack of her heels against the tile. She comes to stand in front of me and rests her hands on the table. She inches her face in front of mine and up close the light reflects of them and I almost let out a gasp at how beautiful they are.
"A couple of days ago, my bakery was confiscated by your company the basis of my failure to repay the loan that I had taken out a few years ago."
"So what's the problem there?" I ask confusedly with a shrug of my shoulders. I could not feel any amount of sympathy for the woman. It most definitely was not my fault if she had her possession taken from her because no one would have forced her to give it up if she hadn't been unable to pay back her loan.
"The problem?" She says to me in a low tone which gradually got louder "You see the problem is buddy, is that I have been paying diligently every Friday for the past week, in fact this was supposed to be last day that I ever pay on this loan!"
"And?" I say to her nonchalantly.
On seeing my behaviour she raises her hand on table and slams them back down with such force that entire table vibrates. "So tell me why I see my bakery chained up with a note on the side saying that you've taken ownership of it. Okay tell me this, if indeed I did not repay the loan was I not supposed to at least be given some sort of notice? Then why the hell was I not even given"
I arch an eyebrow at her once again, as I am clearly shocked by what she was saying. "What are you even saying? That is preposterous."
"No what is preposterous is the fact that when I went back to the very office that I have been paying continuously is closed down and it's nowhere to be found!"
Understanding dawns on me, she was here because she had gotten scammed.
"So how is that my problem?" She rolls her eyes at me in exasperation. "Aren't you the proprietor of Empire holdings beside Lakeview park?"
"Why yes?"
"Then I hate to break it to you but I think that your employee ran away with your funds which would have been no importance to me if not for the fact that he also made away with mine!" She says, her voice raising on the last two words.
"How can that be I-" I pause in my sentence midway as Luke opens the door, in his hands are a lot of tea and a platter of biscuits.
"Thank you Luke." I say turning to face him. "Luke I'm glad that you are here. Do we have a property over at Lakeview park?"
"Why yes sir." He says as he drops the tray right beside us before adjusting his glasses back up the rim of his nose. If he notices our current position he does not say say anything and comes to stand at the side.
"Well who is in charge of it?"
He ponders on it for a few seconds before he dips his hands into his pockets to get a small clipboard which he flips and comes to stop at the third page.
"Sir, that would Levi."
"Has Levi come by the office recently? To give the monthly report that is?"
"Why no sir, he was supposed to come in this Monday but I remember that he had called the head office to say that he had a family emergency and would have to come back to report this coming week."
I hear a snicker from the woman and almost instantly I feel a flare of anger but I try my hardest to not to let it show, I did not want to let her know that she was on to something.
"And why was I not informed of this?" I ask him as I slowly began to get annoyed.
"I had sent Britney an email to forward to you regarding this did-did she not forward it to you?"
"No, she did not!" I say to him, my voice coming out far harsher than I had intended it to be. "Get her the hell in here!"
Nathan visibly stiffens at my change in demeanor and I raise my hand to my forehead to massage the lines that was starting to form there.
I take in a few deep breath to stabilize my breathing as I try to proceeds what exactly was going on. My employee just ran away with all the funds of my company and I had no idea about it. Hell if it was not for this woman over here then I would have been none the wiser and here I was musing about my past accomplishments when my company is currently under fire.
"Sir, I'll go get her right away." Nathan says to me the second he seems to have recovered from his surprise. He turns to leave but I raise a hand to stop him. It would make no difference right now.
"No Luke, leave it her alone. I will deal with her and her inefficiency later. For now I want you to get every single information you have on Levi ASAP. I want to know where he lives, his close relatives, hell even his checking account. I want to know everything and i mean EVERYTHING!"
"Y…yes sir. Right away sir!" He says and with that he leaves slamming the door right behind him and leaving the two of us alone once again.
I spin my chair around to face her, she had changed her position and was now staring out of the windows. I could not see her face because of the amount of light that came through but I had a faint idea that she was frowning.
"Ma'am it would appear that we may have gotten off on the wrong foot."
At my words she spins around and turns to face me "Hmmm, you don't say…"