The Contract
1322 Words
CHAPTER 4:
Behind her, the door of the office clicked as it closed, and still Elira did not pause in her walk until she had passed into the narrow gutter between the Iron Spire and the next tower that ran along beside it. Her hands became shaky, which held her phone. The photo. The message. The threat.
Her head was thrown backwards, leaning on the cold brick wall, and perhaps there could be answers in the sky. She should have thought. Fast.
Someone was spying on her. Stalked.
And Caelum was not the only threat anymore.
Upon coming back to her apartment, lights were out. Fuzzily sleeping, thank God, was Zayden, his little chest heaving to the pressure of his favorite stuffed bear. She bent beside him and said in a low voice, “It is all right. Leave it to me.”
But she did not think that she was telling the truth.
Next day at Iron Spire, Elira entered the building with the same erect bearing as before, and today she felt the hangman’s knot.
The receptionist hardly lifted her eyes and scanned through her ID.
“Mr. Vallis wants to see you first. Executive professional level.”
Again?
She was gone without uttering something, turned, and went to the elevator.
She did not need to tell which office. This time the door of Caelum’s was open, and he sat behind the desk, leafing through a mass of papers.
He did not look up. “Shut it behind your back.”
She did.
Then he first spoke. “What do you know about biosecurity?”
She blinked. “I what?”
He raised his eyes. “You heard me.”
“I can tell you I don’t know a great deal. Some, anyhow. Enough to know that you want something besides a merger.”
Caelum jerked his lip. “Good. I say this because I have a proposal.”
She stared.
“You are troubled enough, don’t feel like it. It is not such a proposal. Sit.”
“I would like to stand.”
He sat back in his chair and gazed at her like one of his stocks and bonds. “Suit yourself. I will come to the point. You are smart, concentrated, you understand how to think outside the numbers. Twice over you have shown that. I mean I am giving you a job.”
“You have offered me a job now,” she said lingeringly.
“It is not so with this one. You will be working underneath me. When you need to travel, you will travel. I will need you there as eyes and ears in a very sensitive acquisition.”
Elira folded her arms. “And why me?”
He said he has no time to be babysitting interns. And that you are so confidential, and so on”
She snorted.
His face was drawn together. “I am sure that you have something to lose.”
Was it there? The true cause? He was able to have Zayden above her head as a knife to her neck.
“I don’t require your manipulation,” she replied.
“Call it leverage,” said Caelum. “You love your son and want to take care of him. I desire to have this purchase. It is a win-win situation.”
She denied it with her head. “Caelum, what dost thou thyself desire?”
He got up sleepily and moved about the desk until he faced them. “I wish to be well-informed. Everything. And I want him to be turned around to know me, Elira. I do not intend to ask for your leave anymore.”
The pupils in his eyes were telling. Something wounded. But she would not go in that way.
She moved her head. “Please, send the contract to my mail. I will take it into consideration.”
Two days after, Elira was on the privately-owned jet to D.C., along with three executives of Iron Spire. Caelum was not, and his name was heard in every precept, in every look. The endeavor was actual. The target firm was a biotechnology company in pediatric immunity research. The founder was also notorious in resisting corporate buyout.
And her plea: to draw near. Win the confidence of the founder. Bring in-house knowledge.
Smoothly promoted corporate espionage.
She reread the file so many times during the flight, but her thoughts just kept revolving around a singular issue.
Zayden.
What would happen if this all collapsed? If Caelum took him away?
The following afternoon, she came to the D.C. office. The biotechnology company was hidden inside an environmentally supportive structure that reeked of aspirations and lemons. The man thus described as the founder was a man of silver hair, with a smile that would have been warm had it been less anxious young Dr. Camden Royce, plainly tired.
“I heard good reports of you, Miss Vale, and I am happy to be able to shake you by the hand.”
“You have been deceived,” she said, smiling.
Camden chuckled. “Wait and see.”
She understood Caelum was relying on her to work fast, but she could not help this pang of guilt that prodded at her, the longer she hovered around the employees of Camden. They were s*x-crazed. Genuine. It was not your normal profit-earning enterprise. These were individuals who rescued children. Small kids such as Zayden.
On the third day of her assignment, she was on a late-night chat with Caelum.
“Why, progress?” he said.
“I am working at it.”
“That is not enough.”
“I am working. However, I am not wasting decent people.”
The sound of his voice had become bitter. “It is no longer your choice what is good and bad. This you consented to.”
“No,” I jerked back. “I said I would remain near. Not to be thy pawn.”
Silence.
Then he muttered in a low voice, “I instructed my attorneys to draw a petition.”
She felt her breath caught.
“Custody,” he added.
“You would not.”
“I would.”
“Caelum, don’t”
“I want to learn from him, Elira. I need him in my life. Unless you voluntarily hand that to me, you will have it legally.”
Her fingers shook with the phone.
“I said, I did not need to fight him. All you need is belief in me.”
“You don’t deserve it.”
“Maybe not. But I shall get it.”
Elira that night sat before the window of the hotel, gazing in the traffic. She was not able to sleep. Could not think straight.
She had an email awaiting when she logged in. No name. No subject.
But only this line: Your move, Elira. Tick tock.
And affixed thereto: a picture, which exhibits Zayden, leaving his day-school, taking the hand of Mrs. Harlow.
The time stamp was 20 mins old.
Without a moment of thought, she held the phone and called Caelum.
She had another message, she said.
“I understand.”
The blood toppled in her veins. “But you know, of course, what you mean?”
“His security team took him over. Now he is out of danger with me.”
“What?! You snatched him? Without consulting me!?”
“I am defending him. Whichever way, you are being observed.”
“You had no right”
“I did not do wrong to do so. He is my son also.”
She broke down in voice. “Bring him back.”
“I will,” he said. “When this is done. And when I am sure I shall stop you running.”
Elira was standing, with her breathless eyes blazing.
This is a war. And she already lost the first fight.
- Writer
