Chapter 2- The investigation
1131 Words
The morning after the storm was silent too silent.
The luxury suite bore no trace of chaos, yet the tension in the air was sharp enough to cut through glass. The silk sheets, the faint scent of perfume, and the memory of a touch he couldn’t erase all lingered like ghosts that refused to leave.
Charles Montgomery stood at the window again, dressed in a crisp black shirt, collar undone, sleeves rolled up. He hadn’t slept. He couldn’t.
His reflection in the glass looked foreign the same cold eyes, the same perfect composure, but something about his face felt wrong. Contaminated.
He hated that word.
He hated how his mind kept drifting back to the girl the fear in her eyes, the trembling of her lips when she whispered apologies she didn’t owe him.
“Sir?”
The deep voice of Daniel, his long-time assistant, broke through the haze. Daniel entered the suite quietly, professional as always, carrying Charles’s tablet and phone. “You requested I come early.”
Charles turned, his tone sharp and clipped. “Close the door.”
Daniel obeyed.
“Find out what happened last night.”
Daniel blinked. “Sir?”
“I was drugged,” Charles said, his voice low but firm. “Someone from within the company possibly connected to the Liang delegation. I want every name, every drink, every move traced.”
Daniel’s brow furrowed. “Understood, sir. But if you don’t mind me asking… did anything else happen?”
Charles’s jaw tightened. For a moment, he said nothing. Then he turned away, picking up his tumbler though it was empty.
“There was a woman here,” he said finally. “I don’t know who she is or how she got in.”
Daniel’s eyes flickered with surprise, but his tone stayed neutral. “Do you believe she was part of the setup?”
Charles’s gaze turned steely. “That’s what I intend to find out.”
Daniel nodded. “I’ll have security pull the hotel’s CCTV. Do you have a description?”
Charles paused. His mind betrayed him, recalling the soft lines of her face, the way her long hair spilled across the pillow, the faint quiver in her voice. He forced the image away.
“She’s young. Dark hair. Average height. Possibly mid-twenties,” he said finally, the words clipped and cold. “Find her. I want everything her name, her background, and how she entered this room.”
Daniel didn’t question him further. He’d worked for Charles long enough to know when to stay silent.
Meanwhile, across the city…
Bella sat on the edge of her bed, a trembling hand clutching her phone. The morning light felt cruel. Every sound the chirping outside, the faint hum of the ceiling fan mocked her.
Her body ached. Her heart felt like glass.
She tried to piece the night together, but the memories came in flashes: a drink, her stepsister’s smile, Ryan’s voice, the dizzying spin of the world, and then him.
A stranger’s face in the dark.
The warmth of his skin.
The weight of his breath against her neck.
Tears spilled down her cheeks as she pressed her palms to her eyes. “No… no, no…”
Her phone buzzed. A message from Vivian:
“I hope you had fun last night, sis 😉”
Her stomach turned. She knew now every bit of it had been planned. The drugs, the setup, everything.
And she’d walked right into it.
But why? Why would they go this far?
Then it hit her Ryan. Her boyfriend of two years, the man who’d once sworn he loved her, had been part of it too. The betrayal burned through her chest like acid.
She curled into herself, sobbing quietly, her body shaking.
When she finally looked up, her reflection in the mirror startled her.
Her eyes once bright and hopeful were red and hollow. Her lips trembled as she whispered to herself, “You have to move on, Bella. You have to survive this.”
But even as she said it, she knew the night had marked her in ways she couldn’t yet understand.
Back at Montgomery Enterprises, the atmosphere was different cold, calculated, efficient. The world moved on as if nothing had happened, but Charles’s mind refused to.
He sat behind his glass desk, his fingers drumming against the surface as Daniel entered with a tablet in hand.
“I pulled the hotel footage, sir,” Daniel said. “You were right. Something happened.”
He swiped across the screen, showing Charles the feed from the hallway.
At 10:57 p.m., Charles was seen entering his suite. At 11:05, the hotel staff delivered the wine. Then, at 11:23, the camera captured a woman disoriented, stumbling, trying to find her way.
She looked fragile, lost. Her face wasn’t entirely clear, but Charles recognized her instantly.
It was her.
“Pause it,” he ordered.
Daniel did.
Charles leaned forward, eyes narrowing. “Do we know who she is?”
“Not yet, sir. But the hotel logs show she wasn’t a registered guest. Security reported a disturbance in another suite apparently, a group of people left abruptly around the same time.”
Charles’s gaze darkened. “Find out who booked that room.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And Daniel…”
“Sir?”
Charles’s tone lowered calm, dangerous, final. “Discreetly. No one outside this room hears about this. Not the board, not the staff, not even security. I’ll deal with this personally.”
Daniel hesitated, then nodded. “Understood, sir.”
When he left, Charles leaned back in his chair, exhaling slowly. The sight of Bella’s frightened face haunted him not because of guilt alone, but because of the way something inside him stirred. Something he hadn’t felt in years.
He’d built walls for a reason to protect himself from vulnerability, from weakness, from emotion. But the memory of that night kept bleeding through the cracks.
Her voice echoed again in his mind “Please… I didn’t mean to…”
And for the first time in years, Charles Montgomery wasn’t sure what frightened him more: the betrayal that had drugged him… or the thought of caring about the girl who’d been caught in it.
That evening, as the city lights came alive again, Charles stood at his office window, staring out at the horizon. The world below him obeyed, bowed, and feared him yet for the first time, he felt something slipping beyond his control.
“Bella,” he murmured under his breath, testing the sound of her name even though he didn’t know it yet.
He’d find her.
He always found what he wanted.
And when he did, he’d get answers even if he had to tear the truth from the shadows.
- Writer
