Chased By The Billionaire

Three

“He meets up with different guys every week and takes them to the Garden Hotel he owns in Lily Street. I can send you CCTV footage of him and the men he brings,” Alex said into the phone that Green had sent for him. He stood in the middle of his new bedroom, in his new modest one-bedroom apartment, as he pulled off his tie and unbuttoned his shirt.

“That’s it?” Green asked. “You called me for that?”

Alex frowned as he threw his shirt onto the bed. “Yeah, why—”

“That’s not news!” Green bellowed. “For goodness' sake, even the media knows that Torque likes d***s! Don’t you watch the news? What kind of goddamn information is this? Call me when you have something of substance!”

Before Alex could respond, the other man hung up the phone. Alex groaned, threw the phone towards the bed, and typed Cassian's name on the internet search bar. Just as Green said, news speculating Cassian’s new romantic male partner showed up on the third line. No one seemed to be surprised of the man's sexuality except for Alex.

“Damn it,” he grunted as he shut the computer off and slid open the glass door that led to the balcony. Cool air brought by the early winter rushed into his bedroom, but he didn’t mind. Snow was about to fall in a month or so.

There wasn’t much of a view from his third-floor apartment. In fact, there was a newer and bigger apartment building directly in front of him, and below was basically an alleyway full of trash. If he craned his neck enough to the right, he could see a narrow road filled with honking cars and street vendors.

Alex felt his phone vibrate in his pants’ pocket. There were only a handful of people who knew his number and all of them were important, so he picked up the call without hesitation.

“Hello?”

“You like the view?” Tee’s voice said.

“There is no view, Tee,” Alex replied.

“Well, I wanted to get you a fancy apartment, but you told me to get a cheap one. So I got you a fairly nice apartment at Carnation street. It is, in fact, a relatively well-known cheap flower. Carnations, I mean,” Tee babbled on. “I asked the landlord to send me photos of the furnished apartment and it didn’t look half bad.”

Alex looked behind him, at the small cracks on the cement wall and the creaky floorboards. “Whatever. I’ve slept in worse places,” he dismissively said. “Anyway, what do you have for me?”

He could hear the noise of Tee typing aggressively on his keyboard. “Well, tonight’s gentleman caller was truly a dud. Mr. Danny Thomas owns a small restaurant in Saffron street that our man Cassian has never been to. They don’t run in the same circles, and there’s literally nothing connecting them except the bar and their preferences. Just as expected, it truly was just a one-night stand. And oh, would you look at that! Here comes Mr. Danny Thomas going out of the room three hours later!” Tee howled, that Alex had to keep the phone away as he rolled his eyes.

Alex watched as a lady on the street below got her purse stolen, while Tee continued, “Three hours! You think they actually did it for three whole hours? Because if so, then honey, what a stamina!”

“What else?” Alex replied. The lady was now running to catch the mugger, and even took off her heels to run barefoot.

“I got you a position at HP Motors,” Tee informed him. The lady threw one of her heels towards the man. “You’ll be Alex Smith, the new temp at the Marketing Division. It’s a low-level position, but at least you’ll be in the same building as Mr. Hotshot.”

The lady threw another shoe and it landed directly at the man's head, knocking him down just enough for her to catch up. “When do I start?” asked Alex.

“On Monday. I’ll have your papers delivered tomorrow. Tonight, I’m gonna catch up on my shows.” Street vendors have noticed the woman pulling her bag from the mugger, and helped her beat him up.

“Huh,” Alex breathed out, as he watched the scene below with amusement.

Tee, misunderstanding his reaction, defensively said, “Hey, I haven’t watched the last season of The Good Place, alright? Double A had me working my ass off.”

“The what now?” Alex asked, confused. He could hear the tech groan.

“Geez, Louise, Mr. Ace. Turn on the TV every once in a while, will you? This is why you got so shocked on the news about Torque, even when he's practically like a Kardashian in fame. You know what, I’ma send you everything about Cassian as well. Read up for the weekend, ‘kay?”

“I will, I will,” Alex assured him.

“Alright. Later, Ace. Also, put a shirt on, man, it’s a cold December, for goodness' sake,” Tee said, then hung up.

Alex looked down at his bare chest, then around the street for any surveillance. True enough, there was a CCTV camera on the street that was supposed to be overseeing the road, yet was angled up towards him. Alex put up his middle finger and smiled, then went back inside.

The apartment was small and minimally furnished, but it was enough. Outside of his room, there was a fridge and a stove, a small dining table with two plastic chairs, and an old couch in front of a small TV, all sharing the same space. There wasn’t even a fire alarm or a fire extinguisher in sight, and there were only two narrow windows—one near the stove, and one by the corner near the couch.

Alex decided to unpack his things—which weren’t much. Since he was taken in by the agency ten years ago, all he had ever brought with him were the essentials—his personal surveillance gadgets, a set of knives, a handgun, a wallet, and an old wrist watch that used to belong to his adoptive father. Everything could basically fit in a backpack, which was necessary for a man like him that had to hide and move quite so often.

He held the wristwatch and admired it. The battery had died a few years back, and there was a small crack on the glass from that one time he had to jump from a building with his backpack on.

“One last job,” he muttered to himself, smoothing his thumb over the face of the watch. He smiled and placed it on his nightstand. “Now it feels like home.”

***

The next day, Alex went on with his normal mission routine. He checked the perimeter on the pretense of going out for a run. He bought groceries, and clothes and accessories for his new persona. He worked out in the narrow space he wasn’t sure if he should call a living room, a kitchen, or a dining room. Then he took a bath and cooked himself brunch.

As expected, he received a box from Tee around lunchtime, and so he began to do his homework. Alex may not be attuned to social media or current events, but that was because he chose to know only what he had to. And this time, he studied up on everything there was to know about HP Motors and its CEO, Cassian Torque. From the looks of it, Cassian led quite a privileged life. Good grades in top schools, leadership awards, endless seminars. His mother died when he was a teenager, and his father had gone on to marry and divorce a few women after that. He has two younger step-brothers, but being the eldest and the brightest, he was the one groomed into the position.

Cassian received no backlash for being gay. The media, however, had quite a couple of things to say about how he seemed to be embracing the bachelor life promiscuously. The only relationships he had that lasted more than a night were during his high-school and college days. After that, nothing. It would've been easier if he had a boyfriend who Alex could leech information from.

When Monday rolled in, Alex was ready in his slightly oversized suit and tie, and overnight knowledge on the corporation. He put on fake glasses, and didn’t bother styling his hair. Instead, he just ruffled it up so it looked like he had an unruly dark brown mop on his head that went down to his eyebrows. Lastly, he put on the brown contact lenses that Tee provided.

“Looks good, no?” Alex smugly asked as he checked himself out in the rearview mirror of his banged-up rental car, after sending a photo to Tee.

He could hear the tech click his tongue. “We're going for the ol’ Clark Kent look, huh? Kinda unfair that you still look nice. You really are a pretty boy.”

Alex smirked. “Can’t help it, Tee. I was born with it.”

“Whatever, Ace,” Alex could imagine Tee roll his eyes, even though he’s never really seen the guy’s face. “Oh, here comes Mr. Hotshot. Two black HP cars are on the driveway.”

“Uh huh,” Alex hummed, calmly collecting his tattered sling bag.

“What are you doing? He’s come out now. Aren’t you gonna stage a run-in?”

“Not today,” he replied, getting out of the car. “I’m going to observe him this week, and try to get close to the employees first. Gossips usually run wild at the lower-level management. Ah, I leave work at 5, right? What time does he usually leave?”

“Around 6 or 7. Sometimes, he stays until 11 for work,” Tee informed him. “Five more minutes and you’ll be late, you know.”

Alex leaned on the side of his car and checked his watch. “I know.”

He waited for three more minutes, slightly loosened his tie, then began running to the elevator.

“First day at HP Motors. Good luck, Ace.”