Miss Gray’s Vengeance

The Battle Line

Noah jolted upright in bed, his eyes searching frantically for the source of the noise before they finally settled on the banging door.

“The fuck.” He raked his fingers through his hair groaning as the morning light assaulted his eyes. He’d forgotten to draw the curtains the night before.

“Boss!”

The urgent call from outside elicited another groan from him, anticipating an impending headache. Morning was never his forte.

“The hell you want?” He roared to the person at the other side of the door.

“Boss, it's urgent.”

“It better be or kiss your ass goodbye.” With that threat, he kicked the blanket off his body and strode to the door.

He gripped the handle of the door and flung it open in force. His eyes fell on his secretary. “You’ve got a death wish?” The man gasped when Noah grabbed him by his collar and passed him a death glare.

“Boss, it…it’s bad news.”

Noah grunted and let the man go with a push. The man staggered backward and after managing to balance himself, he returned his gaze to the floor.

“What is it this time?”

“Th…the media…. Rumor..”

“What is it? Spill immediately, Adam.”

With a shaky hand, Adam fished his phone out of his pocket and passed it to him.

“What is this?”

“Read it, boss.”

Noah’s gaze averted down to the phone in his hand, reading each and every word that was written boldly on it. “The f**k is this?” He exclaimed as he read further, his roar reverberating in the entire house. “Who wrote this on here?”

“This news is everywhere now. There is barely anything that we can do.” The fake news about the Hank Corporation dealing with fake electricals was everywhere. There was news that the Hanks produced fake electricals that caused harm to the people.

Noah ran his fingers through his messy hair, his chest heaving upward and downward in anger. Never in his entire years of business had he produced anything of bad quality. Their products were always of good quality.

“Find out who published this s**t and have it taken down, immediately. I don't give a f**k how it goes down but make sure it does before noon.” He threw the phone back to him.

“Yes, boss.”

“Then what are you still doing here?”

“Th…There's one more thing sir.”

“What?”

“One more article.”

“Give me the damn phone.”

He snatched the phone from his secretary and started scrolling through all the news articles of the day until his gaze settled on one that made his eyes widen.

“They are canceling the deal because of the rumor, boss. What are we going to do? The Gray corporation has decided to cut off all ties with them and end the deal that they were supposed to have because of the circulating rumor about...”

The sound of the phone colliding so hard with the floor caused Adam to clamp his mouth shut and lower his head. “Go get this news off the internet,” Noah ordered and with that, he stormed back into his room.

*****

At exactly noon, Noah stepped into the Gray’s corporation with his head up high ignoring the attention that he received from the company employees. He needed to deal with the issue as soon as possible as his company had lost a ridiculous amount of deals in a few hours.

As he stepped into the top floor, his gaze locked onto Ella who stood guard outside the CEO’s office. “Where is she?” He demanded, his voice firm.

“Mr Hank,” Ella greeted. “I’m afraid you can’t meet with Miss Gray. She’d asked not to be disturbed. Maybe some other day.”

“Inform her who it is?”

“It doesn’t matter who you are, Mr Hank. The order states that I shouldn’t let anyone in. I’m sorry but we can't entertain visitors...”

“I’ll do it my way then.” He cut her off.

Before she could register his words in her head, he marched toward the door of Eve’s office and pushed it open. She caught up to him just in time and they both stepped inside, their eyes on Eve whose piercing gaze was fixed on Noah.

“I tried to stop him,” Ella sighed.

“It’s fine. Leave.”

Once Ella was gone, Eve cleared her throat, leaned back on her chair, and began to twirl the glass of wine in her hand.

“I see you're celebrating with yourself,” he sneered.

“Don’t care to join me. You’ll defile my cup.”

“I see.” With a smirk settled on his lips, he took steps forward. “One would think that the daughter of the mighty Gray family would be the better choice to run the company. Who would have thought that she would go about ruining things.”

“Nah, I don't know what you're talking about. What I do and don't is none of your business. I'll run this place not by you.”

“Considering how dumb and careless you are, I wonder what convinced him to leave his company in your care.”

“That's also none of your business.”

“It is. You ruin everything good in your damn life. I should inform your father about that ill luck.”

“Can you shut the hell up?” Deciding that she had enough, Eve rose from her chair and walked around her desk to stand before him, her glare venomous. How dare he come to her place of work and ruin her mood in just a minute? She’d been having a good time herself before he stormed into her office and ruined everything just like he always does.

With his two-piece black suit, neatly combed hair, and with the way he towered over her in her own space, one might think that he was the boss here and not her. She felt small compared to him.

“I suggest that you leave if you have nothing reasonable to speak about. I was busy before you stepped in and made the environment sour.”

“Busy plotting as always.”

She threw her head backward and let out a short laugh.

“You know me too well. I’m not speaking to you, Noah. Not today. When you’re done, use the door.” Eve looked him over before swiveling around and making her way back to her chair where she sat and continued sipping from her wine while scrolling through her phone.

Noah’s anger escalated. His fist clenched and he strolled to her table and slammed on it harshly.

“I'm not here for jokes, Genevieve. Fix your mess or else…”

“Or else what, huh?” She snapped, meeting his burning gaze with one of hers. “What will you do? Oh, don't be surprised honey. I'm done pretending to be cute and calm. You're ungrateful.”

“I see you don't want peace, Eve.”

“Genevieve.”

“Tell me, why did you do that, huh?”

“Cancel the deal? Come on, everyone is canceling their deals with your company. You don't expect me not to. I mean, the deal was important to me as it was to you too.”

“Don't act ignorant with me. Here.”

He gave her his phone with the news article opened in it. Eve hesitantly took it and scrolled through the article. Once she was done reading, she rolled her eyes and returned it to him.

“And what does this have to do with me?”

“You don’t know anything about it? You sure?”

“Just leave, I don’t know what you’re trying to say.”

“You're dancing with fire, Genevieve, and I'm warning you, you're bound to get burnt.”

She chuckled. “I wonder who’ll get burnt at the end. But from the look of things, you’re already getting burnt.” She gestured to his phone. She leaned back on her seat and sipped from her glass with a smile on her lips.

“You really want to bring me down this badly?”

“You can't imagine.”

“Well, I'm no longer shocked at whatever s**t you do. Considering that all you know how to do is bring people down just like you did with Melissa a year ago. You almost killed her, why? Because you were jealous?”

“Noah!”

“All I'm saying is the truth and I'm warning you, Genevieve Gray. If you don't stop this, you are going to get burnt in YOUR OWN FIRE.”

“I asked you to stop mentioning the past.” Her voice was calm yet restrained.

“I care less about that.”

“Fine then. Let's watch who is going to get burnt in this game of mine.” All of these, he started it and she was just making sure to finish it.

“You're drawing a battle line.”

“I don't care if I draw a death line or a battle line. All I'm saying is that you better watch who is going to get burnt in the fire. This is just the beginning and I promise you, more and more are to come until I'm satisfied.”

Noah gritted his teeth as he tore his gaze from the woman who used to be his wife. He clamped his eyes shut. She was the same from a year ago yet different. The woman before him right now was like the devil, ready to do anything and everything to bring him down. The Eve who used to be married to him would never have such look in her eyes nor look at him with such burning hatred and quest for revenge.

She used to look at him with so much love and affection. She used to stare at him longingly as if her life depended on him and he could still remember the faint blush plastered on her cheek each time she stared into his eyes. In short, she looked at him like a human god.

Sparing her a last look, he grabbed his phone and turned his back to her, marched out of her office, and closed the door with a bang after him.

She finally relaxed on her chair, her eyes still on the door.

Yes, she knew how much Noah valued his company. She knew how much he cared for it and it was the main reason she striked. A year ago, he’d valued his company even more than her. But even after her successful plan, she still felt unhappy. Perhaps she needed to do more.

His words were hurtful, his accusations tore through her heart. She’d never thought of bringing anyone down before all of these.

Perhaps it was time to prove her innocence? To end the accusation once and for all? Enough is enough and she can’t keep suffering for a sin she knew nothing about. It was time to expose the truth to the whole world.