Who did you murder this time

“I’ll kill you.” Ophelia screamed.

“You will never see your mother again,” Ariel shrugged. Then she frowned, her face getting dark. “Let my father go within the hour, or I don’t trust what I will do to your mother.”

Ophelia quickly took her phone out, and hastily dialed a number. “Let him go.”

Then she turned to Ariel. “You will pay for this.”

Ariel was smiling again.

She closed the gap between her and Ophelia, and whispered in her face.

“When I am done with you, you will beg for death.”

Then she stepped back.

She bowed mockingly, and began to walk away.

Ophelia stared after her, her whole body shaking with rage.

She should have killed this damned woman that day. Make her drink a more potent poison or just strangle her.

Her phone started vibrating in her hand, startling her.

“Father.” She said fearfully into her phone.

“You wench.” He screamed over the phone. “Come here. Now!”

She stood, shaking at the realization that her father had probably noticed her mother had gone missing.

After what he did to her following last night’s scandal, she was terrified to go see him.

But she could not ignore his summons either.

Her father was not one to be messed with.

She looked down to see her fingers were bleeding. In her nervousness, she had pushed her cuticles back till they broke, and they began to bleed.

She hit her hand against her head again and again, and finally stepped into her car.

***

“Your father is furious.” The butler whispered to her as he placed her house slippers before her.

She winced, hesitating, but she could not delay much longer. That would only make the man angrier.

“What is this?” Her father screamed as soon as he saw her.

“Father.” She bowed deeply.

“Cut it.” Her father slapped a note against her face. “What the hell is this?”

She took the note, and her hand shook as she looked at it.

OPHELIA KNOWS

Was boldly scribbled on the note.

“This was found in your mother’s ward, and now she is missing,” Her father shouted. “What do you know?”

“No, father," She went on her knees fearfully.

“Tell me you forgot to inform me before moving your mother. I will take that better than my suspicion that one of your enemies did this.”

“I don’t know anything about this, father.” Ophelia kept her head down, trembling like a leaf in the wind.

She felt her father lean down, and bring his eyes on a level with hers. His eyes reminded her of a cheetah’s.

“Do you think it is the minister?”

“I don’t know, father.” She replied, quickly lowering her gaze again.

“You scum.” He shouted as he straightened up, and kicked her side. “Stop saying you don’t know. I need answers.”

She fell to her side and burst into tears.

“National leader.” She heard the butler’s voice behind them. “The madam has been found. The hospital’s director is here to see you.”

Ophelia struggled back to her knees just in time to see two men walk in.

Both of them went on their knees, touching their heads to the floor before the National leader.

“There has been a mistake sir. The madam was wheeled to another wing of the hospital for some tests. We are sorry the staff did not communicate this properly.” Both men touched their heads to the floor again and again.

Ophelia looked at them in disbelief.

How had Ariel pulled this off?

Of course, these men were lying. Her mother had been kidnapped earlier. Whatever Ariel had done, they were all in on it.

But she said nothing.

“Gabeen. It is no problem. I was just worried about my wife.” Her father walked past her, and helped the men up.

“Don’t bow to ordinary mortals. Mistakes happen.”

“Thank you, sir. Thank you, sir.” The fools chorused.

“Just warn your staff to communicate better next time.” He laughed, looking like the amiable old man the whole country thought he was.

“Yes, National leader.” The men bowed deeply.

Her father continued smiling as they dropped gifts, and the butler finally walked them out.

“Come.” Her father said to one of his goons in a suit. “I want them in an ICU.”

“Yes, National leader.” The guard bowed.

“Not dead. So a little car crash should do.”

The goon bowed, and began to walk out.

“Wait.”

“The goon paused.

“Don’t forget to send a get-well package from me the day after.” He said, kicking the gifts they had brought off the table.

They crashed and broke, and shards of glass scattered all over.

Ophelia protected her face with her hands, still not daring to stand up.

“Yes, National leader.” The goon disappeared, and her father turned to her.

“You stupid wench,” He turned to Ophelia, picking up a leather flogger from the couch.

He raised it high in the air and brought it down with a crack on her skin.

I jumped in my seat, startled at the sound. I looked up to see it was Blaine who had slammed my office door shut.

“Get out.” He yelled, and all my assistants scrambled out.

I looked at him, the heat of my sudden fury now matching his flaming eyes.

“It is inappropriate for you to keep barking out orders. Have you somehow forgotten you are no longer chairman here?”

“So far, I have been easy with you because you are my child’s mother,” Blaine said, walking towards me.

“Watch your tone.” I warned.

He stopped, his jaw falling, looking at me in disbelief.

“I, Blaine Tucker, should watch my tone?”

“That’s right.” I said, nonchalantly. “Watch your tone, Mr Tucker.”

And then I felt someone hauling me off my seat, to my feet.

I found my face inches away from his, staring into his furious eyes.

“Your win is temporary, Ariel. This is my family’s company,” His fingers painfully dug into my arm in his tight grip. “I will make the whole of Môshon my family’s again. I don’t know how I would do it, but I swear on grandfather’s life, I will.”

“I like to see you try.” I challenged, staring him in the eye. “It would be a shame if you didn’t.”

He snarled at me, his jaw working and a vein beginning to pulse in his temple.

It was extremely satisfying to see how much I could get on his nerves.

He suddenly let go of my arm, and I narrowly managed to not lose my balance.

The bastard.

“You bring out the worst in me.” He said, shaking his head at me.

“Like you did me?”

“Don’t try to gaslight me," he yelled. "You are a social climber, gold-digger, Ariel. I just hate myself for not seeing it earlier.

"Your mother wanted to have my heir so badly, but she failed. So she groomed you to try. Now where the hell is my son?”

I ignored his cutting words.

I tried not to think about how I had given myself to this man who I thought was different, when he was in fact no different from other men.

He was just another lying man, like all the rest, who had deceived my mother, ruining her reputation.

Blaine was a selfish billionaire who would do anything to get a woman in his bed, and then dump her afterward.

“Answer me, Ariel.” He said, through gritted teeth, closing the distance between us.

“You will speak to me respectfully, Mr Tucker.” I said calmly, returning to my seat. “I am no longer your employee.”

If I and Kan’s plans were going to go as smoothly as I planned, I had to keep a calm head at all times.

One angry or emotional decision would ruin everything.

Blaine exhaled through his mouth, punched my desk again and again, and turned his back to me.

“You are driving me crazy,” he said quietly.

His words transported me to the night Oliver had been made. That one night, I let myself be loose and wild. He had said the exact words in the same tone, as I clenched my walls around him.

I stood up from my seat.

He turned and pinned his eyes on me.

I forced myself to stand still. It was counterproductive to let him think he intimidated him.

“I will not stop asking till you give me an answer. Next time, I might not ask this gently,” he said in a menacing, quiet voice. “You cannot keep my son from me.”

“What son? The one you did not want?”

He stared at me.

“I was destroying your perfect little life with your pageant queen. I am not anymore. Leave me the hell alone.” I said in a measured, angry voice.

I bent, and began to gather my belongings.

It was getting late. My baby needed me. I should not be locked in here with his crazy father.

“You can not be planning to walk out on me mid-conversation,” he said in a warning voice.

I looked up, unable to control the anger that swept over me at that stupid comment.

“What will you do? Lock me up? Restrain me?” I yelled.

As soon as those words left my mouth, the atmosphere became awkward.

The way he stared at me, I knew we both remembered the same thing.

I will restrain you, stop moving

I grabbed my purse, walked round him, and began to head out the door.

“Ariel.”

I ignored him.

“Ariel.”

I reached the door and pulled it open.

“Ariel.” And then I felt his hand on my arm.

I spun around and whacked his head with my purse.

“Don’t ever touch me again.”

He stepped back, a little surprised at whatever he saw in my eyes.

“Your son is dead.” I said. “Did you hear me? Dead? He was never born.”

I turned and hurried out.

I was too upset to wait inside the building for the car to be brought around.

I looked around, and my eyes settled on an odd-looking black car.

Ophelia gasped, her hand momentarily leaving the steering wheel she had been clenching.

Had the bitch seen her?

But she saw Ariel look away again.

Ophelia relaxed.

It seemed even the universe wanted the bitch dead today. She was alone.

An acting chairman should not be out alone, and at this time.

Ophelia did not hesitate even one moment.

She took her foot off the brakes, and began to drive straight for where the little bitch stood.