He calmed down,and his mind started to work again. He didn’t know whether Darius was tellingthe truth because of how expressionless he was. It was the complete opposite ofhow psychological textbooks described a person who was supposed to be excited.As an actor, thelead security guard had once taken a psychology class to portray his charactermore realistically. And so, he trusted the textbook to be right. He looked atDarius and tried to read him.Darius knew whathe was up to, but he didn’t respond. After a few more seconds of silence, hesaid, “I want to know the reason for your disappearance. My gut tells me it’salso why you became a security guard here. I’ll eventually deal with thesepeople, so there’s no point in you hiding the truth. If you want to continuebeing a successful person with a successful career, these people will onlybecome obstacles to you—just like what happened back then. However, I can’t besure that they’ll be kind enough to leave you alive this time.”
“He also has alot of socially unacceptable thoughts. In the beginning, things didn’t go wellfor him because his actions caused people to fear him. As time passed, peoplestarted to forget, and under my father’s watchful eye, he became more and morelike a normal child—one that was great at bringing joy to others.” The leadsecurity guard looked at Darius seriously. “You have tobelieve me. I’ve told countless people about this, but none of them believedme. I’m telling the truth!” His voice trembled with agitation.Darius nodded andpatted him on the shoulder. “Calm down. I know Felix; he died after jumping outof my office window. It’s all over the internet, and the authorities questionedme about it. He’s already dead, so you have nothing to worry about.”The lead securityguard lowered his head, not wanting Darius to see how out of control hisemotions were. Darius looked at him and sighed when he sensed his emotions. Hestood up and said, “I think we can end things here now.”T
And that was whyhe was here. This was his only chance. He’d originally been the richest man inAlmiron City, but Darius had easily taken that all away from him. This meantthat none of the other affluent families in Almiron City could help him becausethey didn’t stand a chance against Darius.Wilson had beentrying to decide between starting over in a new place before returning to getrevenge and letting go. Though he’d only just heard of the Reid family anddidn’t know much about it, he clearly understood it was wealthy and influentialenough to have eyes and ears in many different cities. This meant the Reidfamily was even more terrifying than he imagined.At this verymoment, Darius was seated in his office as he thought about the lead securityguard’s father’s company. The lead security guard had already left the room,but he suddenly returned. He hurried into the room and quickly shut the door.His sneakiness made Darius raise an eyebrow and look at him curiously—he lookedlik
She got to herfeet in a rage, making her chair screech against the floor. She stormed over tothe sofa and plopped down on it before looking at her phone. Instantly, heranger disappeared—Darius was the one calling her. Her breathing sped up, butshe calmed down in a few seconds. She knew he hadto be calling because something had happened. There was no other reason for himto call her. She exhaled, feeling disappointed. Still, she answered the phoneand said sweetly, “Mr. Reid, this is Erin.”Darius asked, “IsZack still working on something at the company?”Erin didn’t knowwhat had happened, but she had an ominous feeling. “No, he left for AlmironCity two days ago.” Suddenly, she realized what was wrong. She shot to her feetand cried, “I think I know what’s happened, but I need some time to thinkthings over. I’ll need to hang up.” Instead ofreceiving a reply from Darius, all she got was the sound of the dial tone.She lowered herarm to her side, keeping a tight grip on her
He got a callfrom Ansel, who sounded infuriated. Before Darius could say anything, Anselsnarled, “Mr. Reid, it’s as you expected—none of them want to come with me! Infact, they’re unbelievably contemptuous.”Darius smiled.“Check your inbox in two minutes, then forward my email to them.” After hangingup, his fingers flew over the keyboard. A few seconds later, information on FTTV’s board of directors appeared on his desktop. He sighed, thencopied all the dirt he could find on them into a word document before sendingit to Ansel.Ansel forwardedit to the board members without looking at it. Then, they turned to him with anodd mixture of angry looks and sycophantic smiles. How could there be suchpeople in this world? He felt weirdedout and didn’t really know how to respond, so he put his hands behind his back.It was a goodthing he’d grown up in a challenging environment. He’d heard plenty aboutpeople like this in the past, but this was his first time seeing them inperson
This was thefirst time he felt like someone trusted him wholly. He was desperate to dosomething for Darius, so he pulled his phone out again. Darius raised aneyebrow, not knowing what he was up to. Then, he saw Ansel frown again. “Mr. Reid, Ithink I’ve failed you once again. The board members aren’t coming here.” He wasnervous to say this, but he didn’t expect to see Darius smile again.Ansel clenchedhis fists and trembled with a mixture of nervousness and anger. He didn’t knowwhy Darius was smiling. Even if he could tell that there was no malice behindit, it still made him uncomfortable. The anger on hisface was obvious, and Darius could sense his negative emotions. He immediatelydropped the smile, straightened up, and put a hand on Ansel’s shoulder. “I can guesswhat’s on your mind, but there’s no need for that. You’re justinexperienced—perhaps it’s because you’ve never learned these things before, orperhaps it’s because someone stopped you from learning about them. W
Darius alreadyheld the board members accountable for his wasted time here. He smirked andturned his computer on again to scrutinize the information he’d gotten on them.The more he read, the wider his eyes became. There werethirteen board members in total, and aside from Ansel, none of the remainingtwelve were kind souls. Not only had they not done a single act of kindness intheir lives, but they were also continuously doing bad things.Darius narrowedhis eyes, practically spitting fire. It was hard to believe that he hadn’tnoticed these things before. He took a deep breath, stood up, and put his handsbehind his back. Ansel frowned at this, sensing that Darius wasn’t in a goodmood. He put his phoneon speaker, noticing that it made Darius look slightly appeased, and herelaxed. However, it didn’t last long because the person on the other end ofthe line hung up after a few seconds.Ansel’sexpression darkened, and he looked at Darius. No matter how dense he was, hecould te
He handed Dariusthe phone without hesitation and watched him curiously.Darius held thephone up and said without preamble, “I’m sure you’ve already seen the news—oneof your owner’s not-so-loyal dogs, Felix, died after jumping from my window.Yet I haven’t been punished in any way. In fact, I’m free to roam every cornerof Almiron City, whether it’s your company or home. I’m ten minutes away fromreaching the peak of my anger.” After that, he hung up.Ansel gaped athim. He was shocked by Darius’ words but more so by the board members’ actions.He’d noticed that the second Darius started speaking, the booming music on theother end of the line had disappeared. It made him wonder where they reallywere.“They’re at thecorner-most bar on 18th Avenue,” Darius said. Even if Ansel hadn’t asked, heknew what he was wondering.Ansel gaped evenmore. “How’d you know, Mr. Reid? They didn’t tell us anything.”Darius smiled. Heput the phone down and pushed it toward Ansel. At the same time,