Until The End

CHAPTER 11 - MEET THE WALLACES

Smug self-complacency was what Nadia felt when she pushed open the conference room doors exactly twelve seconds before the stated time and found it free of Dylan VanAssche. She had managed to beat the clock, despite the swarm of employees returning from their lunch break, who had unknowingly tried to jeopardise her mission by obstructing her journey.

Nadia walked inside with a spring in her step, owing to her recent accomplishment. The few occupants of the room did not express any notice of the addition of the new member. Nadia was glad for the lack of attention. She had already received a week's worth of it in the cafeteria.

Dylan's assistant, Elyse, was at one corner of the room, preparing refreshments for the meeting. A group of people—seemingly technicians—was clustered near the digital screen that covered half of the wall. The only occupied seats at the giant U-shaped conference table were by a red-haired woman and her companion. The woman's head was tipped down as she worked on her files, while the man sitting to her right—with a darker shade of copper hair—had his legs crossed on the table, his eyes closed.

The head chair at the centre was empty, which Nadia figured was going to be Dylan's self-acclaimed throne. She counted six chairs to its left, before dropping the count and sitting at the farthest end.

Being an employee—a dedicated one at that, as she liked to call herself—Nadia could not challenge Dylan's authority. That would be an excellent way to lose her job. But by no means does it imply that she could not search for loopholes. She could, by all means, sieve his orders like weathered sand and search for the brightly coloured shells of ambiguity hidden beneath them. She could not decline to be a part of the meeting, she could not be late to it, and she could not disobey his summons, but the 12-chair distance in between would be her symbol of defiance to his dictatorship.

Nadia placed her files on the table and looked around, trying to gather intel. She had never attended a meeting unprepared. Whether it was a knack to gather information or gain credibility, she wasn't sure. But her habit of deep research was a coat of armour and she felt defenceless sitting without it in a conference that was apparently quite important.

The set-up for the presentation was completed and the group came around the table to take their seats—except the presenter, who stayed behind. On close observation, Nadia noticed the ID cards around their necks were different to hers. She narrowed her eyes, but with the distance, it was hard to read their company's name. Barely a second later that thought, the screen lit up, displaying it in huge block letters—Wallace Technologies. Nadia rolled the name on her tongue. It sounded familiar. It looked familiar. With a little push to her memory, she recalled it was the business magazines and the internet that she knew it from. As reported by tabloids, they were closely associated with Dylan's company, but that was all she could remember about the firm.

"Jesus Christ! It's been fifteen minutes," Nadia heard the copper-haired non-dozer groan as he opened his eyes and pulled his feet off the table, "where the fuck is Dylan?"

It appeared it was a rhetorical question because though glances were shared among the employees, no one was keen to reply.

"Does your boss not want to have this deal?" The man threw an angry look at Elyse, who was setting refreshments on the table.

"He certainly does, Mr Wallace," she replied politely.

"Then he should learn to value others' time. You know I had eight different companies who wanted to sign a deal with me, but I decided to give this one a chance? I'm doing you a favour here and this is how your boss treats me?" He cocked his round head to a side, a pair of furious eyes glared at Elyse, as if she was the one holding Dylan back.

"If it wasn't for my sister here wanting to work with your company again," he continued, throwing a hand to point at the redhead beside him, "you were never going to get this deal. Not even if Dylan came begging after me to sign it."