Challenging a Cold Heart

Chapter 42: Debts

Luc's POV

I stared down at Ryuu's secretary as she told me that Ryuu was in a meeting and asked me to wait in the waiting room for him.

"Harris, you could wait in the waiting room." I told my lawyer and then turned to the secretary.

"Tell your boss that I am waiting in his room." I told the secretary, ignoring her previous instructions.

"Okay sir." Harris agreed immediately and went to the waiting room. I started to walk towards the room with Ryuu's name engraved on it when the secretary stopped me.

"Sir, you cannot go into his room." She insisted anxiously.

"Who is going to stop me? You?" I asked her pointedly.

She blinked.

"Tell your boss I am in there." I said as I stepped away from her and strode into the room.

It was a big room with glass walls on one side. The opposite side of the room was lined with green plants. Turning around to check the room, I saw that there were black sofas and a table on one side while a stylish black executive desk with padded arm chairs were on the other side. There was nothing on the table beside the sofa. However, the desk had an iMac and an in out document tray on the right side corner. I walked over to the desk area and saw that the in tray had some office documents with post it notes requesting signature while the out tray on top was empty. Ignoring the desk, my eyes glanced through the shelves behind the desk. The centre of the shelves were filled with trophies received by Ryuu and his conglomerate. There were a substantial lot of them but I wasn't really interested in checking them. I was more interested in the pictures that lined the two sides of those shelves. I walked over first to the further end of the room to peer at the pictures.

Almost all the pictures on that side of the room showed him receiving awards on behalf of the business or pictures of days when he opened offices or signed important agreements. There were text below the photographs that actually explained what it was. But I wasn't really interested in it. Bored, I walked past the shelves of trophies in the centre to the side that was closer to the glass wall. This side was more interesting, I thought as I looked at a picture of a young Ryuu with his father on the first day of starting work in the Yasuhiro Headquarters in Seoul. Beside it, was a picture of his graduation from Harvard for all the certifications he obtained. The top shelf was completely filled with pictures of his work in NASA, academic pursuits and humanitarian efforts. There was a picture of him with a bunch of smiling kids from somewhere in Africa.

Moving on to the middle shelf, I saw that the pictures there were more personal. There was a family picture of him and Rei with their parents. They all looked very happy in it. Ryuu was distinguishable from his brother because he had a side parting in his hair while Rei always wore his hair pulled back from his head. In the picture, Ryuu would have been around 6 years, judging from his looks. The next picture showed Ryuu with his father, his step mother and his baby brother Kei held by his step mother. Ryuu wasn't smiling at all in the picture. He held himself subconsciously away from his father, step mother and baby brother in the picture. He looked to be about 8 years then. Moving on from that, I saw a picture of him with Rei, Alexander and Andrew. Everyone else was smiling for the picture except Ryuu who just held a pleasant expression without a smile. I peered at Alexander's picture. He seemed sort of familiar with his longish hair that skimmed across his shoulder. Ignoring it, I moved on.

There were several pictures of Ryuu and his twin at different ages. He was always smiling when he was alone with his twin and unlike the Rei I knew, the Rei in the pictures were goofy and doing something stupid, perhaps to make his twin brother smile. I sighed as I saw a Deverell extended family picture with Ryuu and Rei also in it. Beside it was an extended family picture of the Yasuhiro family with the twins. On the lowest shelf there were pictures of Ryuu with family babies. Some babies and children I didn't know. But I recognized Kei and Olivia. There were more pictures of Ryuu with his cousins, nephews and nieces. I knew all of those pests and I didn't even want to look at them. I almost just walked away when I saw a picture of a baby with very familiar green eyes. I went over to the picture and saw a smiling Ryuu with a chubby baby in christening white clothes, looking wondrously at the camera, his small fist in his mouth.