Filed to story: The Regretful Billionaire: An Unpredicted Reunion >>
In Gilbert’s villa, Danika checked the surveillance cameras alone in the room. She didn’t give up just yet. Gilbert and Zack stood at the doorway, worried. “Bro, can’t you tell her to rest? If she keeps doing that…” “It’s no use. She won’t stop until she finds Stephanie.” Gilbert knew Danika very well, so he had not told her to stop.
“It’s so absurd. How can a person vanish just like that? If not for Danika’s insistence, I’d think her friend had never existed.” Zack began doubting his technical skills.
Gilbert frowned. He knew how great Zack’s and Danika’s skills were and found this very weird, too. It shouldn’t be this way.
After a while, he walked into the room, stopping next to Danika.
“Danika,” he said.
Danika stopped typing. “Is there news of her, Gilbert?”
He shook his head. The hope that had risen in Danika’s eyes dimmed once more.
Gilbert sat down next to her and looked at her grimly. “Parrington is neither big nor small. There aren’t a lot of people whom you can’t find. When you said Eustace asked Paul for help yet came up with nothing. I thought it was weird.”
Danika raised an eyebrow. “Weird, how?”
“You could say that Eustace isn’t that great at looking for people, but Paul is an expert. There’s no one in Parrington that he can’t find,” Gilbert said.
Danika was deep in thought; what Gilbert said made sense. “But he still hasn’t found anything. I can’t ask him too many questions since he’s doing me a favor.”
“Have you considered that perhaps he knows where she is?” Gilbert shared his bold hypothesis.
Danika was shocked. She was dazed for a while.
Gilbert continued, “We’ve sent out so many people, yet we haven’t found her. Even your hacking abilities couldn’t trace her. This is weird in itself. There haven’t been any big names coming to stay in Parrington lately, so the one who made Stephanie disappear is most likely someone from here. If you look at this carefully, there really aren’t a lot of choices left.”
Gilbert’s words opened up a new train of thought in Danika’s mind. Her face was grim as she continued typing on her keyboard. But this time, she didn’t look for anything related to Stephanie. Instead, she started placing the focus on Paul Wagner.
She thought that if Paul knew about this and chose to hide it, it meant he had something to do with it. If she could find his whereabouts, she could have her answers.
At this thought, Danika’s confidence bloomed. She had to find Stephanie.
She found things out quicker than she expected. After simply looking up Paul’s comings and goings these past few days, she found the route that Stephanie had taken.
Things were not as she expected. Paul was not covering for anyone but himself. Stephanie was right there in his villa!
Right this moment, an unpleasant feeling washed over her.
“Paul probably didn’t expect you to investigate him, so he didn’t tamper with his surveillance cameras.” Gilbert looked at Paul’s villa through the monitor. Stephanie had walked in and never came back out.
Danika didn’t speak. Gilbert pressed on, “Paul is Eustace Quincey’s friend. Who knows if Eustace is in the dark about this or if he’s covering up for Paul.”
“Of course he’d cover for his friend,” Danika thought.
She remembered the call she had with Eustace that day. His tone was off, and she hadn’t noticed anything then. But now that she looked back on it, it seemed obvious.
It was no wonder that Eustace didn’t come to see her these past few days. He didn’t contact her often, either. He was probably afraid that he would give something away.
At once, it felt as if a huge rock were weighing down on Danika. She couldn’t breathe.
She got up and walked out of the room. “I’m going to make a call:”
Gilbert didn’t ask her any questions. He guessed that Danika was going to call Eustace. He was happy to see this happening. He didn’t believe for one second that Eustace knew nothing about this, and Danika would not believe it, either.
Danika went to the balcony and took a deep breath before calling Eustace.
“Danika?” Eustace’s voice sounded the moment the call went through. He seemed surprised that Danika would call him.
She said nothing, suddenly realizing she didn’t know what to say.
Should she interrogate him? What right did she have to do that? She and Eustace were not in that kind of relationship. He was doing nothing wrong in covering for Paul.
“Danika? What’s wrong? Have you found anything on Stephanie?” Eustace was worried when he didn’t hear her talk.
At the mention of Stephanie, Danika’s face shifted. “No. Have you?”
“No,” he replied.
“What about Paul?” Danika asked.
Eustace paused for a moment before saying, “Probably not. He’d tell me if he did.”
Danika couldn’t describe what she was feeling. It just felt horrible. A wisp of disappointment appeared in her chest.
“Are you…close?” she suddenly asked.
Eustace said that they were, but then he sensed that something was amiss. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing much. I’m just surprised that there are people in Parrington that he can’t find.” She smiled. If Eustace were here, he would see that her smile was forced, twisted as if she’d been crying.
Eustace was silent. He had the urge to tell Danika the truth, but when he thought of Paul, that urge subsided.
“Don’t worry. Stephanie will be alright. Maybe she’ll come back in two days.” He and Paul had agreed that he would let her go in two days max.
Danika smiled lightly. “Really? Are you sure?”
“Yes. Believe me. She’ll be alright,” Eustace said. He didn’t know Danika already knew everything; he thought his words would comfort her.
Danika hung up, her face as cold as ice. She turned and went back into the room.
“Get someone, Gilbert. We’re going to get Stephanie back,” she said, her voice devoid of emotion. But
Gilbert knew that she was angry. Furiously angry.
“Alright.” He nodded and took his phone out. Done with his calls, he still felt worried. “What if Paul doesn’t give her up? It’s his territory. It’ll be hard for us to just waltz in.” On top of that, they were obedient citizens. Paul, on the other hand, was from the underworld. If anything happened, they would be at a disadvantage.
“He will.” Danika’s face darkened. She walked toward the computer and printed a few documents, bringing them along.
Gilbert didn’t ask any more questions. Since Danika had spoken, he was confident.
They rushed toward Paul’s villa. On the other side of town, Eustace thought Danika seemed weird over the phone. He came to a conclusion quickly: Danika already knew about everything. He instantly got up and left his office.
Danika and her group of people reached Paul’s villa. A bodyguard walked up to her. “Miss Danika?”