Chapter 3:

Darius's POV

I stormed off to my office, feeling enraged that the girl I took pity on was planted in the house to source for whatever information Mr Malik was trying to get.

What made me even more angry was how Mr Malik thought he had the liberty to do whatever he wanted in the house.

He had been given too much freedom and that needed to stop.

I picked my car keys and drove back home angrily. Whatever charm he was using for my parents clearly wasn't working on me, and he would need more than words to convince me that he was deserving of his current position before I stripped him off it.

"Welcome back, sir," one of the maids greeted me as I walked in but that was the least of my problems.

"Where is my mother?" I asked instead.

"She is in the garden, sir. Would you like me to get you anything, sir?" She asked, and I stormed off to the garden, disregarding the maid.

Mother was laughing over the phone but as soon as she saw me walk in, she ended the call and turned to me with a concerned look.

"Is everything okay? Why do you look so angry?"

I brought out my phone from my pocket and showed her the screenshot of the chat I saw earlier on Father's laptop.

"Here," I said, handing my phone over to her, and she gave me a confused look.

"What is going on?"

I watched as she went through the chat and she looked at me still confused.

"This is a conversation between who and who? And how does it concern us?"

"That chat was encrypted on father's laptop to show its importance, and it was a conversation he had with Mr Malik before he died. Turns out that Father lost a priceless stone and no one is aware of it except for Mr Malik who thought the best thing he could do was to keep it to himself," I said with a frown on my face.

"He couldn't have possibly kept it to himself. Since the stone went missing before your father's death, he probably thought we were already aware of the situation. Why are you getting all worked up over this?"

Her nonchalant attitude towards the chat got me even more irritated and I wondered just how much Mr Malik had fooled them and for how long.

"Don't you get it?" I hissed. "You are paying him six figures monthly for him to do a goddamn good job, and report all the activities going on to us, and not make some fucking assumption!" I growled.

"Language, Darius. I understand that things might be a little —bad right now, with the heavy workload and the missing money you have to account for to clear your father's name, but that is not enough reason to be pointing fingers at anyone, just to leash out your anger." Mother said, and I shook my head, but she continued anyway, ignoring my disapproval.

"Malik is already a part of our family. He has been working with us for over a decade, and he has been nothing but excellent at his job. I know all of these are strange, but you might want to consider working with him to reduce the weight on your neck."

Seeing how Mother wouldn't even allow me to speak about him in a negative way, I realised that telling her about how he planted Freya in here to find whatever thing he needed made me realize that the only way to make her see what I was saying was by proving to the world that he was pure evil.

I didn't know exactly what he had done, but I could feel it. Those dirty gazes he hid under the guise of humour; that shady behaviour of his, I was going to expose them all.

My phone began to vibrate, and Mother handed my phone back to me.

"What?" I snapped at my secretary.

"Erm… I'm sorry for disturbing you sir, but you were meant to have a meeting this evening. It slipped my mind earlier to remind you, but the people need to know if it will still be held."

"Are you done?" I frowned, feeling all sorts of emotions coursing through my veins.

We employed all of those imbeciles to do one fucking job and they couldn't even do that right.

"Yes, sir," she said, barely audible.

"Good. Tell them that you forgot to inform me beforehand because you lack the basic etiquette of working and that is about to cost them their time. So, I hope you'd have the decency to come up with a sensible excuse and handle the situation correctly." I hung up on her without waiting for her to ask any more questions, while my mother stared at me.

"I have never seen you getting so worked up over anything. You should take a break, I will have Malik take care of things."

The sound of his name felt like a bitter pill, one that I found ridiculously toxic to the ear and I could lose it if she spoke so highly of him one more time.

Before I could voice out my anger, Freya walked into the garden, looking so innocent with her petite stature. If I didn't already know that she was a prude who allowed herself to be used by Mr Malik, I'd have pitied her. But I knew better.

Her eyes were puffy and bloodshot red as if she hadn't stopped crying since I left earlier. Her cheeks were wet from dried tears, as she struggled to maintain her balance with the tray in her hands.

I watched as she dropped the tray on the table when Mother's voice broke the silence.

"Don't just stand there like a fool! Hand over my drink." She yelled at her.

Freya carried a glass with shaky hands and spilled the drink over Mother's drink out of fear.

"Bitch!" Mother's words echoed through the air and the next thing I heard was a loud slap that made Freya fall from the impact.

A stream of tears flowed down her cheeks and I clenched my fist, feeling irritated at myself for letting her misfortune get to me.

"Is this how you plan on paying your father's debt? Is this how you plan to work your ass off to pay your father's debt? You poverty-stricken rat! I don't even know which is worse. You or that thief you call a father." Mother glared at her with disgust and Freya sniffed back, trying so hard to hold back her tears but she failed miserably.

"Don't stay quiet, I am asking you a question!"

"Enough of this!" I snapped, not knowing why I bothered to intervene when I could have just walked away. But my mouth developed brains of its own.

"Until she can refund her father's debt, she will be my slave, not yours or anyone else in this house." I glared at my mother and she gave me a disapproving look for talking back to her.

"Stand up!" I yelled at Freya and she jumped from the coldness.

She struggled to stand up, and I found myself even more angry. She should be working her ass off to pay off her father's debt, not colliding with someone to clear his name.

It pissed me off that she was willing to work for Malik when I was here for that. A nasty idea suddenly came to my mind.

"Follow me," I said, and I stormed off into my room.

Freya followed behind me silently and once we got into my room, my eyes fixed on her petite body.

It looked like it could use some care, some touch.

Since she was willing to do anything to get her father's name cleared, my plan should work perfectly.

"Strip," I commanded..