Bought For A Baby, Kept For A Lifetime-Chapter 268: Killing Someone

When Anne reached the CEO’s floor, she was welcomed by cool air, the entire floor’s walls were adorned with tasteful artwork from renowned artists all over the world.

Anne stopped to admire one of the artworks on the wall, it featured something modern and dominant with a lot of black colors incorporated into the image in a way that it makes one feel powerful just by looking at it. It shows a black bird, large and majestic soaring through the skies with it’s wings wide open while a sprawl of mountains lay below, this dark bird dominated the skies with it’s powerful wings yet down below every creature stopped to watch it’s flight.

Anne stared at that particular art piece for a while before walking away. There was a very soft carpet sprawled on the floor all the way forward.

The entire floor was quiet and vacant, untill Anne reached a spacious and well lit reception area, with a sleek curve desk at its center, the lady sitting at the reception was a familiar face, when she heard footsteps, she raised her head with a polite smile to Anne but as if suddenly noticing who Anne was, she quickly stood up.

"Manager Thompson, you’re here!" Cynthia quickly greeted with a smile.

Anne was taken aback by her sudden enthusiasm at seeing her she asked, "Were you expecting me?"

Cynthia nodded and began to leave the reception area that looked large and comfortably luxurious on its own. It seemed along with Andrew, Cynthia had gained a promotion as well.

"Manager Thompson please come with me, I’ll take you to the CEO’s office."

Anne didn’t ask Cynthia how she knew she was looking for the CEO’s office, since this entire floor was dedicated to the CEO and his personal staff, it would only be right that anyone would know she came to see Andrew.

Anne quietly followed Cynthia to the door which was opened to reveal what could take away someone’s breath.

The view of Verizon city from this high up was breathtaking, rays of sunshine streamed into the office through the floor length windows, the CEO’s official desk was made of glass, large and curved in a graciously sleek manner. There was a clear vase sitting on his desk half filled with water and star magnolias, the white petals of the flowers gave the whole space an ethereal feel.

Was it a coincidence, did he like the same flowers as her or was it because...?

Anne suddenly got a flash of those three letters again and her heart gave a lurch.

"The walls were blank a few days ago and I asked the CEO if he needed me to suggest some art pieces to place on the walls, but he said that he already had photos to hang up there."

As Cynthia was speaking, she was facing the left wall which had a sleek white wall, but the walls weren’t empty, there were several pictures hung up there. When Anne looked in that direction, she was startled because she met her own face right on the wall.

There was a stylish looking picture of her that didn’t look like her everyday self, it was one of the pictures she had shot on that day she replaced Valeria for that photoshoot.

Then there was another picture of her which she didn’t know how Andrew could have gotten.

It was a picture of her from years ago, in the picture she was wearing a simple white shirt, her hair was tied up in a lose bun that allowed several tendrils of hair to fall in different directions on her face, she was wearing large clear glasses and within the lenses one could see her brown eyes shining like beautiful crystals. The smile on her face was bright, it felt like it filled the camera with light.

This picture...it was Kristen who had taken this picture of her.

At the time he had been dabbling in photography and he walked around with a camera around his neck and he used to take several random pictures of her. This specific one she hadn’t seen in a long time, how did Andrew get his hands on this photo of her?

Anne wondered with a frown, then within the third and final frame on the wall was a picture of both of them. Anne and Andrew had never stood in the same frame before unless one time, and even then they hadn’t been aware that the picture was taken.

In the picture, they were both facing each other within the vast space of his study where only a few people were present, it was the day they had gotten married.

They both had eyes on each other, several people witnessing them saying vows to one another in the bond of marriage but only they knew that this marriage was a deal made by Andrew himself.

Anne was especially startled seeing this specific picture, because she wasn’t the only one looking at the picture at this moment, Cynthia had seen it too and it wasn’t the first time, which meant she knew...

"The CEO’s personal life is safe with me, I’m his employee and I’m entitled to keeping his life private, so you don’t have to worry, I won’t be revealing your identity as his wife to anyone in the company."

In the past, Cynthia would admit that she had been fascinated by seeing her boss grow some warmth for a woman, there was one time she had taken a picture of Andrew interacting with Anne and posted it on the forum because she knew many others would be equally as surprised as she was. Cynthia openly admitted this to Anne.

"...I did that once because I didn’t know any better and I’ve always been scared of Mr Sterling finding out, but I swear I had nothing to do with all the other scandals posted about you on the forum."

When Anne saw a genuinely scared look in Cynthia’s eyes, she smiled lightly to ease the young woman’s evidently flustered expression.

"It’s okay, all of it is in the past now. Besides, I know who was responsible for those scandalous posts."

"You do?" Cynthia looked astonished. "Who was it?"

Cynthia had blurted the curious question before realizing she was prying and the person she was talking to was the CEO’s wife, something she still couldn’t believe but was trying to digest ever since she saw that wedding picture hung on the wall, she immediately took back her curiosity and shifted back to doing her work.

"The CEO told me before he went for a meeting that you would come to look for him..." Cynthia said making Anne look thoughtful.

Andrew knew she would come to his office? How did he know that, could it be because of the message he had left for her that morning, he knew she would want to talk to him to ask him some things so he already anticipated she would come to his office.

"...but today is a very packed and extremely busy day for the CEO so he won’t be able to come back here in the next few hours, he’s settling the newly appointed COO and all his responsibilities, along with that there’s a load of meetings, Mr Sterling instructed me to inform you that he’ll see you at home this evening." Cynthia went on to narrate Andrew’s schedule as well as his message to Anne if she happened to come by his office.

Anne felt a bit disappointed that she didn’t get to speak with Andrew right now, deep inside she was burning with anxiety at what exactly those letters meant.

Did they really mean what her heart was telling her it did?

"Alright, thank you Cynthia." Anne expressed a light gratitude and was about to turn away when Cynthia quickly stopped her.

"Please wait, Mr Sterling also instructed me not to let you leave when you get here."

Anne furrowed her brows in curiosity, "Why?"

"Please come with me." Cynthia said leading her to the right side of the office, there was a door that led to a spacious looking room inside the office, attached to Andrew’s office itself.

This room was more than what one to expect a lounge room would be, it felt like suddenly stepping out of a professional area into a hotel suite.

The room had a round formation of a beautiful curved sofa in a fiery liquid amber color along with a smooth brown wooden table in front of it and two other smaller sofas in the same liquid amber color. A soft dark brown carpet was spread underneath this set-up giving that corner a strict yet cozy looking feel.

A bed was placed against the wall, with soft welcoming beddings. The air in the room was soothing, oozing a familiar fragrance from the man Anne knew might have only spent a minimal time in the space, yet his scent dominated the whole area.

"The CEO asked me to make you take a nap here and not to let you leave unless you were fully rested, so please if you don’t want me to get scolded for not following instructions, please do take a nap like he said. Also I am supposed to prepare refreshments for you, and I got a menu copy from Haxen, and whatever dish you pick I’ll have it brought here right away..." Cynthia continued to spew a straight set of instructions given to her by Andrew and Anne only listened on feeling even more stunned the more she heard.

Andrew seemed to have thought about everything and carefully curated a relaxing afternoon for her, but she was supposed to be working right now.

Haxen was a very popular restaurant yet he not only had the power to get a personal menu for her here but also had enough power to have the staff of Haxen themselves deliver the dishes, it was unheard of. Yet when she thought about the person who had prepared all this for her, her heart softened and warmed up.

It made something in her anticipate seeing him this evening.

Cynthia went to and fro, following Andrew’s strict instructions and satisfying Anne’s every need including those that she didn’t think she needed at all, in the end perhaps the warmth of the space had beckoned to her or it was because she had woken up this morning feeling unrested, but Anne curled into the bed, feeling a strong sense of belonging especially when she could inhale his scent with every breath, she drifted off to sleep falling into a lovely dream.

In that dream, she saw her life with Andrew. It was blissful and beautiful, in that dream, what started as a fake marriage became real, in that dream she had said to him,

"I know what these mean..." She showed him the three letters on the adorable bears.

He walked close to her and held her close, "Then will you stay with me for a lifetime?"

She had smiled really happily in the dream, laughed and walked side by side with Andrew.

What started as a misfortune in her life had brought her this...love.

She ended up waking up with a smile on her face, but jolted when she realized it was several hours later.

Anne refreshed herself a bit in the bathroom then rushed out of Andrew’s office to return to her own office, luckily no one seemed curious enough to want to know where she had been.

The rest of the work day passed by very quickly and quite productively since they settled on the new plans for the outreach project assigned to them. Afterwards everyone got off work and said goodbye to one another. 𝑓𝘳𝑒𝑒𝓌𝘦𝘣𝘯ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝘤𝑜𝑚

Anne hesitated from going out of the company with her teammates because she didn’t want to a case of them sighting her entering Andrew’s car which would usually be waiting for her at the parking lot by this time. When she was sure they had all left, she went down using the elevator to the underground parking lot however to her surprise the driver wasn’t waiting for her in his usual spot.

Anne looked down at her watch, realizing she was only several minutes late from the normal time she got off work, why wasn’t the driver here yet? Could it be he forgot to come get her today?

It wasn’t that big of a dilemma to Anne as she could take a cab home, but before she could get to turn and head back to the elevator to make her way out of the company while calling for a cab, Anne felt a sudden hovering of a shadow around her so she stopped moving abruptly, keeping her senses raptly alert as she listened for the indicators of someone being around, when she heard nothing she quickly whipped her head around to look but found no one but the vacant cars still parked around.

Perhaps she was frightened because of the eerie silence in the air.

Sighing out loud, Anne began walking again but this time, it wasn’t the strange creepy sensation she felt but the presence of a large and scary figure cloaked in complete black attire from head to toe suddenly appear in front of her.

Before Anne could gasp or even get a chance to be scared, the person moved with a furious lightning speed, his hand grasping her by the neck so tightly her breathing suddenly began to escape her. He was choking her with a force that could only aim for killing someone.

Anne struggled in such a strong and sudden grip but her efforts were painfully futile, in a short amount of time, it felt like life itself would be drained out of her...