Chapter 89 – His Second Chance Love: The Freezing Silence

There was indeed no point in staying there if he wasn’t able to see Anthony anyway.

“Are Joe and Jared there? Have you seen them?” I asked.

There’s no way they’d stay there with Anthony after what’s happened to the company! It wouldn’t make any sense!

“Jared is in the ICU. Joe left this morning after having someone take his place there. Hey, you don’t have to worry about Featherstone Corporation, okay? I’m sure everything will be alright after a couple of weeks.”

He was probably talking to me in the corridor; I could hear his voice echoing from time to time.

“Yeah, sure.” I lacked the vision they had to fully comprehend what was going on, so I hung up after a brief exchange.

Joe must be heading towards the office if he’s coming back today! With that thought in mind, I hurriedly packed my stuff and got ready to leave the house.

Macy was shocked when she saw me leaving and quickly stopped me at the door. “Are you crazy? Where do you think you’re going?”

“Joe’s on his way back. I have to go to the office.”

“Let him handle it! We can’t have you going out there when you’re pregnant like this! What if something happens to you?”

“I’ll be fine!” I figured it was probably not as serious as I had imagined. Besides, Joe was only coming back a few days after the incident had occurred, so it was obvious that he knew something I didn’t.

“I’ll go with you!” Macy knew there was no stopping me, so she grabbed her coat and headed out with me.

The huge group of reporters and stockholders gathered outside the building made it impossible for us to get in through the main entrance, but Macy had a brilliant idea.

By driving my car and parking it outside the building, she had managed to gain the crowd’s attention fairly quickly. “Hey, isn’t that Mrs. Featherstone’s car?”

That little distraction allowed me to quickly snuck into the building while the entire crowd rushed over and surrounded my car.

Only a few managerial staff were in the office at the time. The rest of the people there were all investigators from the Bureau of Industry and Commerce.

I made my way to the conference hall and saw Joe talking to the investigators.

The man raised an eyebrow at me when he noticed me. “How did you get in here?”

“I walked!”

One of the investigators then handed him a stack of documents and said, “The results of the investigation will be announced tomorrow. As far as I know, there are no other issues apart from the safety violations at HiTech.”

Joe nodded in acknowledgment. “Thank you, officers!”

He then began reading through the documents after the investigator left. Despite everything that has happened, he didn’t seem even a tad bit anxious. In fact, he was so calm that it felt slightly unnerving.

“Mr. Quinn, let’s talk!” I said as I took the documents from his hands.

“What do you want to talk about?” Joe asked as he raised his eyebrows.

The casual way he addressed the conversation really irked me. However, I just swallowed my rage and replied, “It has only been two months and there has already been a problem. Do you take me for a fool?”

“What do you expect? Or are you implying that I have something to do with this?” Joe said with a sneer.

“Don’t you?” I stated with a cold glare. “You were in charge of the Featherstone Corporation audits all this while, especially the Robinson Group. Now the very same Robinson Group that was supposed to be AC Credit’s responsibility has problems with their auditing and you expect me to believe that you have nothing to do with this?” I remarked.

Joe leaned back into his chair and glared at me. “Hmph! Yes, it is true that the audits have always been my responsibility. But you should also note that during the past few years when I was in charge, there was nothing that went wrong. The Robinson Group audits had issues after you took over. Can you be sure that you never have made a mistake while looking at their documents and reports? Weren’t you the one who verified and signed the documents? Do you think I was able to interfere in that?” he declared.

Joe paused for a moment to readjust his seat before continuing, “The issues regarding HiTech were brought up by you. Anthony was aware of the nonconformity of the factory in the South District and how I found an alternative to the water supply. We tried to keep all that under wraps because the company has gone public listed and any negative news would have tanked the stock prices. However, you just have to be a little ‘Miss Perfect’ and bring up this issue.”

I was stunned by the revelation. “So you knew all this while but didn’t tell me?” I queried.

“Oh Ms. Stanhope, do you still not know the unspoken rules of our industries after all these years? Do you have any idea how large the Featherstone Corporation is? Any corporation of this scale would definitely have its flaws. As long as these flaws don’t affect the development or cause any significant problems, the corporation would just overlook them. Moreover, the factory in South District already had its issues settled, it just wasn’t reported to the higher-ups. Did you think the families affected would let the Featherstone Corporation off so easily otherwise?” Joe sneered.

“So why did someone take their life then?” I questioned since I heard the interrogator mention a suicide case when I was taken into the prosecutor’s office.

Joe chuckled like he was being amused by an idiot. “It was more than half a year after the incident before someone committed suicide. I guess pregnancy really does make someone lose their sense of logic,” he mocked.

So someone tried to implicate the Featherstone Corporation by tying the two incidents together and I’m the only one out of the loop?

I was stunned by the revelation and was at a loss for words. Joe wasn’t worried about this incident at all because it was like what Nick said, this was all a reshuffling and the one who is being kicked out is me!

I was the person who signed the auditing documents for Featherstone Corporation and HiTech was in my name. Therefore, both incidents were directly tied to me.

Featherstone Corporation knows that if worse comes to worst, they would announce the termination of employment on me to the public. After that, they would continue operations like normal.

I couldn’t help but give a chuckle. “Well, well Mr. Quinn, well played!” I said with my tone dripping with sarcasm.

Joe knew that if everything went according to plan he could oust me from the company without anyone even caring.

He looked at me and my swelling belly for a moment before saying condescendingly, “It’s OK Ms. Stanhope. Even if you were forced to leave the Featherstone Corporation, you will still have your stocks. Your pregnancy will be due soon so you will leave the company one way or another. Therefore, please go easy on this.”

Yes, I know I’ll be leaving eventually. You don’t need to remind me.

“Since I’m leaving eventually, it doesn’t matter if I leave because of this or other reasons right?” I chuckled dryly.

“Does Anthony know about this?” I asked while holding back my emotions.

Joe looked at me for a moment before nodding his head solemnly.

As soon as I saw that, I felt as if my heart was torn asunder and the air felt suffocating. I actually suspected it was Zachary who was behind this.

It really seemed like everything was just a joke in the end.

Nothing up till now was a coincidence but a ploy that was orchestrated by people in the know.

Alas, everything that happened next was all according to what Joe had described.

The following day, the report from the prosecutor’s office was sent out and it showed that the Featherstone Corporation’s audits had been affected by HiTech and were thus non-conforming. This also meant that the report appearing in International Weekly was falsified.

It was decided by the prosecutor’s office that everything had to be re-audited, including Featherstone Corporation which was managed by Harrison Credit, and Quinn Corporation, and handled by AC Credit. There would also be a fine for commercial fraud under deceptive practices. The silver lining was that because Featherstone Corporation practically had a monopoly on the economic sector of J City, they didn’t publicize the findings and opted to settle it privately.

As for HiTech, I had to take responsibility for all the liabilities as I was the person in charge, and that had affected Anthony indirectly.

All in all, the situation was resolved without much issue. With that, the operations in Featherstone Corporation that were put on hold to assist in the investigation for most of the week resumed to normal.

As for me, it went exactly as Joe had predicted. The company terminated my employment publicly with immediate effect.

Everything that happened went exactly as scripted so I wasn’t too upset since I knew what would happen beforehand. There was only a tinge of dissatisfaction in me.

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