Chapter 82 Sudden Company Inspection
Arabella usually got off work earlier than Alexander, and normally when Alexander came home, she would come out to greet him.
But today she really couldn't muster the energy, so she didn't go out.
Outside, Alexander put what he was carrying on the table and glanced at the tightly closed door of the guest bedroom.
She didn't come out to greet him today—was she too tired?
He loosened his tie, took off his jacket and hung it on the coat rack, walking toward the guest bedroom while unbuttoning his shirt and rolling up his sleeves twice, revealing strong, solid forearms.
He knocked gently on the door and asked, "Arabella, I bought lobster. Want to come out and eat together?"
Inside the room, Arabella was lying on the bed. Hearing Alexander's deep voice, she suddenly sat up, gathered her spirits, got out of bed and opened the door. Alexander's height created tremendous pressure, and she forced a smile.
"I ate a lot tonight, so I won't eat. You enjoy the feast yourself."
Actually, she hadn't eaten dinner at all. In a bad mood, she couldn't eat anything.
From the moment Alexander saw her when she opened the door, he was certain she'd encountered difficulties.
She was always gentle and vibrant. No matter how big the difficulties, she would respond with strength and resilience. Even if knocked down, she would quickly bounce back.
But now, her eyes were full of deep frustration and helplessness, and she carried an air of dejection. This indicated the trouble she'd encountered this time was serious.
Beyond her ability to cope.
Alexander looked at her deeply and asked in a low voice, "Still because of your colleague named Leila?"
She'd previously confided to him about Leila's inexplicable behavior. He thought the other party had escalated their harassment.
Unexpectedly, Arabella was stunned, then smiled bitterly and shook her head. "No."
She hadn't intended to tell him about company matters. She always maintained boundaries—yesterday she'd already dumped a lot of negativity on him, and doing it again today wouldn't be appropriate.
Even the closest friends would find it hard to bear someone else's bad moods daily.
So Arabella didn't explain further and was about to find a random excuse to close the door and sleep, but unexpectedly Alexander pressed, "Then what's it about?"
Arabella was startled, but before she could speak, Alexander smiled and said, "Come on, go wash your hands. We'll talk while we eat—there's beer in the fridge too."
His voice was very gentle, carrying a doting tone. Arabella felt inexplicably moved, lowered her head to suppress that strange feeling, and responded quietly.
She was indeed suffering under the weight of those matters. She really wanted someone to talk to. Philip and Daisy weren't around, and if Alexander was willing to listen, she was actually quite happy about it.
After washing her hands and sitting down, Alexander was already peeling shrimp. He peeled five or six in a row, then placed them in front of Arabella, looking up at her with concern. "Is there something troubling you at work? You can tell me about it. I've been working a few years longer than you—maybe I can help think of solutions."
Arabella took a bite of lobster. The meat was fresh and sweet, leaving a pleasant aftertaste. Good food always had healing properties, and her mood improved somewhat.
She sighed lightly. "Leila cut her wrists today."
Alexander raised an eyebrow. "Your colleagues are blaming you for this?"
Arabella nodded slightly. "Leila accused me of forcing her to give me her clients. She said she cut her wrists because I was workplace bullying her, but actually I've barely spoken to her. But because she cut her wrists, everyone thinks she's the victim."
Alexander leaned back in his chair, legs crossed, hands clasped on the table, looking at her. "Because you can't produce evidence to prove your innocence, you're upset?"
He thought this was the truth and felt somewhat conflicted. Actually, after hearing about Leila that day, he'd had her investigated.
Leila was Sarah's college classmate—they were roommates and had a good relationship.
Sarah was the intern at Arabella's former company who committed suicide over Zack.
That Zack had abandoned Sarah after using her, and Sarah blamed Arabella for stealing him, harboring extreme resentment. Alexander, fearing Arabella would be wronged, had directly fired both of them.
Alexander hadn't expected Sarah to jump from a building.
Leila resenting Arabella over this was understandable, but the situation was still unusual. If Leila really hated Arabella this much and wanted justice for her friend, she shouldn't have waited so long.
Roy hadn't disappointed him either, digging deeper to discover something more interesting.
Leila's father was the Reeves family's driver, and Leila sometimes visited the Reeves Villa, having a fairly close relationship with Gloria.
This was very intriguing.
Because Gloria and Rachel were like sisters, and at the recent Tucker family banquet, the Watson family had been thrown out by Richard in an extremely humiliating manner. It was possible those brainless people would blame this on Arabella.
This investigation made the logic fit, but Alexander hadn't told Arabella about Leila's identity for two reasons.
First, knowing Arabella's nature, if she discovered why Leila was targeting her, she'd probably go find Rachel or Gloria, and he didn't want her to have any more entanglements with the Watson family.
Second, it wasn't necessary, because he was already handling Leila. She would soon be fired and would receive his warning, not daring to do anything to Arabella again.
He just hadn't expected Leila to exploit this brief window.
Though he didn't want her to think about the Watson family again, he also didn't want her living in fear. After a moment of silence, just as he was about to explain about Leila, Arabella curved her lips and said softly, "Actually Leila can't really hurt me. I'm troubled because of something else."
She told him about being pressured by several leaders at the company today and having her commission withheld.
Alexander had been sitting casually, but after hearing a few sentences, he gradually straightened up, his expression becoming much more serious. "You're saying Brightwell Pharmaceuticals has corruption among senior management?"
Arabella didn't understand why he suddenly used such official terminology, but that was essentially what it meant, so she nodded. "I think this isn't their first time. This time my commission was over eight million dollars, and they dared to embezzle it. This shows they've operated this way before and gotten away with it."
Alexander's face showed no expression, but his gaze became slightly sharper.
Brightwell Pharmaceuticals was a company he'd acquired six months ago. He owned an entire medical empire, and a moderately-sized pharmaceutical company was just supplementary business to him.
After buying it, he'd left it to professional management. Only after learning Arabella had joined this company did he inquire about it.
Every company had some dark aspects. As long as they didn't involve matters of principle, he generally allowed them. But he hadn't expected Brightwell Pharmaceuticals' senior management to dare embezzle to this extent!
Withholding an ordinary salesperson's commission—this was something Arabella mentioned to him, so he knew about it. How much didn't he know about?
Anger rose in his heart, but Alexander's face didn't change much. He still smiled gently and continued peeling lobster for her.
He knew she definitely hadn't eaten dinner.
Arabella ate the sweet lobster. At first she didn't notice anything wrong, but halfway through eating she realized, "Why aren't you eating?"
He kept peeling for her but hadn't taken a bite himself.
She felt embarrassed and quickly said, "I can peel them myself."
Alexander smiled, his features deep and profound. To be able to openly peel shrimp for her, he stabbed himself without hesitation. "It's fine. My ex-boyfriend also liked eating shrimp. I just enjoy peeling shrimp for others."
Arabella's eyes widened. She thought this hobby of his was really... too selfless. How could there be such selfless people in the world? He must have loved very deeply to willingly do these things.
She imagined a story of a devoted bottom meeting a scumbag in unrequited love, feeling infinite sympathy for Alexander and comforting him, "It's okay. Someone more worthy of your love will appear in the future."
Alexander looked at her and agreed.
After peeling the entire box of lobster, he got up to wash his hands in the bathroom. Arabella checked the time—it was already 10:30—and said, "Thank you for listening to me talk so much tonight. I feel much better. I'll go sleep now. Good night."
Alexander replied "Good night" from the bathroom.
Arabella had sorted through her bad mood and quickly fell asleep after returning to her room, unaware that in the living room, Alexander pulled out a tissue, carefully dried the water from his hands, then made a phone call with an expressionless face.
The next day, Arabella felt the atmosphere at the company was very wrong.
Early in the morning, several police officers came to the company and went straight to the sixteenth floor.
Office colleagues were buzzing with speculation. Theo returned from outside, glanced at the chaotic office, and his face darkened. "Don't you all have work to do?"
Everyone quickly returned to their workstations and pretended to work hard.
Theo's gaze shifted to Arabella. "Arabella, come with me for a moment."
Arabella followed him into the office and asked, "Mr. Bell, did you need something?"
Theo sat in his chair, looking at her meaningfully. After a long while, he said, "Arabella, tell me the truth. Did you report this?"
Arabella asked in confusion, "Report what?"
"Senior management corruption, embezzlement, lining their own pockets," Theo stared at her, his tone ambiguous. "Was it you?"
Arabella finally understood what those police officers were there for.
She found it somewhat amusing. "Mr. Bell, didn't you analyze it very clearly yesterday? I can't produce evidence about the withheld commission. I might not even win if I took you to court. What basis would I have to report anything?"
Theo said nothing, still looking at her with a heavy gaze.
Actually, he thought so too. This report had come with great momentum, actually reaching headquarters directly. Headquarters had specially sent people to handle the matter, and it looked like they'd planned ahead, because the headquarters people had immediately seized all company accounts upon arrival.
Falsified accounts couldn't be hidden.
The police report was also filed by people sent from headquarters. Fortunately, he'd been timid before and had limited involvement, so it probably wouldn't implicate him.
But Mandy and Billy weren't so lucky. Those two had been audacious, skimming hundreds of millions from the company over the years. Headquarters wouldn't let them off.
How could it be such a coincidence? Yesterday they'd just tried to take Arabella's commission, and today they were suddenly reported.
Headquarters wouldn't normally have a sudden impulse to audit accounts.
Unless someone reported it. But besides Arabella, who else could it be?
Theo couldn't figure it out, but in any case, he couldn't continue antagonizing Arabella now. If she got hot-headed and ran to the investigation team to report him, he'd definitely be in trouble.
After a long silence, Theo said, "If it wasn't you, then forget it. I was just asking casually. Continue with your work."
Just as Arabella was about to turn around, Theo added, "About your commission... we'll follow company regulations."
Meaning she'd get exactly what she was owed, without a penny withheld.
Arabella nodded and walked out.
She was also amazed. Yesterday Mandy and Billy had forced her to give up her commission, and today they were under investigation?
Could such coincidences really exist in the world?
But this was good. Although she didn't know the specifics, being able to root out such cancers from the company was still satisfying.
The huge problem that had given her such a headache yesterday had been smoothly resolved today in such a bizarre way.
In a good mood, she sent Alexander a WeChat message: "Alex, good news—senior management at our company is being investigated, and my commission is safe."
On the other end, Alexander was in a meeting. The conference room full of executives was walking on eggshells, not daring to breathe heavily.
But what shocked them was that Alexander, who had just been speaking harshly to them, actually opened and read his phone when he heard the WeChat notification.
You have to know Alexander most detested subordinates looking at phones during work hours!
Now he was taking the lead...
What made them feel even more chilled was that Alexander didn't just read messages during the meeting—
After reading the message, he actually smiled!
Smiled!
Can you imagine? Someone who had just finished yelling at them and thoroughly scolding everyone—he smiled!
Had the world really become this topsy-turvy?
Alexander didn't care what his subordinates thought. Receiving Arabella's message, he was very satisfied with Roy's efficiency. After careful consideration, he sent back: "Congratulations. Looks like you're your colleagues' lucky star."
Putting down his phone, Alexander noticed all the executives in the meeting room staring at him. His face immediately darkened as he said coldly, "What are you looking at? Have you figured out the accounting plan?"
Everyone immediately lowered their heads in shame and continued holding their breath in trepidation.
On the other side, seeing Alexander's message, Arabella couldn't help but smile. Who doesn't like being praised?
The company audit continued all day without completion. The entire day, the atmosphere at the company was somewhat tense. When Arabella went upstairs to deliver documents, she encountered Mandy. She looked much more haggard, no longer as polished as before, clearly having had a rough day.
Since the audit results weren't out, Mandy was still the company's CFO. She stared at Arabella, who had just finished signing and was walking out, and said through gritted teeth, "Arabella, come to my office!"