"Cass, are-are you serious? What about our dreams and goals? What about all the things we promised to do together?"
"Will, I don't believe that you are capable of giving me the life I always wanted. Without your family, you are nothing. I'm sorry, but this is goodbye. Don't try to contact me again."
"Wh-why, Cass? What did I do wrong? You are my EVERYTHING! I-I don't know what I will do without you…"
"Those are just empty words, Will. At-. Forget it. It's useless. Goodbye."
Seeing his life leave through the door of their apartment with a suitcase in her hand, Will collapsed to the ground.
His hand was outstretched towards the door, and his chest felt as if it was on fire- as if someone had ripped out his heart, leaving behind nothing but a hollow spot.
Pain overwhelmed him. And with that pain came realization.
Realization that she had only been with him for the money.
Years of love. All gone in an instant.
No. He would never trust anyone again. He would never let anyone… get close enough.
Getting close meant getting hurt.
With this thought, each and every scene of interaction with Liz passed through his mind, but one stayed.
It was that of a revealing dress
As that scene replayed itself continuously in his mind, Liz's and Cass's face kept interchanging between each other.
She wasn't any different. She couldn't come close.
NO! He wouldn't let her!
"I WON'T LET YOU!"
With a scream, William woke up in his bed, sweating and shivering from the shock of going through all those memories again.
Seeing that it was still the middle of the night, he drank some water from the glass beside his bed before lying down again.
Yet, Will couldn't get the memories out of his head.
In this way, the CEO of Happle, Inc. spent another sleepless night before finally resorting to sleeping pills a few hours later so that he would at least have the minimum amount of rest needed to get through a workday.
…..
The next day.
After reaching the CEO's office, Liz was surprised to see Mr. Will in a state of imperfectness for the first time.
His eyes were red, and there were dark circles under his eyes.
Of course, Liz didn't give any comment on this and only went about her day as usual.
Yet, she also prepared to begin the first step of the plan to take revenge.
As the personal assistant of the CEO, Liz had clearance in the company to access a lot of information that was hidden to others.
For instance, in case an employee was unresponsive or if there was an emergency, she had the authority to check the address they had submitted so that she could instruct others to either go to check on them or to report the emergency.
To finalize the plan against Jenny, she had decided that she would first find out the motive behind her actions.
Each and every employee address was verified by Happle, so there was little chance that Jenny had been planted in the company using a fake identity. Instead, it was more possible that she had been approached by Sylvex while she was looking for jobs or after she had already gotten the job.
After obtaining the address during the lunch break, Liz waited for the day to be over and was pleasantly surprised when she heard the CEO ask her to go home at 3: 30 PM itself.
Clearly, he was in no mood to continue work in his state.
After having Rao drop her off in a subway station saying that she was meeting a friend for something, Liz headed to the address where Jenny's house apparently was. After reaching it, she saw that it was a simple 2-storeyed suburban house with a small lawn.
If this were a spy movie, Liz mused that she would have had the skills and the guts to break into the house and check Jenny's personal things to ascertain what kind of individual she was.
Of course, this wasn't a realistic option at all.
Instead, Liz walked to the local public school and asked for an appointment with the principal saying that she was someone from Happle, Inc.
After entering the room, she asked the question that would get her the same answer as the other option, but in a much safer way.
"Hi, I'm here from Happle, Inc. Jennifer Gatyela, one of the alumni from your school, has been a glowing employee and we would like to commemorate her for the same. Can I get some information about her habits as a child and also a list of friends that I can talk to to know more about her for my speech at the ceremony?"