Chapter 3
The worst part was, Mandy was pinning me down so hard I could barely catch my breath, and my strength was fading fast.
Instinctively, I fought back with everything I had.
In the chaos, my hand landed on something, and I swung it at her head with all my might.
Mandy screamed, rolling on the floor, completely losing her composure.
I seized the opportunity to crawl out from under her, clutching my chest and gulping down air like I'd just come up for breath.
The smell was so bad it made me gag, and that was when I saw Mandy was absolutely drenched in garbage.
Apparently, I'd just smashed a trash can right onto her head.
Someone snickered.
Mandy, fuming, scrambled to her feet and snatched up the fire extinguisher.
She brought it crashing down toward my head.
Everything happened so fast. I barely managed to block it with my arm.
There was a loud bang.
I heard the sickening sound of bone snapping.
Forcing myself to open my eyes, I saw splintered bone jutting out of my forearm.
In that instant, a surge of fury overwhelmed my fear.
"Mandy, Stephen, just you wait!" I threatened.
Mandy let out a bitter laugh, so furious she couldn't help herself.
She snatched up the fire extinguisher again, about to smash it down on me one more time.
The coworkers around us couldn't take it anymore.
One brave soul reached out and grabbed Mandy's hand. "Mandy, if you keep this up, Lynn might actually die.
"And we're all colleagues here. Do you really have to be so rough?"
Some people were already dialing 911, trying to get emergency help.
But Mandy stopped them, shooting them a warning look.
The loud crash caught Stephen's attention.
He rushed over, his eyes going straight to Mandy.
He pulled Mandy into his arms, gently taking the fire extinguisher from her trembling hands.
"Mandy, are you okay? Did you get hurt?" he asked.
Mandy pointed at the trash bag on her head, sobbing like her world was ending. "Stephen! She smashed a trash can on me. I want her dead!"
Stephen's face turned stormy, but when he finally looked at me, he froze.
He turned back to Mandy, trying to calm her down.
"Mandy, Mandy! Listen to me," Stephen said.
"The company's in a critical evaluation period right now, and I'm at a crucial point in my career.
"So, just teach her a lesson. Besides, that confidential file is worth 15 million dollars. If we get headquarters to help us find the evidence and hand it over to the police, she'll be gone from your life for good."
Mandy slowly calmed down in Stephen's arms and nodded.
She put her bossy attitude right back on, acting like she owned the place.
She strutted over and nudged my chin up with the tip of her shoe.
"Lynn, headquarters isn't going to let you off the hook for deleting that confidential file.
"15 million dollars. Even if you sold yourself, you couldn't pay that back in a hundred lifetimes.
"And with headquarters backed by the Shaw family, you won't even see it coming when you go down," she said with a defiant grin.
I locked eyes with her, an icy smirk curling at the corner of my lips.
If my timing's right, Leo should be showing up any second now.
Sure enough, the next second, the receptionist came running over in a panic. "Mr. Guthrie! Mr. Shaw's assistant is here!"
Just as I was about to smirk, I saw Mandy dash over like her life depended on it.
"Mr. Smith! You're from headquarters, right?" she called out.
"We've got a real troublemaker here. She's been mouthing off to her boss and refusing to follow orders.
"And when she quit, she deleted all our company secrets! Who knows, maybe she sold them to the competition."
Leo was swarmed by people and didn't even notice me lying there by the wall at first.
Playing along with Mandy, he said, "Oh? If she's a corporate spy, Mr. Shaw definitely won't let her off easy.
"I heard you called me here to gather evidence for a lawsuit. Let's get started."
With that, he headed straight for my desk and quickly locked eyes with me, lying there in a pool of blood.
"Mr. Smith, you're here," I said.
Mandy gave me a suspicious look, then glanced over at Leo. "Mr. Smith, you don't happen to know her, do you?"
I looked at Leo, a bad feeling creeping up inside me.
"No, I don't know her. Isn't she just a new hire at your branch?" he replied.
I looked up in disbelief. "Leo, you know about this. Dad assigned me to inspect the branch."
Leo glanced at me, and the icy look in his eyes made my heart sink completely.
"Ms. Shaw, keep it professional! Stop trying to claim connections that don't exist.
"I'll deal with your stealing company secrets through proper channels," he said.
With that, he sat down at my desk, used his admin access to open up the company database, and printed out the work logs.
He handed the printed documents to Mandy.
"Now we can call the police," he said.
"Her account sent company secrets to the competition during work hours, and then wiped them from the system."