Page 12 of Nothing Without You
“There’s just oneslightproblem, though” She flipped the screen back towards herself.
“What?” I asked.
Slumping back on the couch with the laptop, Umaima fixed the dupatta from slipping down her shoulder. Her hair was tied neatly in a loose bun. I only ever saw her hair when she was at home, otherwise it was always cradled under her hijabs. “I went through our systems and found the emails tracing back to you.”
My heart sped up. “I didn’t do it.”
“I know but Harry knows how to run this game. All the evidence points to you, down to bank account transactions. The only odd part is that these emails aren’t pre-determined, which means he has access to your account.”
Straightening my slackened posture, Hasan and I listened with furrowed brows.
“You guys truly know nothing.” Umaima sighed, “Someone has access to Adelaide’s emails.”
“How is that possible?” I asked with a croak in my throat. “How are they being traced back to me?”
Umaima smacked her lips together. “I could hack into your email with my eyes closed. The part that’s weirding me out is a lengthy code I can’t translate. If I can decode it, I can figure out where this person is. But that explains that someone who’s really good with tech is working with them and that’s how they have access to bank details.”
Umaima caught the look on my and Hasan’s face. With astute quickness, she redirected the conversation with a cheery tilt to her voice. “Lucky for you, he doesn’t care much for your personal life. At least no harm there, right?”
My palms turned sweaty, and my vocal cords vanished into an unwritten song. Evidence, that I had no idea about, was pushing me into quicksand and all I could do was watch myself go down.
“Digital forensics took all my computers before I could find more information. I was only able to gain access to the emails and the footage for now.” Umaima squeezed my hand with comfort. “We have to find a way to hide it from them and figure out who’s behind this, but if I don’t have those computers, they’ll lock Adelaide up and this whole thing will go to shit.”
My eyes slightly widened, and my brain raced for any answers when I met Umaima’s gaze. She gave me nothing but a reassuring smile.
Nothing was going the right way. I was moving in circles while standing in one place.
It should be easy enough to get three steps ahead of themand if I knew anything about digital forensics and HR investigations it would be that they won’t start until Monday afternoon.
The quicker I bought those computers; the quicker Umaima could track the board member’s previous records and figure out who was behind the emails.
As if Hasan could read my brain, he said, “Harry blocked your business cards.”
Shock radiated through my pores. “He didwhat?”
“Until investigations are over, he convinced the board to cut access to all your company accounts.”
My hand trickled upwards towards my neck and roughly rubbed circles right above my chest, lessening the constriction tightened within it. “But that’s where most of my money is. Mine doesn’t even have a thousand dollars in it.”
“Why the fuck would he do that?” Umaima spat out. “She handed him the company temporarily and all of a sudden, he’s finding ways to keep her out?Asshole.”
Thick tension made its way around the room. One by one, heating us like an oven ready to explode. I could feel the timer in me ticking as the seconds went by, but I couldn’t let loose like Umaima or even Hasan. It simmered beneath my skin, tightly shut and inaccessible.
Bricks of stiffness built themselves around my shoulders, keeping me upright but dizzy all at once. This was too much weight.Too much pressure.
Hair stuck to the back of my perspired neck. My senses sucked into suffocation, feeling a hitch of overstimulation and uncontrol—my breaths quickened at pace. There were three of Hasan’s, two couches…
Starlight was my parents’ biggest accomplishment. Theywere gone and all they had was me, here, in this world able to take care of it for them—but even I couldn’t… I couldn’t. I was a failure; I always would be. Solving this would solve nothing. No one would care. People would still stare at me like I was a female nobody, acting like I knew what to do. Then Starlight would be Harry’s and my parents would be disappointed in me. Eda would hate me. She’d disown me and I’d be left with nothing. I had no money. No place to truly call home. And I was alone with two of my best friends who were struggling to help me out. I was a lost cause, this would never work out, I would never work out. It would be better to quit now, call the police and tell them it was me; I’d save myself the shame of trying to solve this when all fingers are pointing at me and only me.
The air remained hidden behind my cheeks and back into my esophagus. I tried to breathe but the air inside of me was too scared just like my mind was. It wanted to hide like the rest of me and all I could do was wait for my senses to kick in—for my brain to remember how to breathe.
I am okay.
I am okay.
I am okay.
Sound started coming back into focus. Distant conversations of Moonshine and Osama Taimoor drifted into my ears with?—
