The Arrangement Factor (ARRANGEMENT SERIES #1)

Chapter 39

Alex's POV

"What the fuck is going on, Dan? This is no joke," I shouted as I entered my office.

"Alex, do I look like I'm joking?" Dan responded, his face serious.

"This can't be happening, Dan. I checked all the paperwork myself. How is this even possible?" I said my frustration mounting as I struggled to comprehend what had gone wrong.

"Clearly, they switched the papers at the time of the deal, and we missed it," Dan replied. It made sense, but I couldn't believe I'd made such a colossal error.

"I missed it. I am responsible for this. I should have been more careful. I got distracted, and I've ruined everything. It's my mistake," I admitted, my voice filled with self-blame.

"It's not your fault, Alex. How could you have known? They switched the papers just before you signed them. I would have made the same mistake if I were there. You've been careful, but they were more cunning than us," Dan reassured me.

"How much did we lose?" I pressed for an answer.

"...." he didn't answer and was looking at the ground.

"DAN! Fucking answer me. HOW MUCH DID WE LOSE?" I shouted at him at top of my voice.

"It's alright Alex we can sue them, we'll come up with something." Daniel said still not answering my fucking question.

"Mr. White!" I shouted from my office.

My lawyer came running inside my office. His clothes were disoriented and his eyes were puffy. Looked like finally we all got to see him work all night or work at all.

"How much did we lose?" I asked the same question to him because Dan was not giving me the fucking answer.

"500 billion dollars Sir." He said in a low voice.

"FUCKING HELL!" I exclaimed, hurling a vase from my office table against the wall in frustration.

"How are we going to handle this, Dan?" I implored, my mind racing to find a way out of the mess I had inadvertently created.

"Do you even have any idea, how much more we will be losing when the news gets out and our other clients start backing out?...  We will be losing every fucking thing. Our clients our brand our fucking reputation. EVERYTHING!" I shouted as I was mad at myself for not having a proper background check on our new clients.

It was all my mistake, I sidelined everything that looked suspicious because, they told me they were new in business and I trusted them. I FUCKING TRUSTED THEM. How fucking stupid can I be, I knew from experience not to trust anyone.

I was accountable for us losing everything. Dan had entrusted me with the authority to sign, even though we were equal partners. We had both started from scratch, leaving behind our family wealth and now, I had brought us back to zero. It was a colossal setback. At ZERO. FUCKKK!!!

The foreign clients we had eagerly taken on turned out to be nothing more than fraudsters who had tricked me into signing a deal that could cost us 500 billion dollars.

"Why did I accept their offer?" I questioned aloud, realising that my ambitions for expanding our company outside the US had clouded my judgment. My manager told me that we were already busy with the client we got after 1 year of convincing but I got greedy and now all of them are going to suffer because of me.

The reality hit me hard – the impending doom of our business, clients, and reputation. I couldn't let this catastrophe consume everything we had built. I needed to find a way to rescue us from the abyss.