บท 14: The Deadly Iceberg

CHAPTER 14

"Why are they not clear? Couldn't you manage to get a clear picture of him? How can we find that man when we don't know who he is?"

"Father, if you get a closer look at the pictures, you would see something," Zale spoke out, unaffected by his father's recent outburst.

"See what?"

"Chairman sir, in the last picture specifically, we could see the eyes of the man who kidnapped her," the other man tried to explain but did a lousy job at it as the Chairman once again shouted.

"And so?"

"Father, please calm down and hear us out. With these pictures, we may have a clear lead and it might not be a good one. Following the trend of the first three pictures, there would have been no way to see her abductor's face but in the last, we saw it. He looked up."

As Zale explained, Mr Anders, the Chairman of the Anders Group took a closer look at the pictures in his hands and inspected them carefully.

Previously, he had failed to take a careful look at the pictures because he was angry, but now when he did, he could clearly see the difference and all that they said made sense.

True to what his son had said, the man could have avoided the CCTV cameras well enough, but didn't. It was almost as though…

"He wanted to be seen," Mr Zain said, his lashes going up, peeling his eyes away from the pictures and looking at his son.

"The problem now is, we cannot guess who he is just from his eyes," Zale confessed to his father.

"Of course you wouldn't know who he is. None of the younger generations would," Mr Zain said, his eyes holding deep secrets in their depth.

Zale knew there was something he wasn't being told and it itched him to probe his father.

"Father, does that mean you know who he is?" Zale finally asked, his curiosity beating him to it.

Mr Zain wrinkled his nose and a dark glint flashed across his eyes. Zale and the other man knew things were about to go dark.

Whoever that man was, he was surely not in the good book of Mr Zain and even if he was previously, now, after the whole incident, he was definitely not in it.

"Precision, ruthless, sharp, accurate, deadly, fierce, strong, smart, swift, skilled... Those were the kind of words used to describe him, the Unkillable Killer, right-hand man and personal bodyguard of Jake Frost, the Deadly Iceberg."

As Mr Zain spoke, the chilly air in the cold room seemed to grow colder than before, giving goosebumps to the men that listened.

"If Frost had such a person by his side, how come he was easily killed? Why hasn't anyone from my generation seen him since he is Frost's, right-hand man?" Zale asked his father.

He couldn't place it well himself. It seemed all suspicious.

"That was years ago. Apparently, everyone thought he was dead or retired or something unthinkable happened to him. But after many years, he finally resurfaced, protecting the heir to the Frost Empire. This is no coincidence."

"What do you mean, father?"

"Frost really was a cunning wise man. No wonder none of the attempts on Jade's life ever worked," Mr Zain said to himself in a whisper.

To Mr Zain, all the broken pieces were finally coming together.

Zale looked to his side and his eyes met with the other man. Both of their faces were filled with confusion at what the Chairman meant or was talking about.

Moving to the edge of his seat and placing his hands in the big office desk in between them, Zale probed his father again.

"Father, I didn't get that. What do you mean exactly?"

At his son's words, Mr Zain raised his head, so his eyes could meet with his son's confused ones.

"It all makes sense now. That damn Frost. Even in his death, he still managed to give me a hard time. He truly lives up to his nickname, deadly iceberg."

And for the first time since they began this meeting, Zale rolled his eyes at his father. He was lucky not to get caught by the old man though, or else...

'Can he just get it out already? He is talking in parables. How am I to understand what he means? Unfortunately, I cannot do anything about his stalling anyway, I can only just wait it out, urgh men of those days.' Zale lamented in his mind.

After what seemed to be forever, Mr Zain finally broke the ice.

"All these years we thought him dead, but who would have thought that he was serving Frost in the shadows? Why none of our attempts or any other Mafia gang's attempt to kill Frost's heir proved effective, was because he had the Unkillable Killer protect her in the shadows."

Both men raised their heads almost instantly as they stared at the Chairman with unbelieving eyes.

"No wonder, there was always someone shooting from a different angle when we attacked her before," the other man spoke up, his eyes opening a fraction up at the sudden realization.

"He secretly had his most trusted bodyguard protect his daughter, while having her surrounded 24/7 by her own personal bodyguard. What a plan." Zale thought, but unknowingly said it out loud.

"Since he was wise and thorough, he should have known we were coming for him, why didn't he set up preventive measures?"

"For that I am not particularly sure. But he did make sure to give us a hard time in getting what we want and ensured till the end that I didn't get the seal. Bloody bastard," Mr Zain cursed him through gritted teeth.

"How do we proceed from here, father? We do not know where he is."

"Hmm, Carter," Mr Zain called out, shifting his gaze from his son to the man on his right. "Check all other CCTV footage and trace the car. Bribe who needs to be bribed and get every footage of all the vehicles moving in and out of this city."

"Understood, Chairman," the other man, Carter Greyson responded, sitting straight on his seat.

"If he has her, then it is clear that the one who died is a fake and only used to prevent prying eyes. Jade Nova Frost is still out there and alive."