Chapter 140: ONE HUNDRED AND FORTY

Adrian’s POV

I had been sitting behind my father’s desk for almost an hour when the office door finally opened. I looked up from the documents spread across the desk and saw his assistant walking in with a thick file tucked against her chest.

Roman was sitting at the far end of the sofa, one ankle resting over his knee as he scrolled through his phone, but the moment she entered, his attention shifted toward her.

She crossed the room without saying anything, placed the file directly in front of me, and stepped back with confidence.

I opened the file and scanned the first few pages. It was the employee list I had requested from one of the departments I had already marked for review. I had specifically asked for names, positions, salaries, years of service, current responsibilities, and recent performance records. Instead, I had received several pages of names with barely enough information to tell me why half of them were still employed.

"What exactly do you need this list for?" she asked.

I slowly lifted my eyes from the papers. "To decide who stays."

Her expression tightened slightly. "Who stays?"

"Who gets fired," I corrected, closing the file. "There are people on this list who contribute almost nothing to the company. They have comfortable positions, ridiculous salaries, and apparently no fear of losing either."

She stared at me for a moment before giving a small, disbelieving laugh. "Sir, I don’t think you understand how that department operates."

"That I need to review my staff?"

"No, I mean that particular department is different. It has always been treated as a VIP section within the company. Your father personally approved most of their arrangements, and he was very supportive of the way they worked."

I leaned back in the chair, studying her carefully. "And?"

She tilted her chin. "And it wouldn’t be wise to suddenly start dismissing people from there simply because their work doesn’t look important on paper. Mr. Blackthorne knew how the company needed to operate. Some departments had certain privileges for a reason."

There it was again.

My father.

I looked down at the list, then back at her. "You keep mentioning my father."

She hesitated. "I—"

"Every time I make a decision you don’t like, you tell me how he did things. Every time I question something, you explain how he ran the company. Every time I change something, you remind me that he approved it." I pushed the file aside and folded my hands on the desk. "I’m beginning to wonder whether you understand who you’re working for."

Her face changed, but she still didn’t back down. "I’m only trying to explain how things have always been handled."

I glared at her. "I don’t care how things have always been handled." My voice was calm, but Roman stopped scrolling through his phone.

I stood from the chair and walked around the desk until I was standing directly in front of her. "Listen carefully. This is not my father’s company anymore. Whatever authority he had ended with him. Whatever rules he created are not automatically my rules. Whatever arrangements he made with employees, partners, politicians, or anyone else are subject to review."

She swallowed. "Yes, sir."

"I am running this company now," I continued. "And I’m going to run it the way I see fit. If an employee is useless, they will leave. If a department is wasting money, it will be restructured. If someone has been taking advantage of the company because my father allowed it, that protection no longer exists."

She lowered her eyes. "Understood."

"Good." I returned to my chair and picked up another document. "Now, the recruitment process. How many applications have we received?"

She answered immediately this time. "More than expected. The notice has only been active for a short period, but several senior professionals have already submitted applications. We’re still sorting through them."

I nodded. "Good. Have the current department heads submitted their reports?"

"Yes."

I looked up at her again for a second. "Send all of them to me before the end of the day. I want their financial records, department expenses, employee performance reports, and contracts."

"Yes, sir."

"And don’t filter anything because you think I won’t like what I see." I warned.

"I wouldn’t—"

"I didn’t ask what you would or wouldn’t do." I looked up at her. "I told you what I want."

She pressed her lips together and nodded, while I returned my attention to the papers. "You can go."

She turned toward the door, but Roman’s voice stopped her. "Actually, leave the door open."

She looked at him. "What?"

Roman didn’t even raise his head from his phone. "I don’t like closed doors when someone... is already acting like they own the building."

Her expression hardened for half a second before she walked out without answering, and the door remained open behind her.

I waited until her footsteps disappeared down the hallway before looking at Roman.

He was grinning.

"What?" I asked.

"That woman has an attitude."

I leaned back in my chair. "I noticed."

"No, you just noticed, it seems. I’ve been noticing it for weeks." Roman tossed his phone onto the sofa beside him. "She talks to everyone like she’s doing them a favor by allowing them to work here. Earlier, she tried to tell me that certain financial reports were none of my concern."

I raised an eyebrow. "What did you say?"

Roman leaned back. "I asked her whether the company belonged to her."

I laughed under my breath and turned back toward the documents. "I’ll have her arrested."

Roman’s expression changed. "Already?"

"Not yet." I tapped my fingers against the desk. "I’m not going to make an accusation without proof. I want to know exactly what she’s been doing here first."

"You think she’s stealing?"

I paused. "Not exactly, I think she’s hiding something."

Roman leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. "Because of the way she behaves?"

"Because of everything." I opened another file. "She knows too much about how my father operated. She knows which employees had special treatment, which departments were protected, and she seems far too comfortable telling me what I should and shouldn’t change. So I’ll have her investigated."

Roman nodded slowly.

I had already asked someone to look into her background. Anything that could explain why she had remained beside my father for so long without ever appearing concerned about the things happening around him.

If she had simply been an employee doing her job, the investigation would confirm that. If she had been benefiting from his corruption, I would find that too.

Roman stretched back against the sofa. "So what’s the actual plan?"

I didn’t answer immediately. Instead, I stood.

I walked toward the bookshelf and ran my fingers along its edge. Then I moved to the cabinet beside the window, opened one of the drawers, and stared at the neatly arranged files inside. My father’s handwriting was still visible on several folders and I shut the drawer.

I walked back toward the desk and stopped beside the large chair where I had spent most of the morning..

My hand rested against its back. "This," I said.

Roman frowned. "What?"

"This entire office." I looked around slowly.

The desk, shelves, cabinets, framed photographs, expensive furniture. Even the stupid decorative clock sitting on the corner of the desk.

Everything belonged to a man who was dead, but somehow he was still everywhere.

I picked up the clock and turned it over in my hand before placing it back down. "I don’t want any of it."

Roman watched me carefully.

"I don’t want his desk. I don’t want his files sitting in these cabinets. I don’t want his pictures on the walls. I don’t want his systems, his arrangements, or the way he built this place." I walked toward the window and looked down at the city below. "Everywhere I look, I see him. And every time I see him, I remember what this company was being used for."

Roman stood from the sofa. "So you’re going to change the office?"

I turned back toward him. "Everything."

He gave a small nod. "Right."

"The company needs a complete renovation," I said.

Roman crossed his arms. "That’s going to take time."

I looked at him.. "That doesn’t bother me."

Roman smiled slightly. "I figured."

I walked back to the desk and began gathering the documents into separate piles. "We’re going to review every department. If something is legitimate and useful, it stays. If it’s there because my father wanted control, profit, or protection for himself, it’s gone.". I glanced at the employee list again. "And the people who benefited from his system will have to prove they deserve to remain."

Roman picked up his phone from the sofa and slipped it into his pocket. "Then I suppose we’re going to be busy."

"We already are.". I sat down again, but this time I didn’t look at my father’s chair as something I had inherited.. I looked at it as something temporary.

By the time I was finished with this company, there would be nothing left that reminded me of the man who had built it.