Chapter 120 - Odd

Lena's mood was ruined for the whole day after reading the text's from Samuel's mother. Evalyn, she was the one piece in Samuel's life that hadn't come up with a lot of leads. They had information from for when she was sixteen, but everything before that was patchy. 

According to what Samuel had said and what they found, her parents were either missing or deceased. No record of an accident on file however. Did that mean she was an orphan? It wasn't the first time that situations such as these came up with orphans or parents who change their child's name because they know that they might be in danger and they want to keep them safe before giving them up. This didn't give any leads to follow though to learn about her background. They could only work forward which there wasn't much information offered considered she met her husband, Jacob Foster when she was nineteen. 

It didn't bode well with her, it seemed like she wasn't going to have to wait much longer to find out what the older woman was hiding. Based upon what it was, it could potentially affected her engagement with Samuel and how they proceeded forward with the relationship. At least it seemed like he didn't know anything about what his mother wanted to talk about. It would prevent him from facing any repercussions depending on what it was. 

With how she was feeling though it meant that she was going to have to change everything that she had planned for the rest of the day and evening. She didn't really feel like going out and doing anything knowing that there seemed to be something urgent that she didn't know about. 

It was frustrating but there wasn't anything that she could do about the situation. She could have Genson bring them lunch even though she didn't feel much like eating. She knew that if she didn't though, Samuel would wonder what was going. 

This also meant that she was going to have to cancel the dinner reservation that she had set for that night. It wasn't that huge of a deal, she could set it for either Saturday or Sunday night with little difficulty, but then the whole reason why she wanted to get into work early and finish everything up had been for not since she had only done it so that she could take Samuel out someplace nice to eat since they hadn't shared that type of dinner together and there was little time left before they would be getting engaged. 

She couldn't even really bring her father into whatever conversation was happening as he away until Sunday due to work on the other side of the state with Julian. They were trying to patch up some of the recent problems on the territory boarder by working on increasing the reach of their power. She would just have to fill him in when he got back. 

"You know if you keep glaring at your computer with that kind of intensity, you might actually burn a hole through it." Samuel's comment brought Lena out of her thoughts and caused her attention to turn to him. 

"Something bothering you?" He asked looking down at her from where he was standing near her desk. 

"Work always bothers me." She replied dryly, as she closed the email that was open on her computer. She hadn't been aware of the fact she was glaring until he said something. 

"Did I miss something that you said?" Shen asked noticing that he was still standing by her desk in an expectant manner. 

"Two things actually. I wanted to ask you about what this expense was for this month as I haven't seen before on any of the other months I've gone over. Also, James has been over there waiting for you for about five minutes. He didn't want to say anything though because it seemed like you were really concentrating on something." Samuel replied as he pointed to where James was intending standing near the office door. 

It took her a moment to realize why James would be there when she hadn't put anything on her schedule for them to have to take care of together- she had forgotten that she had a board meeting today and he had probably come to fetch her because it was about time for it start. Just great, one thing that he didn't want to do on top of everything else that was going on. 

"It's about the meeting today, isn't it?" Lena asked as she stood up from her chair. 

"Yes, Princess. I didn't think that you would have forgotten, but I wanted to make sure just to be safe that you wouldn't be late." James replied with a slight nod of head.  She really didn't have time to be thinking about other things right now, she needed to focus on work until she got home. Then she would be able to dwell on everything else that was on her mind. It wasn't like she would be likely to be able to sleep that night anyways. 

"Alright then, thank you." She told James before turning her attention to Samuel. 

"I will look at that when I get back, you can just leave it there on my desk for the time being. I probably won't be gone more than an hour after which I'll have Genson get us lunch. Unless there's something that you need, don't leave the office until I come back." She instructed waiting for Samuel to nod his head in understanding of what she was saying. 

"Good. If you do need anything, you can also message Clive and he will happy to accommodate you." She told him as she started walking towards the entrance of the office where James was standing. 

"Good luck on the meeting?" Samuel offered causing the princess to turn to him with a wry smile. 

"I might actually need that today. I will be sure to keep it with me." She told him before leaving the office. 

Even though she didn't tell him what was going, Samuel could see that something more than usual was bothering the princess and it had only occurred after was texting on the phone. Lena had ringtones set for her contacts on her phone, but because he hardly saw who was she was texting when her phone made a sound, he hadn't yet come to know which ringtone belonged to whom. 

Maybe though it was the board meeting that was going to that was bothering her. She had mentioned before that they weren't any easy group of people to work with as they were still accepting her taking over after her father gave her the position and not everyone was thrilled about the change. 

It was odd to him that while it seemed so many people respected him and what he did that they wouldn't also respect his decision to appoint daughter over the company. Shouldn't they trust him with that decision as well and be willing to work with her if Zane had good judgement in almost every other situation? It didn't make sense to him. 

Samuel figured though that while Lena was gone the only thing that he could really do was continue to focus on the work in front of him. There wasn't much to explore in her office as her draws on her desk were mostly locked and the two that weren't only had work related folders and in them plus other uninteresting bits and bobs.  Lena also always locked her computer when she had to leave and he had no clue what the password might be so there wasn't anything interesting for him to explore on that end either. 

The bookcases didn't have many interesting books to scan through or read to find out interesting tidbits. Most of the books were legal or business related but nothing that he was particularly familiar with. 

J had responded to the text he sent and just apologized for the fact that he was busy but that Samuel would be hearing again from him soon. He didn't mention why however so he could only wait to hear back from the other again. His parents seemed to be busy as they weren't messaging much or perhaps it was out of politeness for the fact that they knew the engagement party was coming up. 

Roger was his only friend that had tried to stay in touch with him despite getting ready to start college soon. He was mildly offended though to hear that he wouldn't be invited to the engagement party. He had wanted to be there to support his good friend. 

Samuel promised to try and make it up though by calling him and catching up, if they could make their schedules work for it. When that would be though was something that was hard to tell. Samuel couldn't give a definitive answer on that yet.

Everything felt odd and out of sorts, which he hoped would change once the engagement had been made official. He knew that there would be other things he would have on his plate, but at least this part would be done and over with.