Two more days passed by before Lena was allowed to go back to work. Her father wanted to let things settle for a day after Samuel had gotten because since there was still so much that needed to be discussed. Jovani at least left like he had said he would the next day since he still had things he needed to take care of. It ended up being later in the afternoon than he had wanted it to be as there was a number of questions that Zane had wanted to ask him about.
Without him around, Lena was able to feel like things were more on a normal level though she still had to process the fact that her Samuel was head of the Vedova Nera family so not everything would be returning to the same normal that they had before.
The two nights after he had come back she had at least been able to keep her own bed space at night even though he had tried to reason once more with about which shot down.
Aside from the fact that she didn't still quite know what to make of her feelings for Samuel that were changing, the rest of her feelings were shifting back to the normal that she was used to and that was what drew her towards wanting her own space back. It wasn't like it was that far away from the date of their engagement anyways.
Clive was happy to be the one to drive them to work. Lena hadn't bothered letting anyone aside from James know that she would be coming back simply because she wanted to see how they would react to her sudden reappearance. Aside from explaining that there were family issues going on, not much of a detailed explanation had been given as to why she would be absent for a few weeks..
Everyone had their own speculations about what was going since it had happened right after the new hires had been made, but the one rumor that had been quickly squashed was that the princess was already getting replaced or her father was taking back over since progress within the company had been slow.
The slow progress of the company had nothing to do with Lena taking over, but more had to do so with the need to be careful. The current financial issue that they were trying to solve was the perfect example as to why she wanted to be careful when it came to moving forward with everything. She didn't want to deal with another issue like this in the future.
The one person that Lena really wanted to see what kind of response she would get was Genson. He had been given her updates about what was going on as Eve had been, but she couldn't help but wonder how freely he had gotten with his interactions and behavior while she was away.
Today though, he would end up going back to being her assistant again because she need physical updates and explanations from him on anything that he found or took note of while she was away.
Now that she would be back at work, it also meant that she could get coffee without anyone telling her that she needed to be careful about drinking too much. She had missed the caffeine. It was bad enough that she also hadn't been able to convince her father to give her the pipe back either. He still believed that she had been using it too much.
Samuel was accompanying her as well. Mostly because his original schedule hadn't been put back into place and partly because there was going to be as shift within the business soon that he would be a part of.
The princess also wanted him there to see how Genson would react to seeing that both of them were back. If he was working with Marcus, she was certain that there would be some type of reaction from him that would help to give it away. She would rather catch him out on it sooner rather than later so that it could be one less thing that she needed to worry about.
Samuel had kept his suit and cufflinks, but wouldn't be wearing his ring to work either since at Genson at least was there and even though he had signed a non-disclosure agreement that made it so that he couldn't discuss anything work related outside of the job, Lena didn't trust him for one second to follow it if he thought he could get away with not being caught if he broke it.
Because she didn't want to have to deal with too many people, she asked Clive to park in the back car garage so that they could enter the building from the back side where less people would notice them having entered the building.
James was waiting for her inside seeming somewhat nervous about her coming back. Why she wasn't quite sure since as far as she had been aware he had done a good job of keeping everything in order while she was gone and her office still looked to be in the same shape she had left it in.
"Any reason for the on-edge behavior?" She asked James as he closed the office door behind her after Samuel had entered the room. He seemed to pause when she asked this question before replying.
"A few people have been quitting recently with all the changes that had been going on recently and I think we might have let someone of interest slip during this time." He answered honestly knowing already to expect that the princess would be upset to hear about it.
"Who is it?" Lena asked her mood already taking on a more serious tone. She had expected to deal with a number of things when she had gotten back to the office, this wasn't one of them however.
"We don't have a name yet, just picture ID only." James replied as he gave her the folder that he had been holding.
"We had been working on going through everyone as Eve suggested we might want to double check and make sure that everyone working here had been properly cleared." James explained.
"Which is also around the time that everything happened with you and people started leaving. This person reviewed but we realized in the system that the information he gave us didn't match with the person that he claimed he was." Lena half listened to what the other was saying as he looked over the photo that she had been given.
The man looked to be in his mid forties, rather thin but tall with short hair. He had glasses on and was wearing a suit. One thing she noticed though was what looked to be a tattoo barely visible on the left hand that was opening the door to leave the building. It was one of the only places that had a security camera in order to make sure that no one tried to break in.
"What about the person he pretended to be?" Lena then asked though she already felt like she had an idea of what would've happened to them.
"Missing it would seem. Beyond identity theft, we can't find any prior connection between the two though without a name it's a little hard to trace them. Eve is working on what she can to put something together. She said it might take her a bit though."
"I see. Can you summon Genson then. He's probably the best person to ask in this matter since it is supposed to be his job to keep track of all these things. I want to see what he happens to know about this matter or anything else." She told James as she closed the folder after taking the picture out.
She doubted that Genson was directly involved in whoever this person was, but once again it came down to the fact that there were so many people that he knew that she didn't doubt he would be able to put something together about it if he hadn't already known ahead of time.
The only thing that made Lena's morning slightly brighter after being immediately drawn into this issue was the fact that she had been right in thinking that Genson wasn't going to be happy to see that she had returned. She could give him points for the fact that he tried his best to cover his less-than-thrilled reaction behind his charming smile, but she could still see it in his eyes.
"Nice to see that you both could come back and join us finally. I suppose that means everything was safely settled?" Rather than answering his question, Lena showed him the picture and gave him a pointed look.
"Am I safe to assume that you know who this person is?" She asked cutting straight to the point. Genson looked at the picture with a frown as he picked it up. He was quiet before he set it down after a moment.
"I can't say I do beyond the fact that I have seen him around here at work of course. Who he might be outside of that is beyond me. There are some people after all that I don't know in this world." He replied with small shrug.
"I'd appreciate if you could think about it and come up with some ideas about who it might be though. Also, I want a report from you now about anything else you've noticed such as why this person wasn't flagged by you before it seems like he stepped out of here." She ordered. He didn't seem thrilled about it, but didn't hesitate to launch into an account of everything he had taken note of while she was away.
