Page 99 of The Friend Zone Experiment

Now that Ket Siong thought about it, he was not sure Ma had not known about Ket Hau and Stephen all along. If he had had his suspicions, so must she. But how she would feel about gaining Stephen as a son-in-law was hard to predict.

Ket Hau turned around. “Mrs. Daley—Helen. You’ve been very patient while we’ve been subjecting you to our drama.”

“Not at all,” said Helen readily. “It’s been a pleasure hosting you. I’m only sorry I couldn’t persuade your brother to try some Glenmorangie. Would you like some? I find a dram steadies the nerves wonderfully.”

Ket Hau declined, but only after an extended pause that suggested he was seriously considering the offer.

“About the USB drive Stephen mentioned,” he said. “I don’t have it on me right now. But it’s in our possession. I can tell you what the evidence consists of, if that would be helpful.”

“I would be very interested in hearing that,” said Helen. “Stephen wasn’t able to tell me much of the detail. It’s been so long since he had access to the documents. But are you sure you’dlike to talk about it now? You’ve had rather a trying day. We could always speak another time.”

“I’m fine,” said Ket Hau. He drew out a chair, sitting down at the dining table. “I should have tried to do something with the information three years ago. But better late than never.”

“It couldn’t be a better time if you had planned it,” said Helen. “So let’s say it’s all for the best, in this best of all possible worlds. You’re sure you don’t want another drink? All right. Do you mind if I record this conversation? Perfect.” She smiled. “Take it away.”

27

Renee was workingwhen she saw the notification. A new blog post had been published on theHornbill Gazette.

She clicked on the link because she felt in need of distraction. Her supplier for Virtu at Home—a family-run studio in Japan that had taken long searching to find—was folding, after the sudden passing of the patriarch. Forget about rolling out the line at Chinese New Year. She might not get to do it at all. It was a crushing blow.

At least sales in the run-up to Christmas were robust, but it was always a crunch getting orders out and everything done before Virtu closed for the break. Shutting the office from Christmas Eve through to the new year was something she’d introduced as a well-being measure, but it made the weeks before wildly stressful. Chinese New Year was bearing down on them, too—it was in late January next year, earlier than usual—and their New Year womenswear collection had to be perfect. It was their mainstay, vital for cash flow.

At least Renee had had three weeks of relative peace since the Freshview pitch to focus on Virtu’s problems. They were waiting to hear about the outcome of the pitch, though they should be getting the news any day now. Freshview had said it would take three or four weeks.

In the meantime, Su Khoon had taken himself off to Europe, where he was travelling with his family. They were due to return to London next week, and Dad was flying in from Singaporeto join them for a few days. He’d made it clear the reason he was coming was to tell Renee and Su Khoon in person about his choice of CEO—the assumption was that Freshview would have announcedtheirchoice by then. But the plan was also to have a big family get-together to celebrate Renee’s birthday.

That was something to look forward to. They’d booked a nice restaurant—Renee was particularly fond of Yauatcha’s patisserie—but she was considering whether she might invent a bout of stomach flu to get out of the meal.

Dad, Su Khoon, and his family were going to travel back to Singapore together afterwards. With a lesser man, one might be inclined to wonder whether the fact Dad had elected to share a plane with Su Khoon and Jessie for thirteen hours indicated he was leaning towards choosing Su Khoon.

But Renee had decided not to read too much into the choice. She was avoiding thinking about the Chahaya leadership contest as much as she could. It was a topic that only led her down dead ends.

It didn’t occur to her, as theHornbill Gazetteupdate loaded, that its contents were unlikely to be soothing, given the reason she’d subscribed in the first place. It had been years since theGazettehad blogged about Ensengei or Freshview. Even the Facebook post mentioning Stephen’s disappearance dated from seven months ago. Renee didn’t expect to see anything relevant to her in the new post.

TheGazettebegan by apologising for its silence in recent months, before offering an explanation:

We have been busy working on a piece, to be published shortly in one of the UK’s major broadsheets, detailing a shocking corruption scandal implicating the highest levels of the state and federal government. The main players will be familiar to those who have followed Sarawak’s woes over the years.They include a prominent company, run by one of the premier’s cronies, whose rapacious exploitation of Sarawak’s resources and flagrant disregard of the law have been covered in this blog before. The article will also present, for the first time, a full account of the enforced disappearance of a local activist, with proof of the complicity of corporate interests and state forces. As always in Malaysia, money works hand in hand with politics to serve the powerful.

Renee read the post over again, pressure gathering in her chest.

There was no reason to think theGazettewas talking about Freshview. If there was one thing she’d learnt from reading through the blog’s archives, it was that prominent companies run by political cronies abounded in Malaysia. The post could be about any number of shady businesses.

If not for the detail of the disappeared activist. There weren’tthatmany of those.

Renee’s throat closed up, her heart banging against her ribs. She got up and staggered to her kitchen, fumbled for a glass of water, and drank it down.

She had been working so hard not to worry about the Freshview deal—though ithadstruck her a couple of weeks ago that she had the resources to do more than Google obsessively for evidence of what Ket Siong had told her. She’d reached out to the enquiry agents she’d hired a few years back when her brothers had engineered their campaign to sabotage her and Virtu.

The agency had said they would see what they could find out. So far, they hadn’t come up with anything she hadn’t already read about online. They’d said they were investigating a potential lead in Switzerland, of all places, but there hadn’t been an update on that yet.

If they found anything… but until they did, until there was some concrete evidence she could show her family, there wasnothing Renee could do. The pitch was done. Their proposal was going through Freshview’s corporate machinery. Freshview would decide what they decided.

It wasn’t likely they’d decide for Chahaya, anyway, after that debacle at lunch. Andrew had accepted Renee’s apology with oily condescension, but the incident would hardly have endeared Chahaya to him. And if Chahaya lost the pitch, then there was nothing to worry about. Su Khoon would blame Renee; Dad would be scathing about her emotional incontinence; Su Beng would saunter into the top job to which he had been born; and they would all go back to their lives.

Renee wasn’t going to lose it over a deal that would probably never be signed.

She sat back down at her desk. It was only three o’clock. If she buckled down, she should be able to get four or five solid hours of work in before clocking off for the evening.

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