Chapter 218 - A New Lead

Unaware of the storm brewing back in his apartment, Edward was quite proud of himself for finding something that could get them yet another step closer to their end goal. The sleepless night he spent combing through the millions of numbers finally paid off. There was a name that struck him as suspicious and after digging deeper into it, he found a common connection to the list of names and subsidiary companies that CEO Zhu gave Scarlet.

"These are the companies that have one common shareholder," Edward said and opened a file on his laptop, snapping quickly out of his pensive mood. He wanted to get everything done within a week so that he could go back and apologise to Scarlet or even tell her some of the things that he had been up to. Scarlet must be feeling miserable enough to call for Alex. The model usually didn't leave this early according to Jasper. The text that she sent Jasper made Edward feel slightly relieved.

"Is she staying with you?" he asked the young CEO and Jasper nodded. He didn't think hiding anything from a crucial partner in their mission would do any good. 

"Alex is bringing her over for a few days. She's still complaining about how Scarlet is too good for you. She didn't want to pack everything over in case you went back to find it empty. Scarlet didn't want you to worry."

Edward felt his heart soften at that but slapped himself out of those thoughts. He was working now and he couldn't afford to be distracted. No wonder his father chose to live separately from his mother even if they were both in love. It was difficult for any spy to focus on their mission if their minds were constantly occupied by thoughts and worries for their loved ones. Edward could understand now why many spies who found love chose to leave their spy lives behind and settle for something relatively normal.

"Back to topic," he said and wiped any traces of emotions from his face. Elfie got serious too and Jasper put his phone away. Ever since Elfie introduced this teen at the pizza party, Jasper had always been curious about what Edward could do. Was he also a hacker? While he still had no answers, he could understand a little better. 

"The shareholder doesn't come in an individual's name so it took me a while to find out the missing link. After scouring through millions of files and records, I finally nailed a definite source for everything that happened. There were a few names that appeared in the transactions but they are all pointing to the same parent company. I still haven't found the prime suspect and individual giving all these small fries so much confidence to act but we can be certain that two companies are involved in the crime - East-West China Airline and Diamond Containers."

Edward brought up a spreadsheet that contained all the transactions between the various subsidiaries and the counterparts that they traded with. Edward switched tabs and matched those names to the financial report of the companies' shares, highlighting the names of Diamond Containers and East-West China Airline. Jasper looked into the information and was stunned by the number of connections Edward managed to make based on Scarlet's file. If it were left to him and Elfie to analyse, they might never have made that connection.

"Who exactly are you?" Jasper couldn't help but be impressed. Even if Danny and Wilmer had this information, he doubted that they could discover the link so quickly. Yet, this was only speculation from Edward, they had to find the evidence.

Edward shook his head and Elfie smiled. "He can be trusted," the programmer told Jasper who looked slightly doubtful but nodded.

Edward bowed. "It might be slightly late for the introduction but I'm Edward Bayon, an information specialist of sorts. I'm not good at hacking but I know a thing or two after working with Elfie for many years. I also know that Scarlet intends to take down Anastasia alone and I cannot allow her to do that because it's too dangerous. Hence, I'm offering my expertise. I will find the evidence needed but please, help me keep Scarlet out of this."

Needless to say, Jasper and Elfie agreed. They wanted to leave the sisters out of this matter simply because they were the most likely targets that Anastasia was looking for now that his attempts were proving to be futile against Danny and Wilmer.

"How's the situation with Danny and Wilmer?" Edward asked Elfie while Jasper looked through the findings.

Elfie shook his head. "No clue on their side, no lead, I assume. However, Anastasia has gotten less patient. Recently he has started targeting the upper management. Danny is introducing more security measures but after so many years, everyone is tired of fighting. I don't know who will cave first but Wilde Empire isn't as strong as it used to be despite Jasper's support with the VR and the games coming up. Anastasia's son tried to approach us and offered to buy Kiwi Cat Studio for several billion but Jasper had been declining it."

"Wait," Edward stopped his friend. "Anastasia sent his son?"

Jasper paused and looked up. "Yes, he's such a slimebag. It was a good thing Alex wasn't here that day when he dropped by unannounced. I believe I have his business card somewhere, let me get it."

The young CEO left the room and Elfie shook his head when Edward glared at him. "I didn't know about it either! I only knew that EZ Express has been targeting Kiwi Cat Studio but they've always sent sales representatives. I swear I didn't know about Julian's visit, I've never seen the man before!"

Edward cussed. If Lucian Anastasia was said to be the biggest menace that the Interpol couldn't interfere with, Julian Anastasia was the biggest nuisance in the legal world. Every politician had some sort of connection to that man in some way and this was one of the reasons why the Interpol was finding it more and more difficult to pin Anastasia's tail. He had a very capable son who was very good at covering tracks. Even if the Interpol had connections with every country, they couldn't easily get hold of some confidential country secrets relating to trade or commerce. Julian has spies in just about every major country EZ Express had business in and Edward's father couldn't make progress on the case because it would offend too many big wigs if they dug too deeply.

"What exactly do they want from Kiwi Cat Studios?" Edward asked. It didn't seem like the shrewd businessman knew about Alex's relationship with Jasper. Both sisters had been very quiet about their relationsh.i.p.s so Anastasia couldn't possibly find out about it. Julian usually didn't show up in person unless there was something he wanted desperately. Rumours said that nobody could deny Julian what he wanted when he paid them a visit personally.

Before Elfie could tell him more, Jasper returned with the name card. It took him some time to dig it out from the mountain of papers on his desk. Alex was not a very good assistant so the table wasn't tidied to the level that Jasper wanted. Of course, he couldn't tell his girlfriend that. He was only thankful that Alex didn't move his things all over the place in a way that Jasper couldn't find the things he needed. It was high time Jasper looked into hiring a secretary.

"This is the name card," Jasper said and passed it to Edward who snapped a picture of both sides with his phone. The name was Julian Anastasia and underneath the name was his position.

"He is the CEO of EZ Express? What about Lucian Anastasia? Did he step down?" Edward asked and Jasper shrugged.

"I declined a meeting with him, remember?"

Elfie and Edward exchanged looks. While they were making good progress with Edward's new lead and a direction that they could start looking into, it would be incredibly helpful if Jasper could do something on his end as well.

Jasper felt a chill when both teens suddenly turned to him with smiles on their faces. Elfie placed a hand on his right shoulder and Edward placed a hand on his left shoulder, forcing him down onto a chair as they caged him in from both sides. There was nowhere to run and Jasper tried to shrink himself into the chair when those smiles looked more devilish than angelic.

"W-what are you guys doing?" the young CEO asked and Edward flipped Julian's name card.

"We want you to contact him and make an appointment when we tell you to do it. Elfie and I will help you out, don't look so nervous. Listen to us calmly and we might just be able to find the missing link that we need. Right now, we have the companies involved but it's still too wide a scale to search for the culprit. Finding them is like looking for a needle in a haystack. If you talk to Julian, we can burn the candle on both ends. Do you have that resolve to help your girlfriend out? You're going to paint a target on your back to remove the one on Alex and Scarlet's."

Hearing Edward phrase it this way made Jasper unable to refuse. The girls have been working hard all these years and it was time for him to do his part. The bait was finally getting bitten as Scarlet had suggested. Except, now Jasper was done being the bait, he was going to be the hook that Scarlet intended to be. He only hoped that the reel and rod called Edward and Elfie was strong enough to catch the shark called Anastasia. They only had one chance and failure was not an option.

"I agree. This news doesn't reach anyone else, take care of Claire's guards, Alex and Scarlet for me. I don't want them near me while I cast the bait to hook this man in."

"Agreed," Edward shook Jasper's hand to seal the deal and Elfie couldn't help but feel nervous now that the plan they've been hatching all these years was finally going to happen.