Letting Her Go

. . .

"Hello Miss Vanessa... this is Miss Li—ahahahhahaha," Zeirenne had to fan her face as her laughter errupted.

She forgot to take the voice changer off, and hearing her own voice turning into a mouse squeak made her reach her limits. Thus, erupting into an uncontrollable laughter.

"Tsk!" Luisito hissed before grabbing the phone from her flailing hands to take the voice changer off. He glared at her before handing the phone back

"This is Miss Vanessa... isn't it? This is Miss Lin. And I am indeed... in the hands of these men."

The whole car was engulfed with a dreadful silence as the men wiped some sweat off their foreheads from nervousness.

Luisito snatched the phone from her hands, "Did you hear that? Give us what we want and be sure you won't get the police involved or else..." He cocked the gun, loud enough to be heard on the line.

They all waited in anticipation for Miss Vanessa's response. While Zeirenne nonchalantly sat, the men were gripping their shirts, biting their nails, and even ruffling their hair out of anxiety.

"Oh. I see..." Miss Vanessa said casually, like her CEO getting kidnapped was not out of the ordinary, "Please stay on the line as I redirect you to the Management Department. Have a nice day!"

The line ended with a long beep before some background white noise played. Zeirenne was nodding her head while the men furrowed their brows.

"What the hell just happened?" Her seatmate whispered, looking out to Luisito and his gun.

"Well... I think we have to negotiate with the Management Department because you're not really... you know... our costumers." She explained while tapping her chin, "This process of you exchanging me for some money is considered a transaction and all our transactions are handled by the Management Department. It's not within Miss Vanessa's job to accommodate us so she had to redirect the call."

"Are all your employees crazy? Your life is in our hands. How is this process more important than you?!"

Zeirenne shrugged, "They have to follow the protocol no matter what transaction it is."

All the men had to facepalm themselves for the nth time. It was indeed rare for them to meet such a senseless bunch of people. The way ZA International's employees handled everything calmly made them feel terrified. And Zeirenne knew this.

"Don't worry. They won't call the police," she assured them, "This is a private transaction after all."

She looked at them with an 'oddly reassuring' smirk on her face.

Her ambiguous words and mischievous expressions had the men flustered from confusion. No matter how much they wanted to believe her statement, they couldn't shake their worries off.

After a few moments, someone on the other line finally picked the phone up. From this, they had to fix themselves on their seats, waiting for the Management Department Representative to speak.

"Hi! This is Angelo Francisco from the Management Department. It has come to our attention that you are up for a special transaction. I'm hear to listen to your demands. Please state them clearly. Thank you!"

Luisito cleared his throat, "We want 250,000 pesos prepared within an hour. Don't get the police involved or--"

"What?!" Zeirenne interrupted him, "I'm only worth 250,000 pesos?! All this abduction and stuff in exchange for me being priced that low?! Excuse me but I won't accept this insult!"

Luisito, who was still stunned from her outburst, had to fix himself before the speaking once again. "Then we'd like to ask for five..." He watched Zeirenne making a neck slice motion, "...million. We need five million pesos."

She was about to complain once again but Mister Francisco spoke. "Five million pesos... I see." The line went dead for a few seconds, "I'm sorry but for transactions above five hundred thousand pesos, we need to have it signed by our CEO herself. Since she's not here to sign it then there's nothing we can do about it. We'll have to apologize for our incapability."

"Tsk. Then just give us four hundred thousand pes--"

"No! I am not letting myself get sold for four hundred thousand pesos. I'd rather stay here than to let such a small amount of money define my worth."

From this, Luisito exploded in confusion. He knew she was not someone he could scare with a gun. Nor were her employees prone to their threats.

In the end, Zeirenne found herself being dropped off in front of Ponticelli Penthouse. Her kidnappers gave up on taking her as their hostage.

Such a stubborn person, they all thought. But somehow, her crazy personality managed to convince them that she's not someone who'd sell them out to custody. Nevertheless if she does, they already had themselves prepared.

As if they were hypnotized into doing so... they let her go.

Zeirenne waved her hands as a shabby, cramped up car drifted off into the highway.

"That's right... no amount of money can buy me. Because the best people in life are free."

She flipped her hair before taking her phone out from her pockets. She had it with her all this time and if her kidnappers were lecherous enough to do some body search, things would have ended differently. Probably, they would have had their limbs broken and the cell door banging in front of their faces. But she knew them at first glance. They were not bad... just desperate.

"Hello Dylan..." she said on the phone, "Can you investigate some people for me? I'll send you some sketches later."

"Sure thing."

"Okay thank you. I'll see you tomorro-- AHHHH!"

It was the last thing Dylan heard before the call ended.

. . .