The Billionaire, and the Intern

Cole

Cole adjusted his tie, walking from the entrance of the building and heading straight to his office, He was really considering getting an intense back massage from all the late nights and all the strain his back underwent due to him sitting upright almost throughout the whole night.

There were so many court cases his law firm needed to handle, so he spent the entirety of the previous three consecutive days and nights sorting them out running on nothing but caffeine and quick naps.

After pulling 3 all nighters like that, he felt really tired.

Sometimes he questions why he does this to himself. His family owned a lot of businesses, hotel chains, and shares in various companies. He's literally a billionaire who could retire at this very moment and he would still have enough money to last him and his descendants a lifetime of luxury.

Then he thinks about the fulfillment he gets from working in his law firm and with his partners and he's once again, back on track.

Of all the career ventures he went into, criminal justice law and case building was his passion.

One of the most recent cases he was sorting, was of a 10 year old girl who was sexually abused by a relative to a point that she was hospitalised. The relative was more financially well off than her family and was going to buy the case off, but unfortunately for the criminal, he and his partners have taken up the case after being introduced to the family and meeting the poor traumatized girl in question. He also decided to fund all the necessary bills including her hospital bills and therapy bills.

He's handled a lot of similar cases like this in the past and he has never failed to bring justice for the victims, especially when the said victims were children, no child deserved to be put through such a thing.

While walking towards his office, exchanging greetings with hired staff, his eyes met with Amanda's. Amanda was a fairly attractive red haired, green eyed aspiring lawyer Interning under one of Cole's partner in his Law firm and Cole was distrustful of her.

She was in the elevator, about to use it, when they locked eyes.

He subconsciously stared at her whilst his thoughts wandered until the elevator doors closed.

She seemed to be everywhere he turned these days.

Bumping into him,

"Almost" spilling stuff on him,

"Accidently" Meeting even outside of work.

.

Despite his rational side saying otherwise, he found it hard to discard the thought that it all felt intentional.

After all It might all be a coincidence, but his distrustful and paranoid mind kept trying to convince him that she was subtly positioning herself to be seen.

Why?

He didn't know.

Another speculation which didn't help matters would be the fact that his mother warmed up to her quickly.

To Cole, the whole thing looked quite suspicious, like she was up to something.

He was told that she had gotten the internship under one of his partners at the law firm based on merit and based on what he's seen of her, he could tell that that was most likely true. She stroked him as brilliant, and she was friendly and cheerful.

She was also close friends with his mother.

How they met is still a mystery to him.

It was not long before his Mother grew fond of her.

Amanda was also friends with Cole's younger sister, Julia.

Then again, he wondered what she could possibly gain from her plans...if she had any that is.

Regardless, he fully intended on keeping her away at arms length.

They barely spoke. It was like an unspoken rule they had between them.

He treated her just like he treated the other interns at Littleton.

She also sometimes got invited to family gatherings due to her relationship with his mother and sister.

His mother would proceed to go on and on about her and despite his efforts to tune her out, the constant blabbering caused him to learn a few random things about her.

He was barely a few minutes in his office when a call came in, pausing his musings and bringing him back to his surroundings.

It was his good friend and colleague named Chris.

He was breathing a little bit heavily through the phone and his voice sounded a little bit panicky.

Cole instantly knew something was up.

"What is the emergency?" He asked.

Chris' answering voice was uncertain and spooked as he spoke, “One of our interns I believe goes by the name Amanda is locked in with a fake client in my office.”

Cole's eyebrow raised in question.

What did he mean by "Fake" Client.

"Get the technical team to get them out" He suggested.

“That’s not the problem ,” Chris responded almost immediately.

“He is holding her at gun point.”

Now _that_ was concerning. How did that even happen to begin with?

Cole got up and immediately started making his way to Chris' office.

Never the matter, he asked Chris if he had already called the police to which Chris affirmed that he had.

He decided to go see for himself what was going on, hastening his foot steps and even running down the stairs. Thankfully, Chris' office was just two floors below the floor he was currently on.

On getting to the office door, He quickly noticed that there was tension in the air and that some people were quietly walking about in a frenzy. He could see a few of the other concerned staff and interns gathered at the door looking worried and it seemed like the door had been opened.

Inside but closer to the door stood Martin an older gentleman who was talking to the infiltrator calmly with his hands raised, seemingly trying to diffuse the situation. Further inside was Amanda who was being held at gunpoint by an unknown male.

What a nice headline for the media.

“How did this happen?” He asked the nearest person to him who was one of Amanda's co-interns.

"I am not sure, but my best guess, based on what's being said and what I've heard, Is that this guy is somewhat related to a person whose being battled in court by one of Mr Matthews clients. From what I know, Mr Matthews and Amanda have been handling this case for over a month now and this guy wants them to drop the case."

With this new information, Cole looked inside again to observe the situation further.

The person holding her hostage was yelling at Martin and periodically shaking Amanda to emphasize his point and to seem more intimidating,

It would've been more convincing if his eyes weren't darting around and his form wasn't ever so slightly trembling.

He looked to be in his late teens.

This was most likely his first time doing this sort of thing and this entire situation was most likely the product of a poorly thought up, impulsive plan.

To her credit, despite being dishevelled from being waved around like a rag doll, Amanda looked calmer than he thought she would be.

Her facial expression seemed frozen in surprise, her hands were raised in a surrender and the gun was held to the back of her head.

Cole briefly wonders where the teen got the gun from seeing as there were detectors for such things and security placed to prevent such.

Until he remembers.

Could it be....

“Killing her will not solve anything” Cole interjects, walking in and interrupting whatever it was they were arguing about.

"And who the fuck are you!" The male yelled looking every bit like a cornered animal.

"Calm down, and please put the gun down" Cole says ignoring the slight and calmly looking him straight in the eyes.

"I'm going to blow this bitches brains out if you step one foot further!" He yelled when Cole tried to advance forward.

So he stopped.

"What are your grievances if you don't mind me asking" He asked, intending on distracting him long enough for the police to show up.

The boy looked at him incredulously and seemed like he was about to blow a gasket before he took a deep breath and started a long winded narration on how his brother was facing imprisonment because of a "lying wench" (said lying wench happened to be the Client whose case Chris and Amanda were working on) and how his "innocent" brother was being falsely accused and how they were aiding to make his brothers life miserable and to "perpetuate" injustice just because the client had the money for it.

Whilst his story was somewhat touching, Cole didn't know whether to label him as brave or foolish for showing up to a law firm and attempting to murder a lawyer/lawyer in training as a way to solve the situation and he told him as much.

This seemed to make the boy angrier and he starts yelling.

"I don't believe you have it in your heart to kill someone, and I truly commend your devotion to your brother, but I think it's time you put the gun down, so that we can reach a fair conclusion what do you think?" He asked.

The boys features soften to an uncertain look and for a moment it seemed like the dispute had been resolved and he was going to put the gun down, when suddenly, his gaze hardens again and he starts yelling about them trying to lure him into a false sense of safety so that they could arrest him.

Cole who genuinely meant what he said, tried to calm him down and his voice started rising in octaves.

Amanda started increasingly panicking sensing his increasingly unstable behaviour. Her eyes Dart to Cole whose cold gaze remained trained on the boy, with his face unreadable.

Everyone watched with bated breath as the almost feral boy pulled the trigger, horror already flashing in the eyes of some.

All except for Cole who watched on as the horrified boy quickly realised that the gun was empty of bullets.

As expected.

The following relieved sighs were short lived as the boy pulled out a pen knife from God knows where and held it to Amanda's throat.

"Stay back!" He yelled frantically eyes darting around, at this point he was at a loss, he seemed ready to do anything,

Blood rushing through his ears

Adrenaline pumping through his veins

He wasn't going down without a fight!

Just when he thought he was having an epiphany,

His hands suddenly became lighter

Wait, what!

In a flash, before anyone could register what was happening, Cole had crossed over to where the boy stood holding Amanda hostage, pulled Amanda out of harm's way and disarmed the terrorist within a twinkle of an eye.

Absolute silence.

"Well, that was Anticlimatic" A random person outside "'whispered'"