May The Better CEO Win

Maryanne's thoughts were still in shambles following the hair-raising ordeal she had been through in the past 36 hours. In fact, she would not wish it even for her worst and sworn enemy. To bring you up to speed, Maryanne had lost her mother to a fire whose start is still a mystery not just to the firemen that helped put it out but also to the investigators on the case.

Secondly, her lingerie and cloth retailing business had gone under after the stock prices took a dive in a span of less than 24 hours following the fire. On top of these, Maryanne had been kidnapped, starved and tortured till she could no longer feel the pain. Or did her veins numb? Or was it the pain receptors? In short, her brain no longer bothered to register any more pain administered to her.

Maryanne had escaped from her captors by jumping down two floors through a bathroom window. Luckily, she did not fracture any bones and was capable of finding her way home. At the moment, she did not have time to think who was behind her tonne of misfortunes.

As a matter of fact, Maryanne imagined stopping to think things through might increase the number of unfortunate events likely to happen to her. The only thing she knew was that she had to move fast. Or else, her captors would locate her. And this time round,Maryanne knew she would surely die.

Maryanne did not have the courage to look at herself in the mirror. She was dead sure her face was thoroughly disfigured from the thorough beating she had received earlier. Even there was some blood that had dried near her lips.

Maryanne knew that confirming her face was thoroughly disfigured and her eyes swollen to the point of squinting would definitely dismantle her composure. In order to save on time, she hurriedly threw a few essentials into a backpack and stepped into the shower.

God, it felt heavenly taking a shower after over 48 long and agonizing hours. Imagining the shower would wipe away all the bad things that had happened to her and she would step out and find everything the way it was three days ago, Maryanne scrubbed every inch of her body thoroughly. In total, she took approximately 20 minutes to get ready.

Yes. 20 MINUTES. NO MAKE UP WAS NECESSARY AT THIS POINT.

Since withdrawing money from one of her accounts might alert her kidnappers, Maryanne decided to get some cash from her father's study, weeeell, now her study. Interestingly, even the two $100 dollar bills she had left on top of the desk were still there.