Unexpected

Chapter Twelve

KAI

The girl next to Kai on the plane wouldn't shut up. He was doing his best to ignore her, but the last leg of the flight seemed like an eternity. The girl had woken up from her nap sometime over the Atlantic ocean, and that was when she noticed Kai. She'd walked back from the bathroom and instead of going back to her seat across the aisle, she had gasped and flopped into the empty seat next to him. Her name was Pearl, and she was his biggest fan, and she read up on the Rikan Corp family in every magazine she could get her hands on. In fact, she was convinced that she knew more about Kai than Kai knew about himself. Kai had politely responded at first, and then realized that she refused to leave. So he put on his headphones and pretended to watch a movie. Pearl then chose the same movie and began to talk to him about everything going on in said movie.

It was embarrassing.

And highly irritating. Kai made a mental note to never fly business class again. In the future, he'd cash in on his celebrity status and take advantage of a first class private seat.

Kai couldn't have been happier when his plane touched down on American soil. Much like the girl next to him, Beijing had been a pain. He despised board meetings, summits, conferences, and generally anything involved with the key players of Rikan Corp. It wasn't that Kai disliked finance or business strategy per say, but rather everything else that came along with dealing with the people who were involved in his father's company. He had the feeling that the majority of people who attended the Annual Summit used it as an excuse to wine and dine in an exotic country for a week. For Kai, the stress just doubled from a normal work week. For the last two years, his father had insisted that he meet basically every person on the planet that could possibly have some sort of connection with Rikan Corp in the future. These people needed to be entertained, and apparently Kai was the perfect person to do that.

"This prepares you for all the networking and socializing you'll do when you're in my position later," his father always said. "You'll need these connections. Best if they get to know you already."

Levana had given him a massive headache during the meetings too. Not that this wasn't normal, but after their last dinner together, he'd really hoped that she would begin to see things from his perspective. He had tried hard not to show his irritation around her, but this week in Beijing had been particularly vexing; she'd only made it worse. He set a reminder in his phone to send her some of the counter-arguments he'd come up with during the flight back to the USA. Maybe there was no use in trying, though. It seemed like nothing he ever said regarding Rikan Corp would ever be taken seriously by her or her family.

When his phone registered that he was back in the United States, he got flooded with text messages. He really should have gotten an international plan a long time ago to avoid having to deal with so many messages at once, but at least it was something to do while he waited to deplane. Kai deleted most of them. Clients. Nainsi. Nainsi again. Levana. Dad. More clients.

A text from Scarlet. Thorne told me you weren't doing so great. Come over any time you want.

"Maybe you should mind your own business, Thorne," Kai muttered to no one in particular. Maybe he'd take Scarlet up on the offer, though.

Kai saw that he had a text from Thorne too. You get that generator yet?

Whoops. Kai had completely forgotten about the elevator debacle while in Beijing. Maybe his Purchasing Manager could look into that. But really, how often did that sort of thing happen? Thorne had just been unlucky. The thought made Kai snicker. Thorne was always the lucky one. Surely he would manage to twist this situation to his advantage somehow too.