"Finally!" Gwen burst into her office with a huge smile on her face. She let out a contented sigh as she threw herself on her leather spinning chair.
Her laugh resounded in the big office as she apun around and stopped to oversee the busy city. Peter had been following her in and closed the door behind him before he went to stand before her desk. Even though he had not been in a good mood earlier, seeing he like this made him feel good too. Her smile was contagious to him as he felt his lips lift into a smile.
"Congratulations boss!" He said.
"Thank you! Ah! I feel like I can finally breath!" She chuckled to herself.
Peter was amused by this. He never thought he would ever live to see the day his boss was ever intimidated by someone. But he would be a hypocrite to criticize her because he too felt the pressure back there.
Gwen turned around and smacked the table. "What are our finances looking like?"
"We can make enough for all our distribution channels." He had long prepared for this moment and he had done his research. So he knew all the answers to her questions.
Gwen smirked as she swung her chair side to side. "That adalimumab is not so bad. It actually came in handy."
(A/N: pronunciation: Ada-lee-myu-mab)
They had made enough from the adalimumab to fund the development of this new drug. It helped them throughout their ups and downs from their first failure to their current success.
The king couldn't carelessly fund them, it would be too suspicious if more funds than what was needed for the production of the adalimumab moved from Italy to America. They were already on the feds' radar, they would be fools to attract any more unwanted attention.
"New product, more money", she said with a chuckle. "There hasn't been anything like this on the market. No one will be able to resist it at all."
"We will make enough for the big supply", Peter agreed.
"Yes", Gwen agreed as she rested her elbows on her armrest and brought her fingers together. She smirked. "Everything is finally falling into place. I thought Amy was a big threat but she was just a small fly all this while."
"Uh....." Peter started with uneasiness. "She's still working with the feds. She could be planning something."
"Bullshit! If she was planning something, she could have done so at the corporate gala. She had the opportunity but of course, she couldn't. If she failed then, do you think she can now?" She stood up from her seat and walked around her desk.
She sat on the edge of it, her thick thighs in her pencil skirt were more prominent and Peter couldn't help but look. She smirked as she crossed her arms against her chest deliberately pushing up her breasts.
"Peter", she gently called out forcing him to look up at her face. She was barely suppressing a smile. "We have been careful all this while. The feds failed to make a move on us because they have nothing to prove their allegations. Amy is no different. If she had something on us, she would have long destroyed us. I hate to admit this but you know how capable she is."
"Boss, I don't mean to be negative but don't you feel she could set a trap for us?" He was genuinely worried about this.
"Peter", she patted his cheek and chuckled in amusement. She treated him like he was a little child. Well, these were moments he felt like one to her. "Peter, do you know how you can tell if something is a trap? When everything is going too perfectly. Think of the ups and downs we have experienced to get here. I don't know about you but none of that feels like things were going too perfectly. Today is a great example for that. Amy won't do anything to us. My years of being loyal to the Dark waters can't just go to waste so easily. No."
Peter felt an unpleasant shiver down his spine when he saw her face morph into a cold expression. There was anger and murderous intent that flashed in her eyes. Peter had only worked with them for five years, who knows what Gwen had experienced while working with them for who knows how long.
"Boss", he decided to feed his curiosity after what she said. "Why did you join the Dark waters?"
Her already cold expression turned more ugly. The next thing he knew, her hand came flying to his face. He closed his eyes bracing himself.
Pak!
At the Wrights home
"What happened to your face?" Peter's wife tried to touch his face that had a red hand print on his left cheek. Worry was etched on her features as she took in her husband's bruised face. She had rushed to the door to meet him but did not expect to see such a scene.
He dodged her touch and hissed in pain as he touched his bruised lip. He walked into the house with her hot on his heels. "It's nothing."
"What's nothing? Look at your face."
"Leave it Shauna", he grumbled as he walked into the bedroom.
"Who did this to you?" She closed the door behind them and crossed her arms against her chest. She didn't want the kids to overhear them otherwise it would scare them.
Peter threw his bag on the bed and loosened his tie and sighed, knowing his wife would not let go of the issue. With his back to his wife, he decided to give her the truth.
"I made a mistake and my boss hit me", he said quietly.
"What?" She rushed to his side and forced him to face her worried self. "How could she do that? Aren't we past the age where bosses hit their employees. Bosses shouldn't even do that in the first place! You're not her child!"
Peter shut her up by pulling her into his embrace. He rested his chin on her shoulder and breathed in her scent. It relaxed him. "It's because you're like this, I feel better already. You make it so easy to forget everything."
Shauna sighed as she hugged him back. She felt her husband was pitiful. He was doing a lot for their family and never complained. She felt she was so lucky to have a such a man in her life. Although she was a housewife, she felt looking after their home was not enough to show how grateful she was to the life Peter had built for them.
"Let me go freshen up", he said while breaking the embrace.
"Yeah, you stink", she joked making them both chuckle.
"You still love me", he said with a smirk and soon regretted when he felt the pain.
"Sorry", she whispered with half smile and half frown.
Peter was smiling until he turned his back on her, walking into the bathroom. Once he locked the door behind him, he looked at his unsmiling face through the mirror. That slap Gwen gave him didn't just hurt him, it insulted him. He felt more hurt when he remembered those women who died during the tests. But, it was done.
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