Chapter 404: Chapter 404: Strangers at First, Unacknowledged in the End (Part 1)
Vivian Yates began to feel a creeping fear. The more she thought about it, the more terrified she became.
They had figured out every last detail about her, but she knew nothing about them, other than the fact they were involved in some earth-shattering conspiracy.
’Am I being too passive here?’
A sharp glint flashed in Vivian Yates’s eyes. She couldn’t just sit back and await her doom.
She wrapped herself seductively around Chase Lynch and purred, "Darling... what’s the real reason you want me to get close to Leona Grant? He’s already in love with Annabelle Linton. You could just control Annabelle directly..."
Chase Lynch chuckled softly. ’Looks like this woman isn’t a complete idiot after all.’
’Then again, so what?’
’She’s really just a backup plan.’
’Annabelle Linton.’
’Her role in this is far more important...’
A wicked smile played on Chase Lynch’s lips as he tilted her chin up. "Be a good girl," he said, his tone depraved. "You just need to get close to Leona Grant. I’ll handle the rest."
"But..."
The man’s patience wore thin. "You have no right to an opinion and no choice in the matter."
The moment Vivian Yates chose to deal with them, her fate was sealed.
She didn’t realize she was just a pawn.
A pawn, disposable at a moment’s notice...
...
His heart was in tatters, and every breath seemed to ache.
Leona Grant had been working under intense pressure day and night for several days straight. He was quiet to an unnatural degree, a state that was both disturbingly normal and yet completely wrong.
Half the company had collapsed from exhaustion. The employees complained endlessly, some even coming to work with IV drips, yet Leona Grant showed no intention of stopping.
His special assistant, Chase, finally couldn’t take the employees’ complaints anymore. He contacted Xylas Shepherd and the others, asking them to try and persuade the CEO.
At this rate, someone at the company was going to die.
Xylas Shepherd felt obligated to agree, but he made sure to bring Nathaniel Locke with him.
Xylas spent two hours trying every persuasive tactic he could think of, but for the entire duration, Leona Grant’s fingers just flew across his keyboard. Without even lifting his head, he spoke five simple words: "You are free to go."
Finally, Nathaniel Locke looked at him and said flatly, "The way you look right now, any woman who took an interest in you would have to be blind."
Hearing this, Leona Grant abruptly raised his head to look at Nathaniel Locke, his face grim.
A worried Xylas Shepherd tugged on Nathaniel Locke, but Nathaniel’s face was a blank mask.
Just when Xylas Shepherd thought Leona Grant would get angry, he instead stood up abruptly, grabbed his jacket, and started walking out, uttering a single, calm word: "Go."
Xylas Shepherd was a bit slow to react. "Go where?"
Nathaniel Locke, already following, drawled lazily, "Nowhere special. You can just stand there."
’Nowhere special? And I can just stand here? What would I be standing here for?’
A confused Xylas Shepherd looked up and realized the two of them were already long gone!
...Right. He got it now. ’Nathaniel was being sarcastic again.’
The three men went to eat. Leona Grant was still just as quiet, eating with his head down and not uttering a single word. He was the very definition of silent.
Xylas Shepherd and Nathaniel Locke both sighed.
By the time they finished dinner, night had fallen.
Suddenly, Leona Grant didn’t feel like going back.
’What was there to do back home, anyway?’
’Work was finished.’
’Sleep wouldn’t come.’
’There was nothing to do back there.’
The truth he didn’t want to admit, however, was that he was afraid to go back.
The house was filled with traces of Annabelle Linton. If he went back now, he’d be faced with visions of her being there one second and gone the next. He really didn’t know how he could face that.
Xylas and the others were loyal friends. Seeing that Leona Grant didn’t want to head back, they said nothing and just walked with him quietly.
As they walked on, Leona Grant’s gaze landed and fixed upon the Ferris wheel at the amusement park ahead.
And just like that, a flood of memories was unwittingly unleashed...
