The M.I.L.F Rebate System: Every Woman I Spoil Makes Me Richer!

Chapter 90: Turned Down?

The Ghost pulled into the firm’s reserved bay at 3:58. Mrs. Harriet was always early, she made this a habit and knew she had to be early as it was better than the alternative which was late.

Two minutes early. It was always two minutes early — not five, not ten. Five read as anxious. Ten read as compensating for something. Two was the margin of someone who controlled their schedule rather than the other way around.

The driver had the door open before the car fully settled.

Harriet stepped out with the folder under her arm and moved toward the entrance without breaking stride. The afternoon air was mild and she didn’t notice it. Her mind was already inside the building, already at the meeting, already three moves ahead of wherever the conversation would start.

The lobby received her the way it always did.

The receptionist looked up and offered a greeting that landed somewhere in the air between them. Two associates near the elevator straightened almost imperceptibly. Someone said her name with the particular intonation of people who wanted to be seen acknowledging her without requiring acknowledgment in return.

She moved through all of it without pausing.

Her office was on the fourth floor — corner facing, the view decent enough that she had stopped seeing it years ago. She pushed the door open, set the folder on the desk, and looked at the time on her phone.

3:59 PM. Mrs. Harriet moved like a woman with purpose and this was why time was the most important thing to her.

She sat down, straightened the folder, and allowed herself exactly thirty seconds of stillness before the meeting began.

She needed to catch her breath, at least for a a minute or so.

This was a physical meeting and with Arthur not being present, it was up to her to handle everything in his absence which ironically doubled her workload.

Her phone rang to bring her back to reality.

She looked at the screen.

[Liam.]

She stared at it for one ring longer than necessary, then picked up.

"Liam." She kept her voice even. "I owe you an apology. Your message — I’ve had very little space this week and it went unanswered longer than it should have." A brief pause. "I also have to be honest with you, the dinner we discussed — my schedule right now makes it difficult to commit to a specific—"

"I’m in your lobby," Liam said.

Harriet stopped.

["The lobby downstairs,"] he continued, his voice carrying the same calm quality it always did, as if the information he was delivering was entirely unremarkable but Mrs. Harriet wondered if he somehow knew her schedule.

["As for the dinner — there are 365 in a year. I’m confident one of them works."]

She looked at the office door.

"Come up," she said. "Fourth floor. End of the corridor." She spoke like he had never worked there before which made Liam almost chuckle at it.

She put the phone down and stood, moving to the window briefly before returning to the desk. The meeting she’d scheduled could wait five minutes as they seemed to be running behind — it was her meeting and her building and her schedule, and Liam being in the lobby was a development that required direct handling rather than further delay.

She had delayed enough and if it was enough for him to find her in the office, it must be something urgent.

The knock came two minutes later.

"Come in."

He pushed the door open and she registered, in a single efficient sweep, that he looked exactly as composed as he’d sounded on the phone. Dark jacket, clean shirt, the Cartier catching the office light briefly as he moved. He looked around the office once, this was the first time he had been in it so it was only natural for him to be curious. The office felt like a completely different location from the room he had just walked in from.

But Liam also became aware of the heat.

The office ran warm despite the AC unit’s best efforts, and she had unbuttoned the top of her blouse during the drive up from the lobby without thinking about it. She noticed Liam’s gaze redirect itself upward after sneaking a peak at her cleavage and she smoothed the front of her blouse without drawing attention to the gesture.

She knew he was a man at the end of the day but this was also the reaction Vanessa couldn’t get from him.

She gestured to the chair across the desk.

He sat.

"You came to the firm," she said.

"I hadn’t heard from you. I had reasons to want to speak with you in person." He held her gaze. "Someone called me a day or so ago claiming to be your husband."

Harriet’s expression didn’t move. But something behind it did.

"He spoke vaguely," Liam continued. "Enough to suggest the call was coordinated rather than coincidental. When I told him the only person from the firm I’d been in contact with was Arthur, the line went dead right away." He paused. "Then I asked him directly whether he was actually your husband."

"And?"

"He hung up."

The silence that followed had a different quality than professional silence. She looked at him across the desk — at the steadiness of him, the absence of performance, the way he delivered information that implicated people around her without editorialising about what it meant.

She had read his file this morning. The win rate, the financial activity that didn’t match his circumstances, the clean record. The file had confirmed what she had already suspected — that she was dealing with someone considerably more capable than what she initially thought.

But there was something off about all of this, what was Liam hoping to benefit out of this?

This almost felt like he was trying to establish some sort of personal relationship with her by looking out for her.

At least, this was a possibility that Mrs. Harriet entertained. Liam wasn’t the only perceptive one in that room.

"We have things to discuss," she said.

"We do."

She opened the desk drawer and removed a notepad, uncapped her pen, and looked at him, finally giving Liam her full attention.

"Then let’s begin," she said.