Chapter 264 Are We Sharing a Room Tonight?
After an entire night of discussion about the PR measures to be taken, the rumors online seemed to take a turn for the better after the company posted the public disclaimer online. They worked overtime right till midnight before everyone from Citrus Apparel finally called it a day.
Courtney walked down the stairs with Bill, only to find that Oliver had been waiting for her for a long time.
When Bill saw Oliver, he nodded as a form of greeting. Then, he told Courtney, “I’ll take my leave now. Take care.”
“Okay. Thanks for all the hard work.”
“No worries. I would suggest you to be more careful these few days. Ask people to accompany you when you go out, because cyberbullying is not something trivial.” After all, Bill had experienced these personally, so he felt worried for Courtney, as though he was the victim as well.
Courtney nodded. “Don’t worry.”
When she reached home, the lights in the living room were still on but the entire house was quiet.
After she opened the door, Alexander walked out of the kids bedroom.
“They’re both asleep?” Courtney asked without thinking.
“Yes.” Alexander nodded. “Has everything been resolved?”
“You knew what happened?”
Courtney put her bag down and took off her shoes before going to the kitchen to pour herself a cup of tea.
Even Alexander—who never goes online—knows about this, which means that it’s quite a big incident.
“Truth is, it’s hard to not know about it. I heard that the blue collar workers of the Hunter Group are making a fuss again. The Hunter Group is only a street away from Sunhill Enterprise, so of course he knows about it,” Oliver replied for Alexander as he sat on the couch.
After shooting Oliver a glance, Alexander followed Courtney into the kitchen to help her out.
They poured three cups of tea and placed them on the coffee table before they all sat down.
“How did your investigation go?” Alexander asked as he looked straight at Oliver.
Upon seeing that, Oliver immediately frowned. “What investigation? How did you know that I’m looking into it?”
“Right after you guys submitted the documents for the bid for Sakura Group, someone unleashed malicious rumors about Courtney immediately. After you controlled the direction of the conversation, someone else immediately revealed the relationship between Courtney, Citrus Apparel, and Hunter Group. It’s too far-fetched to say that this is a coincidence.”
Alexander was a smart person—of course he could deduce this.
“Since you are so smart and you thought about all this, why didn’t you remind Courtney beforehand?”
Oliver looked at him sideways, waiting to see how Alexander would defend himself.
“Even if you stop them from making a scene out of this incident, you won’t be able to prevent everything else. It’s better to take the swift blow and get into incidents like these at the start of the business compared to encountering them after you have already stabilized.”
“Why don’t you just say that we will win when we have nothing else to lose?”
“Rather than wasting time playing word games, why don’t you just tell us what you found out?”
Sure enough, Alexander had the power to bring them back to his main focus in just a few words.
Even though Oliver was not happy about it, he knew that it was not the time to throw a fit. Hence, he announced seriously, “When Courtney sent the message to me, I was already at the door of the conference room and I already bugged the washroom. This is the recording of Martin’s end of the conversation.”
With that, Oliver placed an USB drive on the table. “Based on the signals, we pieced together what the other person said to Martin and the match is more than 90%.”
“Just tell us directly—what is the problem?” Courtney did not bother to listen to the recording as they were short on time. She did not have the luxury to compare and deduce the conversation, and she trusted Oliver’s professional capabilities in this field.
“It is confirmed that Martin is someone from Ivory Apparel. If my guess is correct, he revealed Bill’s designs to Ivory Apparel right from the beginning. I guess he wanted to leave for a long time but there are two possibilities as to why he is still staying with us.”
“Which are?”
Oliver cleared his throat. Just as he was about to flaunt his professional capabilities of making deductions, Alexander’s low voice rang out beside him.
“Either Ivory Apparel asked him to stay at Citrus Apparel to continue to spy on you, or those from Ivory Apparel regretted their promise to him and do not want to honor their initial agreement anymore.”
“Hey, stop snatching my lines!” Oliver glared at Alexander angrily. “Are you done yet?”
“Which is more likely?” Courtney ignored Oliver and asked Alexander directly.
“The latter,” Alexander explained calmly and clearly. “If Ivory Apparel wants him now, they wouldn’t take such a great risk by asking him to stay on in Citrus Apparel. After all, once you find out about his betrayal, it would be a stain on his professional career and he will have a hard time getting around in this industry.”
“There’s another possibility,” Oliver interjected. “The people at Ivory Apparel are delaying the entire process. This shows that he still has value to them, mainly because they still want to use him to spy on Citrus Apparel and they don’t want a person like him to work for them. After all, which company wants someone who might betray them at any time?”
Courtney nodded in agreement. “Exactly.”
“So what are you planning to do next?” Alexander asked.
“We’ll let Martin be. Since we already know about his identity and Ivory Apparel plans to leave him here, let’s just go with their plans.”
A sly glint flickered in Courtney’s eyes. “But I need your help on this.”
Later that night, after Oliver took a shower, he suddenly stopped on his way back to his room. Then, he turned around to look at Alexander, who was still sipping his tea in the living room.
With a frown, Oliver asked, “Are we sharing a room tonight?”
Alexander shot him a look in response.
Oliver continued to frown and raised his chin haughtily. “In that case, I’m going to lock the door. When you have nowhere to sleep, don’t even bother knocking. I’m a sound sleeper.”
With that, he closed the door and locked it with a crack.
Alexander continued looking calm and finished his tea before he walked to the master bedroom.
Ever since Alexander arrived here, he had no plans to share the same room as Oliver.
In the master bedroom, Courtney had already finished showering. Wrapping herself in a white towel, she sat in front of the vanity to put on her skincare. When she heard footsteps approaching, she glanced at the door with a mischievous glint in her clear eyes.
The round door knob was turned, but it could only move slightly before stopping.
The person outside did not seem to believe this and attempted to turn it again. However, the door knob could not be moved. After a while, someone knocked on the door.
“Courtney, please open the door.”
Courtney was happy to hear this. “What’s up?”
“I want to take the hairdryer.”
“I’ve already placed a new one in the bathroom outside.”
Then, she deliberately yawned. “I’m tired now so I’ll go ahead and sleep. Goodnight.”
Without waiting for Alexander’s reply, she turned the lights off by pressing the switch next to her. The room was only illuminated by the yellow lamp at the side of her bed, making the room look cosy.
Standing outside the door of the master bedroom, Alexander turned his head around mechanically to look at the other room that was also tightly shut.
Even if it was not shut, he had no plans to ask Oliver to open the door. After all, it was a huge embarrassment to him.
The next morning, Tina’s biological clock woke her up at half-past six. Yawning, she climbed down her bunker bed with her eyes closed. Halfway through, she suddenly realized that something was wrong.
Looking at the huge figure sleeping on the bed, she exclaimed with wide eyes, “Mr. Alexander, why are you sleeping here?”
