Upon hearing that, Zayne shrugged. What a tease Heather is, not giving me any leeway to flirt with her!
Now, not only could he not take advantage of her through his actions, but he couldn’t take advantage of her by his words either. And so, Zayne couldn’t help but question his decision. If he hadn’t come over so easily, he might have been able to negotiate something for himself.
“Don’t think of doing anything funny,” Heather snapped at him now as she eyed him viciously.
He could only offer her a helpless smile in response. He didn’t dare to argue with her, since one could only compromise upon meeting a woman such as Heather. Not too long ago, he thought she had crossed a line but now, he was mesmerized by her. No matter how outrageous her request, he was willing to go through hell or high water for her.
Once again, he shrugged. Unfortunately for him, she greatly disliked this action and thought he seemed all too much like an unreasonable hooligan.
“You’re so cruel to me, Heather!” Afraid that she would pull her dagger on him again, Zayne didn’t dare address her more intimately.
“Have you helped me look into Matthias?” she asked him instead of dignifying his statement with a response, referring to the time she asked him to investigate Matthias.
At this point, he looked at her with discomfort. There were some things he found hard to say, so he stammered and stuttered, which in turn made her extremely unhappy.
“Get to the point. There’s no need to beat around the bush,” she told him as she stared at him keenly. Truly, she didn’t understand why he behaved like that.
“Do you and Matthias have a bad relationship?” he asked cautiously. Thing was, he found out a bit of insider information but it pertained to Heather and Matthias’ romantic relationship, and was therefore difficult to bring up to her.
Rolling her eyes at him, she answered plainly, “Save your gossip. I’m only curious about what secrets he’s hiding behind my back.”
“That’s rather unkind of you,” he protested righteously. “Everyone has their secrets and even people who are dating must have their own personal space.”
In the end, Zayne wasn’t willing to tell her Matthias’ dirty little secret, firstly because he was afraid she would be disappointed in Matthias and secondly, he could understand why Matthias would keep this secret from her.
“Are you going to tell me or not?” Heather asked impatiently.
“No,” he answered clearly, irritating her even more.
“Fine, don’t tell me then. Your pay will be deducted by half.” Heather was ruthless, for she didn’t believe he could pass up the money.
Naturally, his face fell when she brought money into the equation. How could he live with himself if he blindly sacrificed his hard-earned coin for a man he didn’t know?
Not to mention that the man was, technically, his rival in love. After thinking about it for a while, Zayne finally decided to tell her the truth.
“Do you really wish to know Matthias’ secret?” he asked her, feeling troubled. This is such a quandary! He felt like he was betraying his fellow men.
“Yes.” No matter what, Heather couldn’t shake the feeling that Matthias was hiding something related to his family from her. Since she was deeply afraid of his family, she needed to know what he was hiding from her.
After dithering for a few more minutes, he told her joyfully, “It’s actually not that much of a secret. I imagine you might even have guessed it already and only want confirmation from me.”
With a single look, he was able to see through her. Clearly, his reasoning skills hadn’t diminished throughout the years. Thus, she only smiled at him without saying anything, surmising that it was likely she already knew the answer.
“However, I regret to inform you that you’re mistaken!” he crowed triumphantly. The smile at the corners of his lips was particularly glaring.
It was a unique skill he had—the ability to make her explode with anger in an instant. If it weren’t for the fact that he was quite useful, Heather might have killed him just to shut him up by now. Communicating with him was simply too much trouble.
She hated how much he loved teasing her self-righteously. He was deeply sexist and chauvinistic, and she had told him many times that she did not like being teased like that. “You know this way of talking will get you killed,” she informed him with a forced smile.
Yet, Zayne still dragged his feet, refusing to plainly speak Matthias’ secret. She had no idea what he was so concerned about.
“At any rate, Matthias isn’t as despicable as you think he is.” Since Zayne didn’t dare to be frank, he spoke in circles that left her confused.
“Are you saying I make him look ugly?” she asked with dissatisfaction.
“I’m not saying that,” he refuted, gesturing at himself. “I’m not the one saying that you’re being petty.”
Fed up, Heather barked at him, “Stop beating around the bush! I don’t intend on continuing to waste my time here arguing with you.”
For the first time in his life, upon seeing that she was about to leave, he almost hoped she would. Nonetheless, he was still very concerned about his pay.
In the end, Zayne regarded her with a forced smile and did not say anything. Thus, she spun on her heel and headed toward the exit, taking all of her ire with her.
“Hey!” he shouted after her.
Alas, she neither responded nor stopped walking. When he realized she was about to open the door and walk out, he hurriedly asked, “You’re not really going to deduct my pay, are you?”
Already vexed, Heather became even angrier upon hearing that. Hence, she wrenched open the door and, without looking back, faintly answered, “I’m thinking about taking away your pay altogether.”
“Hey, I’ll go on strike!” he called out before she could step outside.
In the end, she cut him off with an unceremonious slam of the door. Truth was, Heather didn’t take his words to heart because she knew he wouldn’t go on strike. Similarly, she wouldn’t genuinely deduct his pay.
It was only because they had this understanding that they acted so carelessly around each other. Rarely could she tolerate someone being so impudent toward her.
If it weren’t for the fact that Zayne could provide her with all sorts of intelligence, there was a chance she wouldn’t speak to him again in her lifetime. However she looked at him, he was simply someone she didn’t like and only begrudgingly managed to stay friends with.
After Heather left, the smile on Zayne’s face faded as well. While he acted one way in front of her, he acted another way when he was by himself.
Even if she would keep misunderstanding him, he liked torturing himself like that. Nonetheless, he knew that it was probable that he was someone she didn’t want in her life.
After making her exit, Heather cautiously looked around. Like a famous celebrity, she put on a large pair of sunglasses upon determining that there was no one nearby.
In truth, she was only being careful because she knew someone was following her. Every visit to Zayne was a tedious task. However, he had professional anti-reconnaissance knowledge and with his guidance, she would not easily be followed—not to mention that he had multiple hideouts and constantly flitted in between them to prevent others from spying on him.
Only after she was a long distance away from his current hideout did she update him with a message saying, ‘I have left safely.’
Once, they made a plan. On the off-chance that their meetings were discovered by someone else, Zayn’s face was not to be exposed.
Even though he had already erased all of his information, he was still afraid of being recognized by someone. To prevent that, he wore a disguise every time he met up with her and sometimes, he did not show up at all.
Now, after seeing her text message that she was safe, Zayne internally sighed with relief. Nonetheless, he was still worried that someone could spy on her, as she wasn’t a professional and didn’t have strong anti-tracking capabilities.
At this point, he thoughtfully rubbed the stubble on his chin. It took a lot of time, money, and energy to meet up with her. The disguises were quite expensive and this was his first time taking on such a difficult case that he couldn’t even show his real face.
It was a pity she wasn’t grateful for his sacrifices. Sometimes, he truly felt that she was cruel.
In the past, he often thought that women like her were heartless. Now, he knew that it wasn’t that she was heartless, but that her heart was not for him.
After about half an hour, Heather finally reached the Langston Residence. To her surprise, she discovered Everly in the living room and, to her even greater surprise, Matthias was sitting opposite Everly.
For a moment, she wondered just how long they had been talking. After all, two people that she never thought she would see together were chatting together quite happily.
“Heather!” Matthias called out, noticing her immediately. It was as if he had a radar that could detect her the moment she appeared in his vicinity.
In response, she gave him a forced smile. Right now, she didn’t trust anyone—not her significant other and certainly not her cousin. In fact, it terrified her how well her cousin and her significant other were getting along, not because she was afraid Matthias would fall in love with someone else, but because she was afraid they would make a deal with each other in private.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were coming, Matthias?” she pretended to chide him.
Beside them, Everly also stood up. She looked a bit embarrassed, as if Heather had caught her in bed with the enemy. After all, she was hiding so many secrets from Heather that she automatically felt guilty whenever she saw the latter now.
“What are you both talking about? It seems so interesting,” Heather added meaningfully before Matthias could reply.
Instantly, Everly became even more embarrassed as she couldn’t help reading into Heather’s question.
Matthias, on the other hand, didn’t seem to notice anything was wrong. “We were talking about what you were like when you were young,” he replied with a smile.
Internally, Heather chuckled coldly. She wouldn’t be so easily tricked by him. Everly didn’t exist when Heather was young, and the lie would have worked better if he’d told her that he and Robert had chatted about the time when she was young.
“I did a lot of stupid things when I was young, but nothing quite so amusing.” Her tone was self-deprecating but the sarcasm in it was getting clearer and clearer.
Sitting nearby, Everly winced. Sometimes, a woman’s intuition worked well. Realizing that the situation was rapidly going downhill, she hurriedly interrupted in a tone of adoration, “No way! I’m the one who did a lot of stupid things when I was young. You were always so radiant and admirable!”
Meanwhile, Matthias continued to smile but even he was starting to realize that Heather was behaving oddly. He couldn’t understand it, though. Not too long ago, Heather had constantly praised Everly in front of him, so why was the meeting between these two cousins so tense now?
