Chapter 151

Imperial Heights.
Charlotte stepped out of the shower and noticed her phone glowing on the nightstand. There was an incoming call, the number half-hidden, flickering on the
screen.
She wrapped a towel loosely around her damp hair, grabbed the phone, and slid her thumb to answer. Her pale feet pressed into the soft carpet as she made her way to the balcony.
“You guys are in Cabinda?”
“Yes, Charlotte.” Jackson sounded extra formal, like he was trying not to mess up. “We hit a snag in our research. We’re missing something. Came here to look for it.”
Charlotte raised an eyebrow. If the lab didn’t have it, where else could they possibly find whatever it was?
Before she could say anything, Adonis practically yelled through the speaker, voice full of fake cheer. “Charlotte, honestly, we just missed you. Seriously.”
She pressed her fingers to her temples, lips curving. “Try again.”
“We really do miss you,” Adonis mumbled, sounding guilty. “But, uh, since we’re here, we were hoping you could help us out… with a little money.”
He clearly didn’t want to say the number out loud.
“How much?”
“Oh, just a hundred million.” Adonis tried to laugh it off. “See, Charlotte? We’re adults now. We know how to save money.”
Just a hundred million. Of course.
Charlotte paused, her hand still for a second. A chill crept into her voice, but her eyes sparkled with the hint of a smile. “What a shame, you learned to talk.”
Worried he’d pushed too far, Jackson quickly took over. “Charlotte, we’ve had a bunch of unexpected accidents during the experiment. We burned through more funding than we thought.”
“I’ll transfer the money to the lab account tomorrow.” Charlotte’s voice was lazy and warm, like she’d just woken up. On the other end, both guys went silent barely daring to breathe.
A hundred million. Most people couldn’t even imagine it. But when Charlotte said it,
it sounded as ordinary as buying coffee.
“One more thing. Come pick something up for me.” She glanced at her desk, at a wad of hair wrapped in a tissue. Her gaze cooled.
She hung up before they could reply, opened Adonis’s secret profile, and sent him her location.
Not even two seconds later, her phone rang again.
“Charlotte, did you send the wrong address? Are you seriously living at… Imperial Heights now?”
If he remembered right, Imperial Heights was a private estate. The CEO of The Blair Group had bought the whole place outright. A thousand square meters, turned into a private, almost mythical villa Nobody ever went there. Most people had never even seen it.
There was nowhere else like it in all of Cabinda.
And the CEO, Anthony, was famous for being dangerous. Not someone you wanted
to owe a favor, or even meet. How did Charlotte end up in his orbit?
“I’m sure.” Charlotte balanced the phone in one hand while she dug through a drawer for her hair dryer.
Adonis was quiet for a long moment, then spoke up, careful and anxious. “Charlotte, Anthony isn’t a good guy. You shouldn’t get too close to him
“Oh.”
She found
the hair hair dryer, put her phone on speaker, and tossed it onto the bed. Then she flopped down, stretching out her long legs dangling over the mattress. She found a comfortable spot, switched on the dryer, and slowly started drying her hair.
“So, what exactly is wrong with him?” Her voice was colder now.
“Anthony’s sharp. No one really knows what he’s thinking. Why are you mixed up with him at all?”
Charlotte switched the dryer to her other hand, sounding bored. “Do you know why my grandmother lived to ninety?”