Chapter 835
“Oakley is used to the raw potency of my handmade batch,” Claire noted. “He’s definitely going to notice a dip in quality with this mass-produced assembly-line stuff.”
“But it’s not like I have the hours in a day to keep hand-mixing it for him. The commercial version will do the job just fine.”
“It’ll absolutely work, it just requires a little more patience.”
“He’s not going to complain.”
And honestly, Oakley didn’t mind in the slightest.
In fact, the original ointment had healed him so impossibly fast that he half- suspected it was loaded with illegal steroids.
A cream with a slightly slower, visibly progressive healing curve actually felt vastly more legitimate and trustworthy to the average consumer.
“My thoughts exactly,” Owen said, fully backing Claire’s business logic.
“Whatever else you want to know about the company’s ops, just say the word. I’ll walk you through everything.”
Since Claire was a major equity partner purely through her formula, Owen desperately wanted her to be hyper-critical of the process.
If she spotted a flaw, they needed to nuke it immediately.
Though, obviously, zero flaws would be ideal.
Claire laughed and shook her head. “I’m good, Owen. You’re lightyears ahead of me
in this arena. I’ve literally never run a business in my life.”
“All I know is that quality control is king. As long as our scar cream genuinely delivers on its promises, we’ll never have to beg for customers.”
With an A-list megastar like Oakley spearheading the marketing campaign, and the staggering weight of the Churchill family backing the venture, how could this start-up possibly fail?
Even if Owen actively refused to leverage his family’s name, the elite circles all knew he was the youngest heir to the Churchill empire.
The moment he launched a business, billionaires and investors would literally trip over themselves to fund it, just to curry favor with his family.
It was an undeniable truth: some people weren’t just born on third base; they owned
the entire stadium. His starting line was everyone else’s finish line.
“Don’t even sweat it. That’s guaranteed,” Owen said confidently. “The Churchill family built our entire legacy on absolute integrity.”
“Grandpa always says…”
Claire hadn’t grown up by the old man’s side, so she had missed out on his
legendary lectures. But Owen and his brothers had essentially been brainwashed by their grandfather’s cutthroat yet principled business doctrines since they were in diapers.
With generations of accumulated wealth and brutal market dominance, the Churchill family possessed a terrifying mastery of the corporate world.
Integrity was paramount. The moment you started scamming your consumers, your empire was officially on a ticking clock to ruin.
There were countless old-money dynasties out there, but the reason the Churchills remained an untouchable monolith came down, totheir unwavering ethical code.
Claire listened attentively, soaking in the masterclass and genuinely feeling like she’d leveled up her business IQ.
She ended up spending the entire day at the R&D lab.
It wasn’t until late evening that Owen finally clocked out.
“Come on. I’m taking you out to eat,” he announced.
Owen wasn’t a tyrannical boss; there was no way he was going to let his cousin
starve after she spent the whole day consulting for him.
As the most notoriously hedonistic playboy in the Churchill family, his knowledge of
the city’s underground culinary scene was unrivaled.
Even at the tail end of August, Foundry Row was absolutely electrifying.
It was the most notoriously chaotic late-night food district in Cabinda, world-famous for its face-melting Cajun Crawfish and spicy crab-a flavor profile that practically spoke to Claire soul.
Don’t ask why a health-conscious doctor was obsessed with scorching, deep-fried spices. The answer was simply the culinary culture of Apex.
When you grew up eating fire for breakfast, a medical degree wasn’t going to magically rewire your tastebuds.
Being a doctor just meant she knew exactly what detox supplements to take the morning after.
Foundry Row wasn’t just a spice gauntlet; it was a sprawling maze where you could find authentic comfort food from every corner of the globe.
It was the pulsing culinary heartbeat of Cabinda, essentially serving as the metropolis’s ultimate midnight diner.
The second Claire inhaled the chaotic, mouth-watering aroma of sizzling garlic and chili, her stomach let out a ferocious growl.
Since parking a luxury car here was practically a death sentence, Owen had opted to bring Claire on his heavy-duty motorcycle.
Weaving through the gridlocked traffic on the bike meant they arrived in record time.
He was such a notorious regular that half the street vendors already knew him by face.
Navigating the neon-lit chaos with practiced ease, Owen led her into a packed, aggressively loud seafood joint known for its lethal spice levels.
He immediately ordered a massive platter of premium crawfish, which the restaurant audaciously charged by the piece.
Without blinking, Owen dropped an order for fifty massive crawfish-thirty drenched in
vel
blistering Cajun spice, and we
swimming in rich garlic butter.
To top it off, he threw in a steaming platter of Spicy Snow Crab and an elegant
spread of Steamed King Crab legs.