Chapter 837

“I know what I’m doing,” Thorne replied calmly.

When the affair with Vesta had first come to light, Lloyd had aggressively warned him against it, just like everyone else.

Back then, Thorne had given him the exact same answer.

It was Thorne’s polite way of telling him to back off.

On the surface, Thorne always played the respectful son. But when push came to

shove, if he didn’t agree, he wouldn’t listen to a damn word Lloyd said.

Since Thorne was determined to be stubborn…

There was nothing he could do.

As for the corporate fallout, he trusted his son’s ruthless competence.

Resigned, Lloyd kept the rest of the conversation brief and ended the call.

Thorne handed the phone back to the Butler and returned his attention to the door. “Minnie, can we talk?”

Still nothing.

After a few more futile knocks, he turned back to Latonia. “Did she cry on the way home?”

Latonia nodded sympathetically. “Yes.”

She’d sobbed her heart out, in fact.

It was devastating to watch, considering Jasmine rarely shed a tear.

A moment later, realizing his emergency meeting was looming and Jasmine wasn’t going to budge, Thorne sighed. “Minnie, Dad has to handle a work crisis. If you need anything, come find me in the study, okay?”

The room remained stubbornly silent.

He paused, refusing to push her any further, and looked at Latonia. “Go check on her in a bit.”

“I will, but-“

“She’s just icing me out. Call her name a few times; she’ll answer you.”

“Understood.”

Thorne murmured a few final words of comfort through the wood before heading to his study.

By the time he managed to extinguish the PR fires, over two hours had passed.

Emerging from his office, he went straight back to his daughter’s room.

She was finally asleep.

Seeing the deep, troubled frown

etched into her small face even in slumber he gently smoothed out her

brow He fingered for a mor

then quietly slipped out.

Anticipating that he’d want an update, Latonia had stayed awake.

The moment the bedroom door clicked shut, she stepped forward. “She barely said a word all night. She was waiting for her mother to caff fighting sleep for hours. But the call never came She finally crashed about thirty minutes ago, still

clutching her phone.”

Thorne gave a tight nod, asking no further questions. “Get some rest.”

Meanwhile.

By the time Charlene and Stewart wrapped up their grueling strategy session, dawn was breaking.

The entire conference room looked like a zombie ward.

Both Charlene and Stewart were running on fumes.

Yet, Charlene was staring blankly at her phone, lost in thought.

Knowing she was agonizing over her daughter, Stewart nudged her. “Just call her if you want to.”

She blinked, snapping out of it. “It’s too early. She won’t be awake yet.”

“Then call her when she is. Right now, you need to go home and crash.”

The past few days had been utterly brutal. Charlene was so sleep-deprived her vision was starting to double.

“Yeah,” she muttered.

Despite her exhaustion, the second she got into the car, she shot a text to Latonia, asking for an update on Jasmine.

Latonia was probably still asleep; by the time Charlene reached her own driveway, there was still no reply.

The Ross family had already caught wind of the night’s explosive drama.

Though it was barely morning when she walked through the door, Helena Ross and Maisie were already up.

Taking one look at Charlene’s utterly drained state, they swallowed their questions about the scandal and

immediately shoved her upstars E bed.