The Ultimate Chance-Chapter 163

When they got home, Aubrey made a beeline for Angel’s playroom where he was driving the toy car he got for his fifth birthday. When he saw her, he got out for Aubrey to have a turn.

Damon ruffled his hair and then hugged Aubrey. "Are you sleeping over?"

She nodded, bouncing on her heel happily. He helped her into the car and hid the remote control behind him as he made the car go laps around the humongous room. It always made the kids happy when they thought they were driving the car on their own.

When Avery joined him, he pulled her closer to him and pressed his lips agaisnt her forehead while one hand hovered over the button to make a turn as soon as Aubrey got close to the wall.

He knew she was thinking about something that was troubling her so as soon as the kids lost interest in driving and moved on to another game, he pulled her out of the room and asked, "what’s wrong?"

She shook her head. "Nothing. I just didn’t expect Charles to act the way he did earlier."

She explained how he dismissed them when she only wanted to give him some soup, and how he wouldn’t even let his daughter get in the house for a moment before they left.

He sat on the couch in the living room and pulled her onto his lap. "I know you’re worried about him and Aubrey. But my love, I think there’s a reason why Julie asked you to take care of her child."

She tilted her head to face him. "She doesn’t have family and Charles would be a wreck. She was right about that, clearly." He was still looking at her intently, so she considered the possibility that made her frown. "Are you saying you think she didn’t trust him enough? But she’s his daughter."

She changed her mind as soon as she made that argument. The D’Abovilles were Damon’s parents and the Vaillants were hers, and you wouldn’t know it from how both of them were treated by their families.

Charles had indeed moved on quite fast for a man who buried his wife only a day ago.

But again, maybe it was just his way of handling grief and being with a woman didn’t mean he was in love. There were countless men who turned into playboys as soon as their wives died, especially those who loved their wives so much that it didn’t matter who they were with anymore.

She could only hope the gnawing feeling at the pits of her stomach was her overthinking.

______

The following day, Damon dropped the playful duo off at school while she had an early meeting at the office. Mina had discovered something the day before.

She was last to arrive at the conference room despite being a few minutes early, which made her wonder why they all thought this meeting was so urgent. Gabe stood from his seat and pulled the chair at the head of the table, indicating for Avery to sit.

She smiled at him and lowered her voice to speak to only him, "this doesn’t mean you’re off the hook for slacking."

He grinned mischievously and returned to his seat while Avery sat down and scanned the conference table.

"Is the CEO selling the company or something?" She asked, making the table buzz in laughter.

"You do know you’re the CEO, right?" Mina chuckled.

The smile on Avery’s face faded. "One of you is stealing from me. Again. I can’t believe I’m having this conversation."

Everyone went silent, but she was not here to ask questions that would go unanswered. Her fury was rising by the second. "Mina came up with a design campaign a few days ago and what do you know, yesterday, High Tide Telecommunications released their commercial campaign and it’s every bit like our own."

With her signal, Mina played the presentation of her campaign on the projector.

"Look familiar?" Avery asked.

She waited for her words to sink in as she scanned the room, then she said, "I want answers from all of you."

The room fell silent for a while, before the manager of the marketing department spoke, "I approve every campaign before it’s sent out and I’m quite certain I did not receive any that looks like that."

"So the marketing head of High Tide is a magician who can read minds, then." She hummed, making the man’s face pale. Avery’s suspicion was focused on him and had only called all the department heads to let them see what would happen if anyone dared to double cross her. 𝗳𝚛𝗲𝕖𝚠𝚎𝚋𝗻𝗼𝕧𝗲𝐥.𝚌𝚘𝐦

Mina almost felt pity for the man. Since Avery met Damon again, she had been way too friendly. Everyone had forgotten how she earned her reputation as one of the most ruthless businesswoman in Olphire.

She didn’t build an empire from scratch by letting off backstabbers.

However, Mina didn’t actually feel pity for him. Whatever was coming for him, he deserved it.

"I don’t have all day, Gad." Avery snapped.

The man wet his lips in a gesture Avery assumed was meant to lubricate his lies.

"I will look into this by tomorrow morning." He promised. "Tomorrow, I will give you answers."

"I want answers in half an hour." Avery said, making his already pale face turn ghastly.

"I—"

She interrupted him. "Meeting dismissed."

As soon as she stood from her seat and walked out of the conference room, the other department heads scurried away as hough they were afraid she would call them back and have them investigate the matter in less time than she had given Gad.

Mina followed her to her office and took a seat as Avery took off her coat.

"Is there anything else?" Avery asked.

Mina raised a brow with a smile. "You’re in some mood. My nephew or niece isn’t behaving today?"

She took a seat. "It’s nothing like that. I’m just nervous."

Though she didn’t explain what she was nervous about, she couldn’t stop thinking about it.

"You know you can always tell me anything, right?" Mina offered.

Avery nodded. That was the advantage of having your best friend as your assistant. You had a built-in shrink everywhere you went. However, it felt odd to discuss Julie with Mina.

Instead she asked, "Are you sure Gad received your email with the campaign details attached?"

Mina fell into thought. "I’ve always sent him campaigns to the same email and he has always received them. Unless this time the email was deleted..."

"I thought so." Avery sighed.

"You think someone else intercepted the email before he had the chance to read it, gave the campaign to someone else, and deleted it?" When Avery nodded, she laughed. "Yet you still had him on edge like that?"

"If his work accounts have such little security, that’s his fault." Avery retorted.

They were still talking about it when Gabe poked his head in and instantly gazed at Mina.

"Uh...I don’t think I need to know the details of your attraction to each other, thanks." Avery chuckled. "What

Are you doing here, Gabe?"

"I billed some extra hours to make up for the days I slacked off." He reported, then he looked at her. "You, on the other hand, have been working way too hard in the last month and a half."

"I’m going to take a maternity leave soon." She explained.

Gabe stared at her blankly. The company allowed every woman six months of paid maternity leave, but they could apply for more time if they needed it. The policy didn’t say anything about them working extra hard in the months leading up to their leave.

Knowing what he was thinking, Avery said, "I’m taking a year off. I know I can’t do half a year’s worth of work in a month but I don’t want to have too much of a work load when I return." Besides, Mina would take her maternity leave at around the same time.

The couple looked at her like she was out of her mind. Mina was the first to laugh out loud. "You do know you can retire right now and still live in luxury for the rest of your life, right? And you wouldn’t even need to spend a dime out of Damon’s money."

Avery rolled her eyes. "And spend the rest of my life lying around like a couch potato? No thank you." She exaggerated.

In truth, the thought of taking an entire year off was killing her, even though she needed it after the intense amount of work she had done over the last several years.

Mina stood from her seat. "I won’t take too long away. But I think my boss can let me work from home for a while if I ask her nicely."

Avery swatted her away playfully. "You have a file to deliver to RA Vaille."

"Yes ma’am." Mina winked and walked out.

The file Avery was talking about was meant for Damon, which Avery couldn’t deliver herself because they both knew how that would turn out. None of them would get any work done if they met in an enclosed office.

Damon’s company wasn’t far away so she decided to walk over, clearing her head while at it. Just as she entered through the glass rotating doors, she caught sight of a silhouette and whipped her head around, nearly bumping her head into the glass before her. She waited until she had completely entered the building to scan her surroundings.

There wasn’t much to take note of. The street was as busy as Imperium had always been during business hours. Still, she couldn’t shake off the feeling that she was being followed.