He pursed his lips, unamused by the current situation that was thrust to him. Betraying his sons – That was something that he could never do. He watched as Lily stared at the view from the window before he stood, his face grim. “If it is not you then… I will make sure to find who did it. Solve this before tomorrow. Then… we can talk.” He left the room without any hesitation.
He needed to think about his decision carefully. Choosing between his sons and what was promised to him by Mr. Yi… was by far, the biggest decision that he ever needed to make in twenty fours hours or less.
When Lily came back to the conference room, she already expected the absence of the Corneel Patriarch. What she did not expect is still to see both of his sons in the room interacting with Mr. Rossi and the other executives
“President Zhou,” Athalia Montez was the first one to notice Lily’s presence.
“Miss Montez,” Lily nodded.
“You know… this is not my first time in Hong Kong, but every time I came here, I just—I can’t help but fall in love again and again.” Athalia sat beside her, beaming. “Now that I think about it, having a wedding in this place must be nice.” Lily nodded in response. Wedding this—wedding that, this woman was quite tactless. Lily didn’t know if this is on purpose but it was quite obvious that not many people in this room liked this Athalia.
While she was nice, her tendency to become over friendly was not very attractive. After all, everyone in this room was here for business and not to talk about flower arrangements and make ups.
Lily eyed the other people in the room as Athalia started talking about her wedding again. Both Herman and Rein were in a serious conversation with Mr. Rossi while their secretaries were standing a few feet away from them. Both men seemed to be in deep thought, their attention was focused on the older man in front of them.
Judging from the meeting earlier, Lily could see that the two were truly passionate about business. That—or they were really good at pretending. Still, Lily could see that the two were even more passionate than their father, who was obviously faking his interest.
This made Lily think of a plethora of possibilities—endless number of possibilities. First, Leon’s facial reaction did not make any sense to her. The man seemed to know a lot about their business. He was also showing some signs of having very high analytic skills. The man was both experienced and smart. So… why would he want Lily to sign the acquisition?
Lily was sure that Leon’s decision to sell the business must have met with a lot of dispute. His two sons alone must have said something about the matter. This could easily cause a big argument between the three, perhaps even a rift in their familial relationship.
So why would they come in here and pretend that they were happy about it? Lily had been around the three Corneels enough to know that they were not exactly on good terms with each other right now. Herman and Rein were obviously teaming up against their father. While Leon was standing firm on his decision, pretending that this did not affect him in the least.
Was Lily right after all? Someone was forcing the Corneel Patriarch to do this?
“So, I was thinking, a wedding in Italy would be really nice. ” The woman interrupted her thoughts, like a flea buzzing near her ears, “I heard that you and your grandmother hail from Italy? Can you perhaps tell me some of your thoughts?” Lily turned towards the woman, the same smile was on her face.
“No,” she answered.
“Eh?”
“I didn’t grow up in Italy. So… I can’t tell you anything.”
“Really? I thought—Sorry, my bad. I always thought that you grew up in Italy.” Still beaming, Athalia continued to talk about things that did not have anything to do with business. “I was just really excited about everything… I could not stop myself.”
“That is pretty understandable. Once upon a time, I was excited to marry my husband too.”
“Really? That sounds interesting, did the excitement wear off after the wedding?”
“No… the excitement wore off… when I killed someone.” Lily uttered. “It made me realize how life is so short… so why waste a lot of time on something as meaningless as a wedding? If you love each other… no amount of wedding will be enough to justify each other’s emotions.”
“Eh?” Athalia immediately paled at her words. “Killed someone?” She gave an awkward laugh. “President Zhou—President Zhou is really a funny woman.”
Lily only responded with a low chuckle before she turned her attention back to the brothers. As expected, her words were enough to silence the woman beside her. Of course, to Lily this was a good thing.
Not long after, the meeting continued without Leon Corneel. This time, Lily was able to see how the two son’s actually cooperated in answering questions from the executives. However, Lily was not done. After a few minutes, the two received a text that immediately changed their expression.
It should be the second ship, Lily thought as she furrowed her brows. “Did something happen?” she asked, her voice laced with concern.
“Nothing, please continue.” Herman gave a fake smile.
“Are you sure?” an executive asked.
“Yes.” He nodded in response. For a few seconds, his gaze darted towards Lily’s direction as he met his younger brother’s eyes. Two attacks in one day? Was this Lily’s work? Impossible.
Lily was not someone known for doing something like this behind her enemies back. Moreover, she was not the type that would mess with the business itself and affect the possible profit that she would receive in the future. Lily was only known to mess with the stocks, cause scandals and some other surprise attacks that will catch her enemies off guard.
Plus, if Lily does not want to sign the acquisition it was very easy for her to do that without any explanations. The brothers’ faces instantly turned grim, their jaws thinned. Was it possible that this was the work of their father’s friend?
