Chapter 4

Austin, still lost in passion, roared furiously: "Who is it!"

"Not even knocking before—"

The rest of her words went unfinished as her eyes widened larger than lanterns.

They were still entangled together in an ambiguous, explicit position. What they were doing was self-evident.

"James?"

She hurriedly jumped away from Anderson's body and out of his embrace.

Frantically pulling down her skirt, scrambling to pick up the stockings Anderson had torn to shreds.

As she picked them up, she suddenly stopped her frantic movements, breathing rapidly as she stood up straight, her eyes darting away as she looked at me.

"James, let me explain."

"It's not what you think."

"I told him that after my postpartum recovery ended, I wouldn't see him anymore. I was going back to my family."

"Anderson asked me for one last—"

"Director Anderson, I'm here to collect the documents."

I didn't look at the flustered woman, but coldly at Anderson, whose face was smeared with lipstick.

He stood up with a contemptuous, disdainful smile, zipped up his pants, and then handed me a stack of documents.

I took the documents and left without saying a single word to Austin the entire time.

Because shouting was useless, and talking to her would only exhaust my emotions.

A dirty woman should just be discarded.

Austin watched my back, a feeling of unease creeping up in her heart.

At lunch, she came to find me to eat, and I treated her like she was invisible.

Wherever I went, she followed. Unable to bear my cold treatment any longer, she broke down.

"James, can we talk?"

"Fine. I'll send you the divorce papers later, and we should sit down and have a proper talk then."

Everyone in the company looked at us with strange eyes. I didn't care anymore.

Austin, however, lost control.

Just then, our supervisor notified us of an emergency meeting.

"Whoever can close the deal with FLY Company will receive a two hundred thousand dollar bonus."

"Plus a promotion and raise."

The supervisor looked at me: "James, especially your group. Because you took a month off, your group's performance tanked."

"Upper management said they're planning to fire you all."

"So take this opportunity to make up for it!"

I was alone now and not afraid of losing my job, but those colleagues absolutely couldn't lose their jobs because of me.

From then on, I threw myself into work frantically, working overtime until late at night, drinking coffee until my stomach hurt.

Outside, thousands of lights illuminated the night, but not a single one was lit for me.

Austin had gone home. She couldn't stand my cold treatment anymore.

I worked overtime partly for my colleagues, and partly to avoid her.

Finally, after completing a project proposal I was satisfied with, I arranged to meet with the potential partners.

They deliberately made things difficult for me, forcing me to drink until I nearly died in the private room.

"James, why are you working so hard you'd risk your life? I'm really impressed."

"I'm very satisfied with the project plan. We'll come over to discuss the rest."

However, the next day when I woke up and returned to the company, I heard the supervisor praising Anderson.

"Not bad, the partners are very satisfied with this proposal. I didn't expect you to be smarter than James."

Smarter than me? Anderson hadn't participated at all!

When I walked closer to look, the content on that proposal was identical to mine.

My brain exploded. Anderson had stolen my proposal and claimed it as his own.

But the only person who knew my computer password was Austin.

I glared at her with bloodshot eyes. She guiltily looked away.

I couldn't hold back anymore and rushed forward: "This proposal was done by me. When did it become his?"

"Austin, why are you doing this to me?"

To them, my rage was just a madman venting emotions.

"James, you can't produce results and still have the nerve to make a scene? Your whole group just wait to be fired!"

No one believed me. Had I once again helped him get promoted and a raise? After the supervisor left, Anderson had his assistant bring cake and wine to celebrate.

The anger in my heart kept burning, but Anderson smirked and handed me the wine.

"The proposal was indeed yours. Austin helped me steal it."

"This kind of thing has happened plenty of times before."

"Every solution you came up with—didn't Austin reject it? She deliberately rejected them to stop you from implementing them, then told me the solutions so I could implement them and get promoted and raises."

"Your former boss knew this, which is why she wanted to transfer you to a branch office in a high position, away from me. But you were stupid and stayed to work for me for Austin's sake."

"Your group is in big trouble now."

I was so angry my face turned red, the rage in my chest wouldn't dissipate.

Before I could strike, Anderson smashed the cake in my face and poured red wine from my head down to my feet.

"Pathetic loser, you dare try to hit me..."

In that moment, I lost control of my emotions.

I found a fruit knife on the table and stabbed it toward Anderson...