3

Knowing it had to be from Sara, Chloe Bishop turned down the volume, lowered her head, and held the phone close to her ear to listen discreetly.

“Mommy, we already ate lunch! Brother made it! He cooked grilled cheese sandwiches with tomato soup, mac and cheese with bacon bites, or scrambled eggs and buttered toast … burp~”

She let out an adorable little hiccup before continuing, “Mommy, what did you eat for lunch?”

Chloe obviously wasn't going to tell them she hadn't eaten yet, so she typed back: [The cafeteria here serves amazing food, and Mommy ate a ton! Don't worry about me.]

“You gotta work hard and keep going, Mommy! Brother, don't you want to cheer Mommy on?”

Adrian’s cold, aloof voice sounded from the other end. “No way.” So childish.

Chloe could practically picture the disdainful scowl on her son's face as he uttered that cold “No way.”

“Fine, then Sara will cheer Mommy up! Energy beam attack—pew, pew, pew! Did you get it, Mommy?”

Chloe’s heart melted into absolute mush. “Mm-hmm, Mommy received all of it!”

Swoosh!

The office door swung open out of nowhere.

Like a kid caught red-handed doing something bad, Chloe instantly snapped her spine straight and turned toward the door in total sheer horror.

Xavier Grayson’s imposing figure emerged from inside.

Though she had crossed paths with him several times today, this was the first time she was seeing him standing at full height.

He was tall and impeccably built, his long-limbed frame wrapped in an expensive, high-end tailored suit. With classic golden-ratio proportions, he had to be at least six-foot-one.

Standing up, he radiated an even more suffocating pressure, like an unshakable mountain peak. Simply by standing there, he seemed to look down upon the entire world.

The moment he stepped out, Xavier Grayson caught Chloe’s panicked little movements, though he didn't call her out on them.

"To the conference room," he instructed, his words as brief as ever.

Chloe scrambled to respond, "Yes, sir!"

Gathering her notes, she followed right behind Xavier Grayson into the elevator.

Even though the spacious elevator only held the two of them, Chloe felt completely suffocated. The aura radiating from this man was simply too overwhelming; being trapped in a tight enclosure with him felt like the air itself was saturated with his dominance, making her heart race involuntarily.

At five-foot-five, wearing two-inch heels put her on the taller side for a woman. Yet standing beside the six-foot-one Xavier Grayson, his towering, powerful frame made her look delightfully petite by comparison.

Chloe stole a quiet, subtle glance up at him.

From her angle, she could only see the sharp, sculpted lines of his profile—a face so drop-dead handsome that it lacked a single flaw.

To think that a man this handsome, tall, capable, and ridiculously wealthy—the ruler of a mega-conglomerate worth hundreds of billions, standing at the absolute top of the city's food chain—was actually...

Dysfunctional down there.

Chloe felt a pure, genuine pang of sympathy.

Ah... God really is fair after all. He never lets anyone have it all. He gave this man everything, only to take away his most essential capability as a male.

Tsk, tsk, tsk... How tragic.

The very next second, Chloe’s eyes collided directly with the man’s downward glance. A cool, pressing voice fell over her from above:

"What are you thinking about?"

Xavier Grayson was more than used to people staring at him, but the way Chloe had just looked at him was completely different.

In her eyes, he had actually caught a faint trace of... pity?

She was feeling sorry for him.

Chloe snapped out of her daze with a violent jolt and yanked her gaze away. She hadn't expected to get caught red-handed stealing a look at him! In an instant, every hair on her body stood on end from sheer anxiety.

If he found out what she was actually thinking, she might as well pry open the elevator doors and jump straight down to save him the trouble of firing her!

"I..." Chloe’s mind raced at breakneck speed, desperately cobbling together a cover story.

"I was just thinking... how can a man as perfect as you exist in this world, President Grayson?! You've managed every single good thing in life purely with your face! Anyone who says the stars are pretty clearly hasn't looked into your eyes! Getting to live a single day with a face like yours would mean dying with zero regrets!"

Xavier Grayson, suddenly hit with a wall of shameless flattery: "..."

Noticing the man's skeptical look, Chloe suddenly recalled what Samuel Grayson had said earlier—that every single former secretary had been fired for harboring inappropriate feelings for the boss.

He wouldn't think I'm hitting on him, would he?!

Driven by an absolute, desperate urge to survive, she hurriedly added, "Please rest assured, President Grayson! I have zero romantic interest in you whatsoever! I am already a mother of two children! If I ever harbor even a single drop of inappropriate intent toward you, you can fire me on the spot!"

Honestly, she had zero interest in men these days—she was only interested in making money!

She was going to cling to that sixty-thousand-Dollar paycheck for these two weeks with a vice-like grip!

Xavier Grayson paused for a second.

This woman... looked so youthful and pure that he constantly kept forgetting she was already the mother of two children.

What unnerved him, however, was the fact that this was the very first time in his entire life a woman had explicitly told him she didn't have a single drop of interest in him—and he could actually feel that she meant every word.

She wasn't playing hard to get; she was being entirely serious.

This was supposed to be something that pleased him—he had finally found a secretary who would focus purely on her work.

And yet, for some strange reason, a tiny, unexplainable flicker of displeasure stirred deep within his chest.