The Miracle of You

The atmosphere in the office instantly changed. The murderous look in Christian’s eyes faded away, replaced by a startling blankness.

Startled, Camille wondered what exactly Harold meant by that.

‘The truth about Pamela Callahan’s death?’ she thought, shocked. ‘I only heard that Gregory Callahan lost his wife to an illness, but at that time, she had already left him and their kids.’

‘Come to think of it, I’m not sure if they got an actual divorce back then…’

At that moment, employees started to notice the commotion. Camille stepped back and tried not to seem like she was involved in any of this. Gossip was relentless in a society like this one.

Christian knew this as well, so he backed off a bit. Interestingly, he no longer looked furious. Instead, there was this cold, calculative look in his eyes.

“We will talk about this tomorrow,” he said icily. “Alone.”

Harold looked satisfied at this. “Very well. Like you, I don’t want any trouble, either. I’m glad that we have both come to a mutual agreement.”

“As do I, Mr. Huckington,” Christian said pleasantly, though his tone did not match the icy look in his gaze. “As do I.”

Harold nodded and then started to leave. But then, as if something had suddenly occurred to him, he turned to face Camille.

Camille couldn’t help but flinch visibly. She simply could not stand the sight of this man, let alone endure his presence. She had hoped that he would forget her existence at that moment, but it turned out that such a hope was futile.

Harold sent her a smug smile. “I look forward to having you in my care, Miss Parker,” he said.

Even though he was addressing her formally, she could still feel the gooseflesh crawling up her skin.

For a moment, she imagined that she was his secretary and that he was constantly asking her to come to his office.This belongs © NôvelDra/ma.Org.

She didn’t dare to imagine any further. The possibility was too disgusting.

“Goodbye, Mr. Huckington,” she said calmly, perhaps in a much sterner tone than she had intended. Though she could no longer bring herself to care.

The employees immediately made room for Harold as he passed, his bodyguards following diligently behind. When the elevators finally closed, Camille let out a small, quiet sigh of relief.

The employees also went back to work, and Christian returned to his office. All was quiet again, but only for a short while.

Later, as lunchtime approached, Christian called her into his office.

“I’m here, Mr. Callahan,” she greeted politely as she stood before him. “Is there something that you need?”

Christian only looked at her with an unnerving gaze. He appeared thoughtful, not anything like she had expected.

Perhaps she was too dramatic in thinking that he might blow up on her today or something. After all, Christian Callahan was not the type to lose his temper that easily. He always had a cunning way of exacting revenge later on.

“I want you to find out the extent of Harold Huckington’s association with Haynes-McGregor Industries,” he said calmly. “I don’t want superficial details. I want you to find out as you always do with clients, investors, and business partners. Find out everything you can about him, including all the business deals that he has made for the past few months.”

Camille nodded. She had kind of expected an order like this coming from him because of the scene just now. It was going to be difficult for her, especially if Harold found out that she was snooping, but she needed to probe things first and see if it was dangerous or not.

“Also, we will need to speed up the process of you getting closer to Michael McGregor,” Christian added. “I want you to make him trust you. Make him confide in you more. Do a push-and-pull effect.” He smirked, appearing amused. “Like I mentioned before, it works on most men. If you do these two things, then you won’t need to go to Huckington’s side like he proposed.”

Camille felt a wave of revulsion, but restrained it from showing in her expression. “I understand, sir.” It was better to just obey and get it over with. She would think later on of subtle ways on how she wouldn’t get Michael in deep trouble because of this. “I can leave now, right? I still need to eat my lunch.”

Christian nodded. “Of course.”

“Then I-”

“Ah. I almost forgot to mention.”

Camille felt her body turn rigid. “What is it?” she asked calmly, but she was almost afraid to hear it.

“It’s better if you make him fall even deeper in love with you.” There was a semblance of a smirk on Christian’s lips. “Make him so desperate to be with you that he’ll do anything you say. Tease him, make him crave for your attention. Make him so obsessed and possessive of you that he’ll do anything at your command. Men like that are easy to manipulate to your whims afterward. He won’t be able to refuse anything you say.”

He leaned back in his seat, pointedly ignoring the shocked look on Camille’s face.

“It’ll be even better if you do it after the announcement of our engagement comes out,” he added, chuckling. “The prospect of ‘forbidden love’ will be irresistible, I tell you.”

The detailed order startled Camille so much that she visibly stiffened. She couldn’t believe the words coming out of Christian’s mouth.

This was pure manipulation, a betrayal on the part of her only close friend at the moment. The thought of it was even repulsive, because there was no way she would string Michael along like that. It went against her nature to be open and straightforward.

“Mr. Callahan, I can’t just-” she began.

“To drive your motivation, I’ll give you a deadline,” Christian said, interrupting her words in the middle, as though he already knew what she was about to say. “I want you to give me at least two pieces of solid evidence of Harold conspiring against me. Use any method that you need at your disposal. There will be an industry gala this month, and there are also plans to collaborate in a joint venture with the Haynes-McGregor Industries. These will give you the opportunities that you need.”

Camille’s eyes went wide at this. “What?” she blurted out. “Such a thing was never in the list of agenda and you never included any meetings of the sort in the schedule, either. When was this planned?”

“Father and I were just thinking about it last week,” Christian said calmly. “There’s going to be a lot of networking involved, and with that, you’re going to have a lot of chances to communicate with Michael McGregor. You need to make sure that you are not suspiciously trying to gather other information. If his secretary finds out about our plans, he will start investigating, and by then it will be difficult to get rid of him.”