Chapter 216 Office Meeting

When he saw who was in the limo that stopped outside the company, Nick almost choked on the Oreo cookie he was eating. He found it audacious that this time Charles had decided to show up in his real form. Moreover, he was acting as if he was Bella’s chauffeur. What kind of stupid game was this?

He stood outside the main entrance and waved at her. He then pointed to Charles.

“Why did you bring him here?”

“He is my bodyguard. He’s following me wherever I go.”

Bella feared that Charles would be angry by such comments. She also feared what would happen if Nick decided to challenge Charles.

Charles didn’t seem pleased by the comment. He stared at Nick with anger.

“He also lacks a basic sense of humor,” added Nick.

“How come you hate everyone I bring here? After seeing you treat Brandon in such a lousy manner I didn’t expect anything better from you.”

“Maybe it’s your fault,” said Nick. “You should be careful with who you bring here.”

He walked all the way up to Charles and gazed at him with contempt.

“Did the Williams Group go bankrupt and you had to look for another job?” he said and laughed.

“Keep on talking like this and you’ll end up becoming shark food,” said Charles.

Bella did not quite understand what was going on between those two.

“Do you know each other from the past?”

Then it occurred to her that they shared the same surname. This surely was no coincidence.

“Are you two relatives?”

“Sorry, but I don’t have asshole relatives,” said Charles.

Bella could not believe that Charles would ever talk about someone in such a manner. He was always a well-spoken man. Whatever was going on between these two, it was quite serious.

But that didn’t matter to Bella. She hadn’t come here to see them quarrel.

“Mr. Williams. We need to go through the designs I have sent you. Then you can let me know what is it that I need to change.”

“All right,” said Nick. “Let’s go.”

He took her from the arm and led her into the building. Sensing that Charles was going to go after them, Nick slammed the glass door into his face but somehow Charles managed to pass through and was now standing next to Bella, with his hand around her waist.

Bella knew that Charles had just used his teleportation skills. Nick tried to ignore that Charles was now in the building and focused on Bella.

“Hurry up,” he told her. “I don’t have all day for this.”

His voice betrayed that he wasn’t very pleased with what was going on. Bella was glad there was no outbreak of physical violence for the moment, but she felt miserable between these two men who happened to share the same surname. Although Charles was acting cool, Nick was now trying to vent his anger to Bella. Bella sighed and followed him up the stairs.

Charles-as nosy as ever-came closely behind.

“If we leave right now, I will pay you to double whatever he is paying you,” he whispered into her ear.

“Why don’t you leave me alone for a minute?” she said and pushed him away. “Don’t forget that if you hadn’t cut my expense account I would not have gone searching for part-time work.”

What a leech! The great Charles Williams was more insecure than a baby. What worth was his love if he was only good at drinking her blood and restricting her freedom?

She sat at the desk next to Charles and took her laptop out from her bag. Charles came right behind and hung above her like a ghost in a Henry James story. Nick wasn’t pleased with all this. Although he didn’t say anything, he didn’t like Charles intruding in his office like that.

“Are we going to begin before the end of the day or do I need to deduct the loss of my time from your payment?”

“That’s what they’re both good at! Deducting payments from their workers,” said Bella to herself while she switched on the computer and waited until her work was fully loaded on the screen.

“What seems to be the problem?” she asked.

“Right here,” said Nick and pointed to a plastic cup she had designed.

“The diameter and the height of this cup is not proportionally equal to the original picture. And the color tone is a bit off. You should have given it a deeper shade of orange. What you got here is not trendy enough.”

“You can give me the exact dimensions of the cup and I can fix it. As for the color, it would be more precise to give me a pan-tone number for the exact tone, or else there will be a slight deviation when the image is displayed on a different screen.”

“It’s your job to find the exact pan-tone number, not mine,” said Nick.

“All right,” said Bella. “I can fix it.”

Throughout the meeting, Charles kept an eye on Bella to make sure that she would not touch Nick. Every time her body would seem to lean towards his direction, Charles’s hand would reach from behind to grab her shoulder and lead her back to her initial position.

No matter what you called it-love or jealousy-Charles was a force to be reckoned. Bella seemed to realize that and tried to get on with the task without paying any attention to him. He was like the wind or the rain. Whenever it decided to show up, there was no way you could send it away.