Chapter 182 Misunderstood Her
Joshua turned towards the familiar face beside him.
It seemed like someone from the advertising department.
“You wouldn't know, that day I climbed from the seventh floor to the twenty-first, just one minute late, and Assistant Joshua gave me an earful.”
Joshua remembered the incident.
"Late is late, what's the excuse?"
The other person just smiled disdainfully.
The elevator doors opened on the first floor.
An employee walking in caught sight of Joshua and shouted, "Assistant Joshua, what are you doing here? Director Luann is looking for you! You’ve got five minutes to bring up the jewelry design from the fourth floor! The clients are waiting!"
Joshua had no words.
He glanced at the stairs; the elevator was stuck on the fifteenth floor. He stepped out decisively, and frantically pressed the down button.
However, after a while, none of the elevators showed any indication of coming down.
"Damn it..."
Joshua slammed his fist against the wall, forced to take the stairs in the emergency exit.
Going down to the fourth floor to grab the files was easy enough, yet the sheer number of floors made him slightly dizzy.
But going up was a different ballgame.
He liked to think he was in decent shape, taking the stairs three at a time, but his legs turned to jelly.
Bam!
He burst into Luann Weaver's office, panting, "The... the designs..."
The clients sitting on the couch, chatting with Luann Weaver, turned their heads with displeasure.
Joshua felt their many gazes; none of them were comfortable.
The chill from the air conditioning brushed over, settling lightly on Joshua's sweat-drenched skin, but it did little to soothe his feeling of embarrassing discomfort.
"Hand it over," Luann Weaver's voice came just in time to cut through the awkwardness, as she extended her hand toward Joshua.
Joshua passed the crumpled blueprint in his grasp over to her. A few drops of sweat clung to the paper. The client eyed it with disdain.
"Your assistant lacks manners," the client scoffed. "First, barging in without knocking, and now this? These plans are filthy. What, you were going to crumple it into a ball before giving it to me?"
Joshua's face flushed with anger, ready to burst.
But the soothing sound of Luann Weaver's voice, gentle as a breeze, calmed his agitation. "My apologies, this one's new and still learning the ropes."
"Go and pour the client some coffee," she instructed.
Joshua stiffened, rooted to the spot.
The client's impatience became more pronounced in their expression.
With a sigh of resignation, Luann Weaver took it upon herself to smooth things over. Fortunately, the client was quite taken with her, not making a fuss over the mishap.
After the client left, Joshua approached in silence. Luann Weaver didn't even glance his way.
"Wipe the sweat off your face; you're a mess."
Grinding his teeth, Joshua asked deliberately between clenched jaws, "Had your fun?"
Luann Weaver sat back in her chair, casually rocking, her toes lightly touching the floor. Her black hair cascaded freely, framing her fair complexion.
"Luann Weaver, do you think I’m an idiot? I can see right through you,” Joshua accused.
"You knew the client was coming today, didn't you?"
"Why did you send me for the prints at the last minute?"
"You just wanted to embarrass me and then swoop in to save the day. Am I right?"
Luann Weaver glanced at him silently, wordless.
At this, Joshua felt even more convinced that Luann had been caught out and was too guilty to respond.
The clock marked the lunch hour, and Luann rose to leave.
As Joshua watched her retreating figure, he spat venomously, "Resorting to such dirty tricks, I’ve lost all respect for you!"
He waited for Luann's private elevator to come back down before taking it up to the twenty-first floor.
"Why does she get her own elevator? I'm just as entitled," he thought.
On its way to the twenty-first floor, he relished the comfort of not being squeezed into a corner.
Leaving the office, Joshua headed to his usual diner. No sooner had he sat down did his phone ring.
"What's up?"
Grace's annoyed voice came from the other end, "What do you mean 'what's up'? Do you think I want to call you? Why didn't you answer my text?"
"You sent me a text?"
Joshua slipped on his Bluetooth headset, maintaining the call while flicking through his messages.
"I've been swamped at the office all day; it's been so crowded, I didn't catch it."
His phone had sat untouched all morning.
[Grandpa froze your bank account.]
"Did you see my message?" came the voice on the line.
Joshua paused for a moment, "Yeah."
"If you're short on cash, let me know. I can send you some."
Just as Joshua was about to respond, he noticed several unread messages at the bottom of the screen, all from Luann Weaver.
[We'll have clients coming in later, remember to pick up the design plans from the fourth floor.] 9:05 AM.
[When you see this, reply.] 9:30 AM.
[What floor are you on now? The files can wait a bit before delivery.] 10:15 AM.
There were also two missed calls.
"Joshua?" Grace hadn't heard a response for a while and, mistaking his silence for fragility, she said, sarcastically, "It’s just a frozen bank account, you’re not that fragile, are you?"
Beep beep beep—
Completely ignoring what Grace had said, Joshua abruptly ended the call and sprang up, quickly exiting the restaurant.
The clients were supposed to arrive at eleven.
Luann Weaver had messaged him at nine.
That meant...
Luann had reminded him.
He just hadn’t seen the messages.
"So, Luann Weaver wasn't playing me after all..."
Mixed emotions swirled within Joshua.
He had thought...
"Even if you weren't messing with me on purpose, it's true that I lost the director position because of you."
"Consider this time... let's call it even for what happened before."
Joshua’s words were a near-whisper to himself.
Lunch out was off the table; Joshua’s funds were tied up, and he didn’t have any cash on him. He’d have to settle for the company cafeteria, scanning his employee card for a meal.
He filled his tray with a meat dish, three sides, and a soup, then found a secluded corner to sit and eat.
Maybe it was because he'd been on the old man's bad side lately and often went hungry, but he found the cafeteria food surprisingly tasty.
"Hey, hey, have you heard? The world's most mysterious and largest auction house is having an event at the end of this month!"
"Can't wait to see what rare treasures will be auctioned this year. I'm oddly excited."
"What's the point in getting excited? We're only going to read about it in the media after the auction is over."
...
In America, within the confines of a sealed room.
A man in a white lab coat was nonchalantly wielding a delicate scalpel, attending to an animal that lay lifeless on the table, with the faint scent of blood wafting through the air.
The door was gently pushed open, and a respectful voice came from behind.
"Sir, we've received the information from the auction house."
Dropping the scalpel carelessly, the man in the lab coat pushed his silver-framed glasses up the bridge of his nose and took the photograph handed to him.
A flicker of interest passed through his eyes, and his slender fingers lightly traced over the dazzling item pictured.
The RH Auction House sure had some patience—they had sat on a diamond discovery for three years before deciding to put it up for auction.
“If they had sold it earlier, I could’ve bought it for Luann by now,” lamented a voice.
“Then I wouldn’t have to hear that ungrateful kid always teasing me for being a tightwad brother.”
