Bought For A Baby, Kept For A Lifetime-Chapter 192: A Weapon

As Anne entered the office, she halted for a while when she saw Clara there as well. If she’d known Clara was here, she would have come at a much later time. Whenever she was in the same space as Clara, she always felt a hateful and suffocating energy directed towards her, and that type of energy usually disrupted her daily flow, she felt better stying away from negativity rather than being around it.

Andrew observed how she was lingering by the door upon entering the office and frowned slightly, his eyes scanned her in concern for a while before he asked,

"What’s wrong?" The silence in the office was abruptly shattered by his deep voice.

Clara seemed to return to her senses as she heard him address Anne. She wanted to get back his attention to her direction, anything if it would draw his eyes off Anne to herself,

"The chairman already assigned the task of the press conference to our department, his assistant specifically told me to come ask you if I needed any details." As she spoke, she took her seat on the chair facing him directly.

Clara’s hopeful gaze lingered on him, awaiting a glance in her direction.

He never toyed with anything related to work, it was something about him everyone knew all too well. He would keep personal matters aside when it came to work, that was how adamantly focused he was to his profession.

Now having mentioned something that had to do with work and the fact that his grandfather had already shifted the remaining task to him, he would pay attention to her and what she was saying right?

However her expression slowly fell as his eyes remained fixed elsewhere.

It was clear he had heard what she said loud and clear, but the person who held his gaze seemed more important than anything Clara was saying.

"Do you need something?"

Clara heard him ask again, his words clearly not directed at her but at the person by the door.

Slowly, Clara’s elegant fingers tightened into a fist.

She had never felt so humiliated, so disregarded and unseen. It was painful to the point it as almost funny.

The very thing she’d been working towards for five whole years of her life, the very desire she’d kept in her heart for almost ten years now, it suddenly felt like all those years had been wasted.

She heard Anne’s footsteps as she approached, and Clara had to do everything to contain the displeasure from turning her face ugly.

"I just got information about the press conference, there are so many media companies blacklisted from SE so I wanted to confirm which ones specifically. I could have gotten it from Cynthia but I couldn’t find her at her work station."

Nodding in understanding, Andrew finally lowered his gaze and seemed to be searching for something on his computer.

"I should have some copies of the file containing that information with me. Sit, I’ll send it to you." He spoke while his fingers rhythmically typed.

Anne noticing the seat next to his desk was occupied by Clara moved towards the sofa at the farther end of the office taking her seat. Andrew’s actions suddenly halted as he watched her going towards the far away sofa, his brows pulled together in displeasure.

As his gaze drifted over in Clara’s direction, her eyes suddenly lit up.

"I also have some questions about the conference, I..." She eagerly began but his reply cut the words off her mouth.

"You can wait for Cynthia outside, she’ll give you every information you need." His reply was swift and dismissive. Shattering any hopes Clara might have harbored for a single moment.

She stared at his rigidly cold face for a while, just a moment ago, this coldness wasn’t there but gentleness, just a moment ago, he’d looked almost warm and approachable.

How could the treatment for two people be this vastly different? She wondered with seething anger rising in her mind.

The reason was clear, even if she wanted to deny it.

One had already made her own place firmly in his life.

Anne had the upper hand, because she had slithered her way into his life one way or the other.

In this moment, Clara felt nothing but regret. If she had been steadfast, if she had been persistent instead of following the calculated formulas of finding ways to get into his life, would he be looking at her like this now? Would it be her who owned his gaze?

But all of it wasn’t her fault, she’d seen how harshly he’d dismissed other women, she had thought her method was the most effective.

She had someone planted in his home to make sure something like this wouldn’t happen, then she made her to work in his company just to fit the image of the kind of woman he would want, she knew his dislikes and removed that from herself, from not overly dressing in luxury to make her not come off as a greedy woman, to playing the innocently beautiful flower type of woman, it was all for him. So why...why couldn’t he see her?

Andrew raised a harsh brow at her, a clear question of what she was still doing in his office when he’d told her to leave, Clara came to her senses at this moment and slowly raised herself up from the seat. Forcing a smile on her lips before turning around to leave not showing her disappointment as her steps remained confident.

She didn’t look at Anne on her way out, she feared her rage would show through if she did.

After she left Andrew’s office, everywhere Clara passed through, men’s eyes were pinned on her, specifically on her chest. She looked down to realize her buttons were still left open and in her anger, she yelled at a male assistant passing by whose eyes didn’t move off her chest for a single moment.

"What the heck are you looking at?"

The guy immediately looked way and scrambled off while Clara did her buttons up to the very last one in annoyance. The person she’d done this for hadn’t even noticed at all.

As she returned to her office, her eyes began to redden with unshed tears as she thought back to the years since she’d known Andrew where she dreamed of being his woman, thought about the life she had always anticipated she would have when he became her husband, thought about the position and status that came with it and how she had envisioned herself at the top of it all.

She didn’t want to accept that those dreams were gone, didn’t want to accept that the man she had made all this effort for would fall in love with someone else.

If her first plan couldn’t work, she would have to adopt a full proof method, this time one that wouldn’t fail if she succeeded.

Clara wiped her tears and straightened her shoulders.

All these years her plans had been a crafting her image in his eyes, biding her time until he began to see her, began to feel something for her. All these years her plan had been focused around winning his heart, if not his heart then his favor, enough for him to want to make her his wife.

Right now it seemed that goal was nothing but bleak if not a terrible fail. But it wasn’t her only option.

It wasn’t her only option.

Hours later when the day had gone dark, Clara could be seen driving towards a part of town where a woman like her wouldn’t be seen. She walked through a deserted alley, though the streets were filled with people, this specific alley was deserted. At the end of the alley, there was a hooded man smoking with his back leaned against the wall.

"Are you the one who made the order?" He asked in a gruff voice as Clara arrived.

"Yes." Clara replied steadily. In this type of alley where a human could be killed without anyone even being alerted of it happening, Clara didn’t look frightened at all, it was as if this was something she was used to doing.

"Here’s your item, I need the complete amount in cash." The man held out a small green bottle that looked like it was pulled right out of a vintage gallery. The bottle wasn’t clear, hence no one could tell what it contained.

Clara dug out a thick wad of cash from her purse and handed it to the man who exchanged the cash for the bottle. Having made the transaction she cam here for, Clara turned around to leave,

"Be careful with how you use that thing lady. If you use the wrong amount you could end up killing someone, if someone dies don’t you even think about getting me involved. I don’t want to be dragged into a murder." The man suddenly warned in a grave yet threatening tone.

Clara looked at the bottle in her hand with a smirk on her lips before replying to the man, "Mind your damn business, I paid for what I bought, whatever I do with it, if I kill someone with it or not doesn’t concern you."

Anticipation, glee, and a deviously possessive look shone in Clara’s eyes as she came into the light from the dark alley. When she wanted something, she would blur the lines of morals to achieve her goals, even If one or two people had to die for her to get there.

As Clara sat in her car, she held the bottle up looking at it closely.

"Annelise Thompson, I have the very weapon to win against you in my hands."