Chapter 126 Chapter 126
“Miss, you have a very pretty face, but you act so rude and impetuous. Be careful, or in the real world, you'll end up crushed and forgotten in a cell.” He tapped his fingers on the roof of the car. “Oh, dear... I think the best course of action is to call the police and open an investigation.”
His words were slightly ironic, loaded with a clear hint of provocation directed at Katherine.
Jessica forced herself to calm down. She took a deep breath, trying her best to maintain her dignity and not show her panic.
“I already said I'll compensate you. We'll sign a debt confession agreement. You don't have to worry about that.”
After speaking firmly, she shrank back toward Katherine.
“Kath... what are the chances that a guy like that will help me with my family's lawsuit after this disaster?”
Katherine Lutz was brutally honest:
“There's a twenty percent chance. Being very optimistic.”
Jessica felt her heart sink into her stomach.
At that moment, Katherine Lutz took the lead. She walked slowly and stopped right next to Antonio Bortolan. The difference in height did not diminish the aura of absolute power between the two.
She muttered a few words inaudible to the others.
Antonio first let out a dismissive laugh, as if he had heard a bad joke. But then he turned his face to face her and replied in a surprisingly calm tone.
In that dark gaze, there was a trace of frustration, curiosity, and a repressed desire that was impossible to ignore.
Katherine didn't back down. She uttered another short sentence.
The weight of those words left the brilliant lawyer silent, deep in thought for several seconds.
The entire exchange was silent. Jessica craned her neck, but the wind muffled the syllables.
After a moment of pure tension, Katherine turned and walked back to her friends.
“Let's go. We'll go back first,” she ordered, adjusting her jacket.
“What? Just like that, out of nowhere?!” Jessica's jaw dropped. “What did he say? What about the police?”
“He's not going to call the police or file criminal charges,” Katherine said indifferently. “Financial compensation and an out-of-court settlement will suffice. We'll wait for his security and legal team to contact us.”
Jessica blinked, stunned.
“How did that shark change his mind so quickly?! What the hell did you say to him, boss?!”
Katherine Lutz walked toward her car, her steps rhythmic on the asphalt.
“I just promised to grant a wish he's had for many years,” she said with the same calmness as someone discussing the weather.
“A wish? What wish?!” Jessica's curiosity was piqued.
Katherine paused for a second and looked up at the bright moon cutting through the night sky. A mysterious and lethal smile slowly spread across her lips, as if she were remembering a debt from times past.
“One he won't forget.”
Regarding financial compensation for the destroyed car, Katherine Lutz tried to discreetly pass the responsibility on to Gabriel Mendes. However, Jessica's wounded pride spoke louder; she stubbornly insisted on taking care of the debt herself. Katherine did not pressure her, respecting her friend's honor, but she left Gabriel Mendes on high alert behind the scenes, ready to cover any possible shortage of funds the second Antonio Bortolan tried to make his move.
Back in the silence of the Arbex Mansion, the night dragged on. Katherine simply couldn't sleep.
Perhaps influenced by his owner's dark unease, little Eros left his luxurious little house in the middle of the night and lay whimpering on the threshold of her bedroom door.
With a soft sigh, Katherine opened the door and let him in. She sat down on the thick carpet on the floor, crossed her legs, and began to stroke the dog's soft fur with one hand, while the other flew over the keyboard of her encrypted laptop. She was reviewing the mountain of data copied from João Arbex's computer in the basement hours earlier.
Its integrity was absolute. Many confidential files from the Arbex Group and its business allies appeared on the screen. Any folder involving business secrets, bids, or family finances, she didn't even open; the data was selected and immediately deleted from her copy. She wasn't a corporate spy. The target was only one: the past.
She tried her best, squinting at the glare of the screen, to find even the smallest line of code related to Daniela Arbex.
Lines and lines of binary information and encrypted reports flowed like a waterfall before her eyes. Minutes turned into hours. Eros fell asleep beside her, his fluffy pink tail finally stopping wagging, the little dog's breathing rhythmic and calm.
Katherine's pale fingers still moved relentlessly across the touchpad.
Until, suddenly, her finger froze.
In the lower right corner of the screen, nestled in a hidden directory, was an encrypted folder labeled “fengwei2003.”
Upon finally finding a concrete clue, Katherine's heart skipped a beat and a wave of triumph flashed in her dark eyes.
The encryption was not of the military grade that protected João's business; it seemed to have been done with old technology. Katherine broke the code and cut through the defenses in less than three minutes.
The contents did not disappoint her. It was a dark gold mine.
The folder contained all of Daniela Arbex's experimental journals and laboratory reports written throughout 2003. The research topics, chemical dosages, organic content, failure processes, and morbid results were all systematically recorded in the scientist's own digitized handwriting.
2003. That year marked exactly two years since Katherine's mother had been forced to take the new and lethal defective drug. By then, the ambitious research project on the drug BDR-2 had already been officially halted and banned by strict government orders due to its high mortality rate. But the records on Katherine's screen proved what she had always suspected: Daniela Arbex had continued the research secretly in the shadows.
And she was not alone. The infamous Professor Howard was also involved.
Before that tragedy, the initial research, BDR-1, had been a resounding medical success, and the product had dominated the pharmaceutical market. Blinded by greed and the promise of cellular immortality, several extremely influential families, along with shadowy wings of the government, supported and invested billions in the collaboration to develop the second generation: BDR-2.
However, due to “unforeseen side effects” — genetic mutations and agonizing deaths — the official collaboration was terminated prematurely, even before the new pharmaceutical product was given a commercial name. The government tried to bury the scandal.
However, the brilliant and crazy scientists from the original research group refused to give up playing God. Some continued their research in the underground. They knew they had achieved a significant evolutionary breakthrough; the problem was that this breakthrough required testing methods that went beyond the limits of human ethics permitted by the state.