Chapter 98 Have You Slept
Byron crossed his arms and hugged himself, looking like he was really scared of her.
Amelia rolled her eyes.
"Stop pretending. You're the one person in the entire Shadow Operations Division who's not afraid of me at all. Tell me, why did you hack into Samuel's firewall?"
Byron was shocked.
"Who told you?"
He had strictly forbidden anyone who knew about it from telling Amelia.
That was Amelia's wound, and he wouldn't let anyone open it up.
If it hadn't been for Amelia back then, he would have been beaten to death by his stepfather. Amelia had given him a new life.
Even though he was two years older than Amelia.
"Liam told me," Amelia said. "If he hadn't told me, were you planning to keep hiding it from me?"
Byron was somewhat surprised.
He had never told Liam whose firewall he had hacked into.
So it must have been something Liam found out himself.
It seemed Liam's hacking skills were far beyond what he had thought.
Byron cleared his throat and said, "Of course I wouldn't hide it from you. I just took a client's job. But I heard you've been getting close to Samuel lately, and I was worried you'd lose your head over feelings and stop caring about making money."
"I know which matters more - money or men."
"Naturally."
"Then tell me, who hired you? What was in the video file they wanted deleted?"
One lie requires a hundred more lies to cover it up.
That saying was really true.
But since he'd already started down this path, he had to keep hiding the truth.
The longer he could keep Amelia from knowing, the better - even if just one more day.
Byron took a deep breath and spoke a name.
"Finn O'Connor."
Hearing that name, Amelia's face visibly paled.
That name had long become taboo at Shadow Operations Division.
Because it was her taboo.
No wonder Byron wanted to hide it from her.
Amelia slowly clenched her fists and stopped asking about the firewall.
"Don't take any more jobs from him. This is the last time."
"Yes!" Byron straightened up and responded, secretly breathing a long sigh of relief.
Good thing he was quick-thinking and brought up Finn.
Otherwise Amelia would have kept questioning him.
But bringing him up would inevitably make Amelia sad again.
Because Finn used to be Amelia's boyfriend.
Back then they all thought the two would definitely get married, but no one expected him to betray Amelia later, getting engaged to another woman for his career.
At the time, many people at Shadow Operations Division wanted to go after Finn and teach him a lesson, but Amelia stopped them.
Since then, no one at Shadow Operations Division mentioned Finn anymore.
It was as if he had never existed.
And indeed, Amelia's expression looked terrible. Even though she tried to stay calm, her eyes couldn't lie.
Byron both regretted and didn't regret bringing up Finn.
He changed the subject, saying, "Amelia, I have a surprise for you. Come with me."
Amelia came back to herself, nodded lightly, and followed Byron toward Workshop D.
This abandoned factory had four workshops in total.
Entering Workshop D, they found a large pit 6 feet deep in the middle of the workshop.
Amelia was surprised for a moment and asked, "What's this?"
Byron explained with a smile, "I felt that having our headquarters on ground level wasn't hidden enough, so I took it upon myself to have them dig out an underground space. Once the underground rooms are built, we'll disguise the surface as a dye factory. Even if someone comes to investigate, they'll only find the dye factory."
Amelia nodded.
"That's a good idea. Just keep the noise down so no one notices."
"Got it, leave it to me! In less than a month, our underground headquarters will be completely finished."
Amelia agreed and patted Byron on the shoulder.
"Everyone's worked hard during this time. Add extra food for everyone tonight, put it on my tab."
"Thank you, Amelia!"
"Thank you, Blaze!"
Amelia checked the time and said, "It's getting late. I'll head back now. Contact me anytime if something comes up."
"Okay."
After saying goodbye to Byron and the others, Amelia soon returned to The Richardson Manor.
Under the night sky, the huge estate seemed especially quiet.
As she had done the previous few days, Amelia quietly came to Liam's room, lit a candle, then turned on the light to treat Liam.
By the time the treatment was finished, it was already past 2 AM.
Amelia changed into her pajamas and lay down, but couldn't fall asleep for a long time.
Finn.
If Byron hadn't mentioned that name, she would have almost forgotten it.
But even so, thinking of him again still brought a sharp pain to her heart.
She remembered Finn telling her he would give her happiness, that he would love her like before, just that he couldn't marry her, and he hoped she would understand.
Of course she couldn't understand, and she would never interfere in someone else's marriage or become a mistress hiding in the shadows, so she decisively broke up with him.
It seemed carefree, but only she knew how much pain she was in during that time.
Amelia closed her eyes, and a crystal tear slid down her cheek.
Just then, her phone under the pillow vibrated.
At this hour, who could it be?
Amelia grabbed her phone and saw the message was from Samuel.
[Are you asleep?]
Amelia frowned.
What was he doing up in the middle of the night?
She was about to turn off her phone when Samuel sent another message.
[I need to see you about something. Can you come to my company tomorrow morning?]
Amelia pretended not to see it, turned off her phone, and lit a sleep-aid aromatherapy candle for herself.
With the help of the sleep-aid candle, she finally slowly fell asleep.
On the other side, Samuel's expression was stormy.
Jeremy and York stood before him, not daring to breathe too loudly.
Samuel's temper wasn't great normally, but they had never seen him this angry.
The reason was that the firewall had been breached, and the surveillance video file they had worked so hard to obtain had been destroyed.
They had been just one night away from restoring the video to high definition.
But it was destroyed at exactly that moment!
Both men felt guilty and ashamed.
They had always thought their firewall was impenetrable, but the facts proved that their firewall wasn't unbreakable after all.
This was a huge blow to them.
After a long while, Samuel finally spoke.
"Find out who destroyed that file!"
Jeremy quickly nodded.
"Don't worry, Mr. Crawford. We'll find out soon. There aren't many hackers with such advanced skills. We'll be able to narrow it down quickly."
"Get out!"
"Yes."
The two quickly left the room.
But when they reached the door, Jeremy received a phone call. His eyes suddenly lit up, and he hurried back into the room.
Seeing Jeremy return, Samuel's face was full of irritation.
"What else?"
"Mr. Crawford, good news. One of our people made a backup of the video, so the backup file is saved on a USB drive."
Samuel's expression softened considerably.
"At least one of your people has a brain."
Jeremy continued, "I'll keep investigating who breached our firewall, and I'll have them start restoring the video file again."
"This time, don't disappoint me again."
"Yes!"