?Chapter 306:


    Pattie, who had been quietly observing, sensed something was off. The two seemed familiar yet distant. What exactly was their rtionship?


    Her curiosity bubbled over, and she couldn’t resist any longer. She nced at them through the rearview mirror and, unable to contain herself, asked, “Do you two know each other?”


    Both Rnd and Maia fell silent at the same time, an awkward tension thickening the air between them. Sensing the shift, Pattie tilted her head and asked, “How did you two meet?”


    Maia opened her mouth, hesitating. “You know Elvira? He’s Elvira’s—”


    Before she could finish, Rnd smoothly interjected, “A friend of Elvira’s.”


    Maia shot him a fleeting nce but said nothing to correct him. The brief look, however, spoke volumes.


    Pattie hesitated, her eyes narrowing slightly. “Huh…”


    The atmosphere between them felt oddly strained, as if an invisible wall had risen in the space they shared. If they were not close, why would Rnd have traveled so far to handle such a minor case? Zenith Legal had a wealth of brilliantwyers stationed right here in Wront. Yet, if they were close, why did they sit apart, as though they were strangers, cloaked in this heavy silence?


    To break the tension, Pattie cleared her throat and forced a bright smile. “Anyway, Maia, it’s a good thing Mr. Cullen came today. Otherwise, you would have been in real trouble.”


    She turned her gaze between the two of them, her voice lightening with enthusiasm. “Since Mr. Cullen traveled all the way from Drakmire, we should really give him a proper wee. How about dinner tonight? My treat.”


    Maia responded almost too quickly. “Mr. Cullen is incredibly busy. He doesn’t have time to—”


    Her words stumbled to a halt as her phone vibrated sharply in her hand. Startled, she nced down. A new message from Chris blinked on the screen: “I am free to cook tonight. Want toe home for dinner?”


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    For a heartbeat, Maia froze. Her fingers instinctively tightened around the device, her nails pressing into the ss.


    Before she could gather herself, Rnd’s voice cut in, unhurried and steady. “I happen to be free tonight. I would be d to ept your invitation.”


    Maia turned toward him, her surprise masked only by the flicker of emotion that shed across her eyes. Without a second thought, she typed a cold, clipped reply to Chris: “Noting.”


    She turned off her phone and gazed out the window, her expression distant and indifferent.


    Rnd, meanwhile, studied her quietly. The side of her face, framed by the window’s pale light, was a portrait of aloof elegance — that same unapproachable air she always carried with her.


    How could someone like her have ever married?


    He remembered the message shing across her screen just moments earlier. His jaw tensed almost imperceptibly.


    Was the sender… her husband? The thought lingered, dark and unsettling.


    At nine o’clock sharp, Pattie and Maia hosted a small dinner for Rnd. The meal had barely ended when Pattie pped her hands together with glee and dered, “We cannot let the night end here! Wront’s nightlife is the best in the country. You would be missing out if you didn’t experience it firsthand!”


    Maia inwardly doubted that someone like Rnd would agree to such a frivolous suggestion. To her astonishment, he simply smiled, neither stiff nor reluctant, and nodded his assent.


    Thus, the three of them soon found themselves stepping into Wront’s crown jewel of nightlife — the Nightingale Ballroom.


    As the velvet-red doors swung open, a wave of pulsating music and shing lights swallowed them whole. The outside world vanished behind them.


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