The Indifferent Ex-Husband Heartstrings in the Mall of Fate

Kent hustled to catch up, whipping out his phone to ring up Ben. “Hello, Mr. Evert, it's Kent. You caught up in something?”

Ben was busy doing a walkthrough of the mall with his team, Ivan tagging along.

Seeing Kent's call was a surprise. “What's up, Kent? Got tto buzztoday?”

When Ivan heard the n"Kent," he hesitated for a sec and glanced at Ben.

Ben was chit-chatting with Kent on the other end of the line.

Kent cut to the chase. “Here's the deal, | need a favor from Mr. Evert. Mr. Crawley and | are in Skyrim City, hanging out at your

Starry Mall, and we've run into a snag. We could use your help to check the security cams.”

Ben was even more surprised. “You and Mr. Crawley are at the Starry Group? Talk about good timing, I'm here too. Where you at?

I'll cfind you.”

Kent couldn't help but grin. “See? | told you we were fated to run into you.”

Adding on, he said. “We're on our way to the security room. If you've got a minute, why don’t you join us?”

“Sure thing, I'm on my way.”

After Ben hung up, he turned to Ivan and the rest. “Got an old buddy who's also at our mall, I'm gonna take a look. Y'all go ahead

and browse around.”

Ivan frowned and asked. “Brandon and Kent?”

“That's right.” Ben chuckled, “You should know them, right? You joined their company right when you started, didn’t you? Wanna

cand say hi?”

“What are they looking for?”

“Didn't say, just mentioned they needed to check out the security footage. Probably bumped into a pickpocket or something.”

Ben pointed downstairs, “Con, let's go say hi. | haven't formally introduced you guys yet.”

“Nah, I'm not tight with them.” Ivan declined, “I'll take a look around myself.”

“Cool.” Mr. Evert didn’t push it and turned to leave, but couldn't help turning back to remind him, “Just don’t wander off on your

own again. You keep talking about getting into architectural design, and while | can still handle it, you can mess around outside.

But when | can’t do it anymore, you'll have to take over the family business, so you better start getting to know our ventures.”

That was exactly why he dragged Ivan along on this Skyrim City business inspection.

Ivan’s face flashed with impatience. “Got it.”

With that, he walked away.

Ben was ticked off by Ivan’s brush-off attitude and was about to blow a fuse when his assistant swiftly changed the subject. “Mr.

Evert, Mr. Crawley is waiting downstairs.”

Ben shot his assistant a look, still slightly choked up with irritation.

Meanwhile, Ivan was already heading down the escalator without a backward glance, clearly not planning to stick around the mall,

already on his phone.

Ben's irritation rose again and he nearly went after Ivan, but the assistant managed to talk him down.

Ivan headed straight downstairs, ignoring Ben.

The call was from Don, asking him to check if Sophia was at home.

“Mr. Crawley said he couldn't get through to Sophia earlier. | was thinking of sending Cindy to check, but she’s tied up. Are you free

to check on her? I've got to entertain clients for dinner soon.”

Don on the other end sounded a bit apologetic, but he was worried since Sophia hadn't responded promptly about her health in

their work chat yesterday. Ivan had volunteered to check on Sophia.

Ivan frowned. “What's up with her?”

He had indeed planned to visit Sophia, but before he could set off, Sophia had messaged him privately after seeing the group chat,

saying she was fine and out and about. She asked him not to cand to tell Don she was okay if he asked.

So, he didn’t end up going.

Don said, “I'm just worried because | don’t know what's going on. She’s on sick leave and now unreachable. Can't help but be

concerned.”

“I'll give her a call and see.”

Ivan hung up and dialed Sophia's number.

Only two rings and the call was picked up.

“You alright?”

The moment the call connected, Ivan asked worriedly.

“I'm fine. What's up?”

Sophia sounded puzzled and a bit weak on the other end, as if her voice was coming through the receiver, yet also...

A flicker of confusion crossed lvan's eyes as he hesitated and turned around following the sound.

Sophia was walking out of the washroom corridor, one hand holding Theresa and the other on her phone, looking dazed and pale.

She looked up absentmindedly, her gaze inadvertently colliding with Ivan's.

Ivan kept silent.

His gaze slowly drifted from Sophia's face to the face of Theresa in her arms, then back to Sophia, and once again to Theresa.

Theresa, curious about her surroundings, noticed Ivan looking at her and puzzledly returned the gaze, her large eyes filled with

confusion.

Upstairs, Ben, who had finally caught his breath, was about to head to the elevator with his assistant.

The elevator lobby was crowded with people waiting.

Ivan glanced at Ben, and in a flash, it seemed like he got the picture.

He gave Sophia, still looking a bit pale, a glance, hung up the call without a word, and dialed another number.

Sophia looked at Ivan, only to see him gesturing "wait for me" before turning slightly away and calmly speaking into the phone.

“Leo, need you to doa solid.”

After a while, Ben and his assistant finally squeezed into the elevator.

When they reached the security room downstairs, Brandon and Kent were already waiting.

The door to the security room was shut tight.

With a stern face and expressionless, Brandon was not the picture of patience.

Ben approached them with a smile. “Mr. Crawley, Kent, sorry to keep you waiting.”

Kent smiled. “No worries, we just got here ourselves.”

Brandon wasn't one for beating around the bush. He spun around and looked straight at Ben, "Mr. Evert, could you crack the door

open for me? I've got a bit of an emergency here."

"Sure thing."

Seeing the urgency on Brandon's face, Ben didn't dare to dilly-dally and quickly shot his assistant a look.

The assistant stepped forward to knock on the door, but, to his surprise, no one answered despite his persistent knocking.

Ben's face turned sour. "What's going on here? Is there no one on duty in the security room over the weekend?"

"I'll give their manager a call to check."

As the assistant was speaking, he fished out his cellphone and started pounding on the door while making the call.

Just as the call connected, the door was yanked open from the inside.

A man in his thirties, yawning and looking irritated, shouted at the doorway, "What's with all the knocking? This ain't no shopping

mall, we're not open to customers."

While speaking, he also showed his disdain by digging out a pair of black earplugs from his ears.

Ben was steaming. "What kind of work ethic is that?"

Only then did the man seem to recognize who was standing before him, and his expression changed slightly. "Mr. Evert?"

Brandon ignored both him and Ben, shoving past the man into the security room and headed straight for the computer.

The computer wasn't running the surveillance software as it should have been but was instead playing smusic app, with the

sound of tunes faintly spilling out from the man's Bluetooth earphones.

The man went pale with embarrassment, took a step forward, and forcefully shut down the computer.

Ben was speechless.

He was so angry his face turned black. "What the heck do you think you're doing?"

The man, as if only just realizing his blunder, stuttered in explanation, "The computer kind of froze up, crashed."

Brandon gave him a look.

The man grew even more nervous.

Brandon didn't bother with him, leaned one hand on the computer desk, and pressed the power button on the tower.

After a brief moment of darkness, the computer booted up and quickly returned to the desktop, the large surveillance software

window right there.

Brandon clicked it open.

Ben saw the man's face drain of color "swoosh" and he looked totally flustered.

"Are you hiding something from the company?" Ben asked sternly.

"The... the surveillance." the man stuttered, not daring to say more, just looking palely at Brandon.

Brandon's handsface darkened.

The surveillance software was showing an offline status.

The latest video feed was from three days ago.

MMMWWLIIOAIfO&L

MMMWWLIIOAIfO&L

mmMwWLHIOfiflO&1

MMMWWLIIOAIfO&L

mmMyWL11I01F1081

mMMwWLIIOfiflO&1