Phoenix Sterling
"Who?" Angelo asked as he gave me a glass of white wine for us to enjoy. I put my phone on the table and sighed.
"Lana Castroff." I answered as I swirled my glass of wine.
"You filed a lawsuit on her company?" He asked me in a curious tone and I nodded.
"You know what happened so I have to take actions." I said and took a sip of the white wine. "I wonder why didn't you just expose her to the public. You don't seem nice to her."
"She's the one who called Julie a commoner. I guess she just always hates them." I said and Angelo chuckled.
"I don't get it either why you're so nice to Julie. I didn't like her when I first laid my eyes on her." I raised my eyebrows looking at him.
"At least you're not being rude to her."
"I never thought Castroff Beauty products will have this incident because they're one of the top brands out there for beauty. Somehow it's hard to believe that they have something going on in their products." Angelo said and I glared at him.
"They do have one of the best brands, that's why I bought it but it turns out like this." I hissed.
"Hello dicks." I turned to see Adrian walking into the room and he sat down on the sofa beside me. Sometimes I really doubt that this man is a Prince of Denmark. The youngest of all of them too. He's the immature one and will always troll around.
"Chance and Dean are out of town and I'm bored." He said as he grabbed a new glass of wine on the table pouring himself some.
"How's the airlines going?" I asked him and he gave me a thumbs up.
"It was doing okay. We just need to buy more airplanes to expand the business." He said as he sipped his wine.
"But I thought you already bought 13 airplanes last month." Angelo asked and he shooked his head.
"I need a bigger airplane for international flights." He said as he put his glass on the table.
"Interesting." Angelo said, chuckling.
"How about you? Suing Castroff?" Adrian smirked looking at me.
"Yeah, you know why." I said simply and Adrian gave me a cheeky look. We all know that he's up for something with that look.
"Lana Castroff is something and she's the type of woman that I will date or maybe have fun with. She's hot." He smirked looking at me and I shook my head. Adrian is a playboy, just like his brother Carter back in the days before he settled down.
"She mocked Julie, a commoner." Angelo said and Adrian laughed.
"That's hot." Adrian said and I shook my head disapprovingly. Adrian suddenly leaned his body forward to me.
"If you don't want to go after Lana, I'll be.. happy to have her." Adrian said and I raised my eyebrows.
"Why do you ask me? I don't like her so feel free to.. have her." I said and sipped my white wine.
"She's your type, Phoenix. I'm quite surprise that you haven't make a move on her yet but I guess it's my time to shine!" Adrian smirked and laid back to the sofa again.
After that, I went back to the office to continue to work. I have a lot of things to do and I have to go to Spain next week for an important meeting. I guess tomorrow, I'll be seeing Lana again for her to investigate what's wrong with her products.
The next day..
I got out from my car and found Lana already standing there in front of the hospital entrance with her team. I told my secretary to showed her team in. I walked towards her and she gave me a polite smile.
"Mr. Sterling."
"Ms. Castroff." I gave her a nod. My secretary led her team into the hospital and we both were left alone.
"Today, we took all the products that might have an unidentified ingredients so people won't get hurt." She said and I was quite surprised to see her pretty professional despite our encounter yesterday.
"I want to personally apologize to you." She said as her eyes met mine. Another surprise of her apologizing, I thought she won't apologize judging by her attitude on Julie.
"My team met your lawyers earlier this morning and I was hoping if you could give us time to investigate a little bit more."
"Very well, I will give you time to investigate and you know that I'm not dropping the lawsuit. I will never." I said seriously especially on my last sentence.
"I understand completely. Our company should have been more careful and we will discuss about the settlement sooner after we investigate further." She said without taking her beautiful blue ocean eyes off me. She was very professional and I really like her work ethic.
"For what I know, it contains hydrochloric acid." I stated and her eyes widened.
"Acid? That's impossible!" She gasped and I can see that she didn't see this coming at all.
"Why would it contain that? Shit!" She immediately walked into the hospital. "Take me to your employees, please." She turned to me and I nodded before leading her towards my 7 employees that's currently hospitalized.
She walked into the first room and she gasped seeing the burn on my employee's hand. Lana introduced herself to her and she immediately apologized. She didn't even think twice to apologize and she even told my employee that she will take care of all of her hospital bills and she will give her money for the damage.
And again.. I was surprised.
She ended up saying the same thing to the other 6 employees. She felt so bad and never stop apologizing to the victim of her products. As soon as she's done apologizing to every single victims, she called someone and asked them to check on the dangerous chemical on her products that she pulled back to her factory.
She walked back and forth in her highheels and not to mention that she was wearing a blazer dress that made her look really professional. She has her hair on a ponytail making her look neat and intimidating. Her red lipstick was like a statement to people that you shouldn't mess with her.
After she finished her phone call, she walked towards me. "We're currently investigating if there's a possibility of acid being inserted in our products and I want to apologize one more time for all the damages. We will contact you further more for the settlement." She said with her eyes looking straight to mine.
"Very well."
"I will pay all the hospital bills and give them more money for the damages that they got. I promise you that this-" She stopped when we both clearly can hear her stomach grumbling.
"I.. I promise you that this won't happen again in the future." She continued as she avoided my eyes completely embarrass.
"I'm assuming you haven't eat lunch, wanna have lunch together?" I asked and she turned to me blinking her eyes multiple times like I was possessed.
"Sure."
Phoenix SterlingWe ended up picking a seafood boil restaurant for our lunch. We ordered to servings of mix seafood boil. I saw her rolling her sleeves up and then she even clipped her hair into a bun to prevent her long hair from going near her mouth.I found her adorable by doing all of these.When we first met, she gave this badass attitude and even mocked Julie for being a commoner. I judged her badly because of how rude she was when we first met months ago. Our second meeting, she was pretty cold and not friendly. But our third meeting was rather interesting. She showed me how professional she is, not to mention that she's pretty responsible for all my employees.Now, she's acting all adorable and calm. Pretty different from our first encounter.
Lana CastroffAfter more than a week investigating all the products, we found no acid on every single product that we launched that day. It was weird for us to see. We did get the medical records of Phoenix's employees for it and they really contains acid inside that product.I was more than confuse at this point. I even asked my team to check it again but the result was the same.I walked to Phoenix's office building and his secretary led me his office. I brought the files with me and I saw him having all his lawyers ready. I guess I should have brought my lawyers but let's just see.I walked in and Phoenix turned to me. He gestured me to sit on the sofa beside him. I took a deep breath and walked towards him. I met his lawyers already and they greeted me politely
Phoenix SterlingI really hate it when my parents tried to set me up with the woman of their choice. I don't understand why they really want me to settle down as soon as possible when I'm only 26 years old. I'm the youngest out of the Illicit and why am I supposed to be the first one to settle down.I don't want to settle down.After I asked my chauffeur to send Lorena back to the hotel, I decided to have a word with my mother."You know now that I have a girlfriend so could you please stop trying to set me up with Lorena?" I asked her and she drank her tea slowly."Mother, I really like Lana and you can't treat her coldly like what you did in my office. She's my girlfriend so you shouldn't act like that."
Lana CastroffI walked into Phoenix's office with his secretary and she asked me if I want tea or coffee. I told her the water will be just fine and she told me to wait for Phoenix for about 5 minutes because he's still in a meeting. I sat down on the sofa and laid back for a second.I'm really tired of dealing with all of this alone. When will my father comeback because I'm ready to kill him for leaving me in the middle of something like this.I bet he's with her again.The door opened and Phoenix entered the room with his secretary. His secretary gave me a bottle of cold water and Phoenix asked her to leave us both alone."Ms. Castroff.. I have a proposition for you." I raised my eyebrows when he said that.
Phoenix Sterling"But on one condition.." She said as she took a step back and sat down on the sofa."What?""Let me stay in your house but with seperate rooms." I raised my eyebrows completely amused by her condition."That's easy, I will gladly grant your wish.""You want to pleased your parents and I want to pissed off mine. I hope you can cooperate with me when it comes to that." That made me wonder if she hates her parents."No one can know that we're married and don't even wear the wedding rings on a daily basis except when we're meeting our families." She said and I nodded."That's easy for sure. Anything else?"
Lana CastroffI brought the last box into Phoenix's penthouse and put it in my bedroom. I looked at all the boxes and stretched my arms out because it's been a tiring day moving in from my house to his penthouse.Phoenix's penthouse has two floors and he even has a private pool on the second floor which is amazing. I can't believe he's living alone in this penthouse and manages not to feel lonely most of the time.I agreed to get married to him because I want to pissed of my father. I bet one though percent on it that he will be mad at me. I'm tired of him having an affair with my own mother who already got married with her commoner boyfriend.My father must be somewhere in Europe with my mother and his secretary just informed me that he will be back by the time I'
Phoenix SterlingWe purposely came kinda late to Maldives because we don't want to deal with people before the party. We arrived about 2 hours before the wedding and we both were busy preparing ourselves for it."Ready?" I was fixing my tie when she came out from the bathroom looking so beautiful in her cream cocktail dress. She smiled at me and turned her body around."What do you think?" She asked."You look beautiful." I said because she did take my breath away. She grabbed her small clutch and she pointed at the door. "Let's go?""Yeah." I said and I checked myself one more time at the mirror before going out. I turned to her and asked her to link her arms to mine. She linked her arm and we walked to the venue together.
Lana CastroffI might not looked that nervous but I was dying inside. I was dying because of his touch, his kisses and the way he always pulled my body to his. My brain stopped functioning from time to time.I looked at myself at the mirror and looked down to see the wedding ring. Phoenix asked me to wear it tonight for the after party, he's going to go for it. He already told his parents and they were excited. They demanded a big wedding and I really hate the idea when we're not even real.I slipped the ring into my ring finger and looked at the mirror again. I walked out from the bathroom and tried to look for Phoenix."Phoenix." I called him."Yeah?" I heard him coming in from outside.