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Chapter - 107

Karen, who could only hear the end of her sentence, was confused, "Rival?"

"Auhh... Let\'s leave that discussion for some other time," Margaret conveniently brushed off the topic, "What I am more intrigued about is the thing that got you startled. C\'mon, tell me what is troubling you?" Margaret asked as a smirk appeared on her face.

"Just some company stress. Nothing I haven\'t dealt with before," Shaking her head in denial, Karen replied. She wasn\'t just going to let it all out in front of Margaret from the get-go. They hardly knew each other by name, and more so, Karen felt a bit intimidated by Margaret. She felt Margaret was trying to pry into her.

"Yeah, Alex told me about it," Margaret said as she took a step closer to Karen, "But why do I feel that you are not being honest with me?" Margaret asked as she bent forward a bit, looking straight into Karen\'s eyes, "It\'s something to do with a man, isn\'t it?"

"I am married," Karen hurriedly tried to deny Margaret\'s claim and said.

"Can\'t your husband be that man?" The smirk on Margaret\'s face widened, "Or is there really someone else?" Margaret continued to weave a trap around Karen with her words.

"There is nothing of that sort," Karen averted her eyes from that of Margaret\'s.

"Margaret didn\'t say anything, but with her face still inches away from Karen\'s, she continued to stare at her.

"What? What is it? Is there something on my face? Karen asked as she put her finger just below Margaret\'s left shoulder and slowly pushed her away from herself. Karen found it odd. Margaret had done nothing, nothing to make her uncomfortable, but she could not breathe comfortably in her presence. She felt a sense of a tight leash around her neck, restricting her.

"Well, I am no one to pry into your personal affairs. From what I have seen so far, you are a good person, so I hope everything ends well for you in the end," Margaret said, while the smirk on her face was replaced by a genuine, sincere smile, "Then I will be leaving first," saying this, Margaret turned around to leave.

Just as Karen wanted to stop Margaret and ask what she meant by her words just now. Margaret turned back to look at her.

"And you wanna give your face some touch up before you leave," Margaret said as she pointed at her own face, "You look like someone who had just drowned herself in water after crying buckets," Margaret said, and without waiting for Karen to say anything else, walked out of the washroom.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Outside, Alex looked at his watch. It had been some time before Margaret left for the washroom. She should have been back by now.

Not wanting to wait any longer, Alex decided to look for her himself. But as soon as he stood up and looked around, he spotted her colleagues sitting just a few tables away from his. He hurriedly turned around and sat back on his chair, but the ladies who were already looking in his direction noticed him.

Before he could even think of slipping away, he received a message on his phone. It was from Hazel.

\'You better come pay your respects,\'

Left with no other choice in his hand. Alex, blaming his luck, made his way towards them with slow and heavy steps.

"What are you doing here?" Alex asked as he reached their table. He knew it was a stupid question, but what else he could ask for?

Ellaine, pointing toward the dishes asked, "What do you think?"

Alex looked at Ellaine and with a faint smile on his face, replied, "I haven\'t really missed your rhetorics," as he replied, he sat down on the empty chair left by Karen.

"Huh... why would you miss us? You are already busy with your so-called work," Ellaine didn\'t try to hide the sarcasm in her words.

"You know, I really liked you when you were sarcastic but not political. I don\'t know what you are trying to achieve, and I tried to let it slide for a while, but if you are going to keep it up, it\'s best we avoid holding a conversation with each other." Alex did not sugar coat his words one bit, leaving everyone on the table in awe.

Ellaine was left speechless for a while. With her eyes wide open, she looked at Alex in complete disbelief. Not just her but everyone had noticed the changes in him for the past few days and even talked about it in their free time, but this was another level. He was not rude, but neither was his usual polite self. He took a stand for himself, even if that meant going against Ellaine, or for that matter, anyone else.

"You know what..." Ellaine wanted to rebut Alex but was stopped by Jennifer.
Taking this chance, Hazel changed the topic, "So, are you here on your own?"

"No, I came here with..." Alex was about to tell that he came with Margaret, but he stopped himself in time as he remembered that embarrassing incident from a few days back, "A friend," Alex completed.

"A friend?" Hazel looked at him with her brow raised in disbelief.

"Yeah," Alex asserted, then he looked around the table, "Are you the only ones here or..." Alex stopped midway, but the ladies knew what he wanted to ask.

"No, Karen is also here. She just went to the..." Jennifer couldn\'t complete when she saw Karen walk out of the washroom, "There she is," Jennifer said, pointing towards Karen.

"Chief, look who is here to see us," Hazel said as soon as Karen was close enough to their table.

When Karen was close enough, Alex got up from the chair, offering it to Karen.

Giving her a slight nod, Alex was about to leave when Karen called out to him, "What are you doing here? Aren\'t you supposed to help out Daniel?" Despite not wanting to, Karen sounded a bit stern. Maybe it was in the effort to mask the uneasiness she had.

"I can\'t work all day. I need to give my body some juice to run on," Alex replied. He was not rude like the last time they came across each other. He even wanted to be a lot more polite, but the tone Karen set made it difficult for him to do so.

"Don\'t overwork yourself," Margaret said, realising the domineering nature of her tone, "It\'s the first trial anyway. Cases like these take a couple of more dates to come to a ruling." Margaret tried to share her experience with Alex.

Hearing her, Alex just nodded, "I should get..."

"Alex, what are you doing here? I have been looking all around for you?" Just as Alex was about to take his leave, Margaret, out of nowhere, walked up to them and entangled her arms around his.

Alex was visibly taken back by her gesture, "I... I... bumped into colleagues of mine. I was just chatting to them until you came." Alex said as he tried to get his arm out of her grip but Margaret, instead of letting it go, tightened her hold.

Following his gaze, Margaret looked across the table and excitedly introduced herself, "Hello, everyone. I remember meeting some of you at Alex\'s place. Let me introduce myself once again. I am Margaret, and I live next door to Alex."

The ladies heard Margaret, looked at her smiling face before turning their gaze to the interlinked arms of the two of them.

This was followed by a long awkward silence. Margaret looked at their faces expecting a certain response but none she got. It was finally Karen who brought an end to this silent scuffle between the two groups.

"I am Karen. Alex works under me at Theation," Karen introduced herself. It was only after Karen spoke did others broke out of their trance and introduced themselves one after the other.

"Why don\'t you guys join us?" Hazel extended the invitation to Alex and Margaret.

"Well..." Alex looked at Margaret, hesitant to decide on his own.

"We would love to, but we are already done with ours. You guys must be in hurry, don\'t mind us. We are already leaving," Margaret refused Hazel\'s invite politely. She was on her little date with Alex, and she didn\'t want anyone to butt in her little moment, "Let\'s go," Margaret turned to Alex and said.

"Aa... Sure," Alex was also keen to take his leave from there. He turned towards his colleagues, gave them a nod and soon, both Margaret and Alex walked out of the restaurant.

As they watched the two of them walk out of the restaurant, Hazel bent forward and whispered, "Did you see that? He just did whatever she asked of him, completely ignoring us," she whispered.

"Yeah, he was like a puppy following his master," someone commented.

"I am telling you. There is definitely something going on between them," Ellaine couldn\'t help but comment again.

"Will you stop repeating yourself like a stuck gramophone? We are seeing it," Hazel got angry at Ellaine to which the latter made faces.

*Shatter!

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