My Second Marriage with the Mafia Kingpin novel Chapter 296

Chapter 296: Has A Nice Ring To It

For those who weren’t part of the underground world, they would be surprised by just how self-sufficient it was—and just how many professionals existed within it... all for money.

Dominion, the White Serpent Brotherhood, and the Di Carpios... these were only the bigger names in the underground world for different reasons. Many other organizations and groups operated on a large scale.

There were, however, many independent individuals within it.

Like Omen and Ghost, who had their own reputations, especially in intel gathering, system hacking, and cyber breaches.

But they weren’t the only ones in demand.

There were also independent professionals: lawyers, doctors, engineers, and many others who were heavily involved in underworld operations.

This quack doctor — Omen was talking about — was someone Ashley knew by name.

Well, she had seen him before, though he had never known who she was. Still, she knew this quack doctor was actually good... despite never obtaining a medical license.

[For some reason, he said it’s easier to make the patient go to this place than look for a transplant.]

Ashley frowned as she responded.

"Of course it’s easier. But is it more effective?"

[...I didn’t think of that.]

"Stupid." She clicked her tongue, but if the quack recommended it, that meant he had likely looked into it.

Ignoring Omen’s chat box, she studied the site and particularly that vain Raka, who was apparently the face of the research.

"The hell?" she muttered. "I think Julius mentioned he was working on some crazy research. I didn’t think it was this crazy."

Out of pure curiosity, Ashley tried gathering every bit of information she could about the drug.

As she did, she suddenly paused and remembered something.

Shifting her focus to the research funded by Lucian, her mouth nearly dropped open.

"He also funded this... very recently," she muttered. "But wasn’t that supposed to be compensation?"

As far as she remembered, Lucian casually mentioned compensating Raka because he had forgotten about his "obligations" regarding insurance for the car dent. It had annoyed her at the time because she thought Raka wasn’t even worth a cent.

But perhaps Lucian had been more or less interested in what Raka was doing.

"Huh," she huffed and searched for every article she could find about Raka’s research.

There were quite a handful of them, including press conference interviews Raka himself had hosted in the past. However, many people ignored him. If anything, online threads mostly found him amusing enough to mock.

"So, because of the lack of funding, the drug kept getting delayed?" she muttered, her brows knitting together. "And before Lucian funded them, this research was on the verge of shutting down completely."

Ashley leaned back, deep in thought.

"For some reason, the High Chamber’s first move was finding Lucian a match," she muttered. "As if they wanted this transplant to happen."

Her eyes narrowed. "Why?"

There were only two possibilities.

Either they were supplying the hospital with forged compatibility records, and the operation would kill Lucian...

Or they genuinely wanted Lucian to recover.

She highly doubted the latter.

That was why Gustav had so easily decided to delay the transplant if the High Chamber was involved. They would never make a move unless it benefited them somehow.

Their reason for it was still something she had yet to find out.

Ashley moved her attention back to the chat log.

[Ghost: Connect me to Quack. Tell him I expect him to contact me as soon as possible. Don’t make me come to him.]

Omen didn’t respond, but she could already tell he was cursing her from the bottom of his heart.

Because now the quack would probably be cursing him too for dragging him into this.

She didn’t dwell on it any longer.

"Why would that quack recommend a research facility when Omen already showed him Lucian’s latest test results?" she muttered. "The quack I know would at least take something this serious seriously."

"Didn’t he see that it’s already end-stage?"

For one foolish second, Ashley’s heart fluttered as a thought crossed her mind:

What if there was nothing wrong with Lucian?

But it only lasted for a foolish second.

"No, no, Ash." She shook her head and breathed out heavily. "Let’s be realistic for now. Every doctor who has seen his results has only said one or two things."

And that was—

Lucian was dying.

She couldn’t afford to cling to a ridiculous idea just because of a quack doctor whose actions hadn’t directly implied anything beyond the assumptions she was making.

Yet the mere thought of it had already planted hope in her heart.

So Ashley shifted her focus back to Raka’s revived research.

"I hate him..." she whispered. "But if he and his drug can give me some hope..."

Ashley bit her lip as she read further.

She thought she should be losing her mind.

This so-called miracle drug.

Instinct.

Concert With Primo

DING!

VERIFYCAPTCHA_LABELVerify