She Left She Thrived She’s Worth Billions novel Chapter 227

Riley?

***

Meanwhile, at Stellaris PharmaTech.

Gabriel burst into Preston’s office.

“Preston!”

Preston quickly turned off his phone screen.

Just before it went dark, it had been displaying a video of Melanie at the quiz competition.

“Preston, Ms. Royce won!”

Gabriel’s voice cracked with excitement.

“How is she so amazing! I couldn't even make sense of those questions, they looked like an alien language, but her solutions were… both complex and simple.”

As the words left his mouth, Gabriel felt like his praise was also starting to sound like an alien language.

“At first, when you didn't want to watch the live stream with me, I thought maybe you had pulled some strings to make sure Ms. Royce would win.”

“But then I thought that would be too disrespectful to Ms. Royce, and you wouldn't do that… I never expected that someone who hasn't been in pharmaceuticals for long could just wipe the floor with her opponent like that…”

Gabriel spoke with animated excitement, but noticed Preston remained perfectly calm, not even raising an eyebrow.

He sensed something was off.

“Wait a minute, Preston… Don’t tell me you secretly watched Ms. Royce’s competition by yourself, behind my back?”

Preston rubbed the fingers of his white silk gloves together lightly, neither confirming nor denying it.

He truly hadn’t intended to watch.

He was certain Melanie would win.

He remembered the night before the competition, seeing Melanie sitting on the sofa, so focused and calm as she wrote, completely unaware when he brought her a lychee-flavored soda.

The bright look in Melanie’s eyes at that moment told Preston—

Melanie was not the prey.

She was the hunter.

It wasn't that she was being targeted.

It was that she had already set the trap, waiting for her opponent to walk right into it.

So, Preston wasn’t the least bit worried about the quiz competition.

Not watching was also a way to show his trust in Melanie.

However…

He couldn’t resist. He had watched.

Because he wanted to see Melanie.

Melanie's every move, every smile, captivated his heart.

“Melanie!”

Before Dominic could finish, a loud shout came from the end of the hallway.

Hazel strode over to Melanie and shot Dominic a disdainful glance.

“Mr. Hale, I need to speak with Melanie alone.”

Dominic knew Hazel disliked him, so he reluctantly left.

As he walked away, he kept looking back at Melanie.

Once Dominic was gone, Hazel couldn’t help but mutter to Melanie, “He’s not good enough for you. You should just divorce him sooner rather than later.”

“What?”

Melanie pretended she hadn’t heard.

“Nothing.”

Hazel shook her head and got down to business.

“It’s a good thing you came to our institute for the competition. Otherwise, I would have had to hunt you down at The Hale Health Center!”

With that, Hazel handed a file to Melanie.

“I recently heard that the National Biological Data Center is planning to launch a ‘FutureVital Seed Program.’ Essentially, it’s about building a specialized genetic profile database for children.”

“Stellaris PharmaTech has already signed on to handle the high-throughput gene sequencing and raw data processing. The center is also looking for a partner to manage the advanced bioinformatics analysis and health model construction. Are you interested?”