Chapter 132: Trust the Process
Chapter 132: Trust the Process
The moment Debbie returned to her office, she immediately locked the door behind her. She didn’t even bother sitting down.
Instead, she walked straight into the private restroom attached to the office. Closing the door, she took a deep breath before pulling out her phone.
The leaked photos. One after another, she carefully examined every single one. She wasn’t looking at herself.
She was studying the background. The angle. The lighting. The reflections on the mirrors. Every tiny detail.
As one of the people who had actually worked in this office for years, she knew every corner of the room by heart.
If the photos had truly been taken here... Then the cameras had to be hidden somewhere.
Nearly half an hour passed. Several times she thought she had found nothing. But Debbie refused to give up.
Finally... Her eyes narrowed.
"There..."
Standing on top of the sink, she carefully reached toward a tiny ventilation opening.
Hidden inside was an almost invisible pinhole camera. If she hadn’t repeatedly compared the leaked photos with the room itself, she would never have noticed it.
Her heartbeat quickened.
"So it really was here..."
Instead of touching it, she quickly took several pictures from different angles. She continued searching. Behind the wall clock. Inside the smoke detector. Even beneath a decorative shelf.
One after another... More hidden cameras revealed themselves. Whoever had installed them had done an unbelievably professional job.
An ordinary person would never have discovered them.
After photographing every single device, Debbie immediately sent all twenty-two pictures to Lucas.
Message: "I found them."
At the university... Lucas was sitting through another painfully boring lecture. The professor continued explaining legal theories while most of the students struggled to stay awake. Buzz.
His phone vibrated. Seeing Debbie’s name, Lucas immediately opened the chat. Twenty-two images.
He frowned. For several seconds, he stared at them one by one.
"...What am I looking at?"
The pictures seemed completely ordinary. Walls. Smoke detectors. Air vents. A clock. Nothing stood out.
Just as he was about to ask, another message arrived.
Debbie: "These are the hidden cameras." Lucas’s expression instantly changed.
"So that’s how they did it..."
Without waiting for the lecture to finish, he gathered his things. The moment class ended, he left campus immediately.
Less than forty minutes later... Lucas arrived at the temporary office Chloe had rented opposite the law firm.
She had deliberately chosen this location so she could monitor the firm without attracting attention.
Lucas pushed open the door. Chloe was calmly reviewing documents as if she had expected him to come.
Without wasting time, Lucas placed his phone on the desk.
"I have them."
He showed her all twenty-two photographs before continuing.
"Debbie also told me Victor ordered her to stay for overtime tonight."
Lucas’s expression darkened.
"We both know what that ’overtime’ really means."
He looked directly at Chloe. "So what’s the plan?"
To his surprise... Chloe didn’t even flinch. She calmly placed the documents aside before looking at the pictures.
After a brief glance, she nodded.
"Good."
Lucas frowned. ...Good?"
She simply replied, "Everything is proceeding exactly as expected."
Lucas couldn’t understand.
"Victor is preparing to make his move."
"And you’re just sitting here?"
Chloe folded her arms calmly.
"I’m building the case."
Lucas couldn’t hide his frustration anymore.
"Building evidence?"
He took a step forward.
"Do you expect me to sit here until that bastard actually tries something?"
"Is that when you’ll finally decide there’s enough evidence?"
His voice grew colder with every word.
Chloe remained completely composed. She neither argued nor defended herself. Instead, she simply looked at Lucas.
Then, in her usual calm tone, she said,
"Trust the process."
Those three words only made Lucas even more irritated. He still couldn’t understand what kind of trap Chloe was setting... Or why she seemed so confident that Victor was already walking straight into it Fiona just did rubbish just pilling work for Debbie.
Seeing that Chloe had no intention of explaining herself, Lucas simply let out a helpless sigh.
"Fine."
"If you won’t talk..."
"I’ll wait."
Without asking for permission, he pulled out the chair beside Chloe and casually sat down. Then, to everyone’s surprise, he leaned back lazily, crossed one leg over the other, and rested both feet on the edge of Chloe’s desk. With one hand, he lightly pushed against the floor, causing the swivel chair to slowly rotate back and forth.
He looked completely relaxed, as if he were sitting in his own office.
Chloe glanced at him from the corner of her eye. For a brief second, silence filled the room.
Then she calmly lowered her gaze and continued organizing the thick stack of documents before her, as though Lucas’s outrageous behavior didn’t exist.
She didn’t say a single word.
Standing behind her, the bodyguards exchanged shocked looks. Every one of them wore the same expression.
Disbelief.
Was this young man completely unaware of who he was sitting beside?
This was Chloe Everhart.
The woman known throughout the country’s legal world as the undefeated queen of litigation. Countless CEOs, politicians, and billionaires treated her with the utmost respect. Even speaking too loudly in front of her made most people nervous.
Yet Lucas...
Had his feet on her desk.
He even continued spinning his chair leisurely while humming to himself.
Any ordinary client who dared behave this way would have been thrown out immediately.
Chloe had never tolerated even the slightest disrespect. She was famous for ending meetings on the spot if someone wasted her time or crossed the line.
And yet...
Today, she simply ignored it.
That alone stunned everyone present.
The bodyguards couldn’t understand.
The assistants couldn’t understand.
Even Chloe herself found Lucas strangely... different.
There was no flattery.
No nervousness.
No desire to impress her.
He treated her exactly the same way he treated everyone else.
It was the first time she had ever met someone like him.
Without realizing it, the corner of her lips curved upward ever so slightly before returning to normal. She silently continued reviewing the documents in front of her, leaving Lucas to lazily spin in the chair beside her.
Meanwhile...
Back at the law firm...
Debbie looked at the mountain of case files piled on her desk and quietly took a deep breath.
"So much..."
Victor clearly hadn’t been exaggerating. The workload was enough for several people.
One file after another, Debbie carefully reviewed contracts, organized legal documents, and prepared reports. Time passed quickly as she buried herself in work.
Outside the office windows, the afternoon sunlight gradually faded into evening. One by one, employees packed up their belongings and clocked out.
"See you tomorrow."
"Good night."
Soon, the once-busy office floor became quieter and quieter. The sound of keyboards slowly disappeared, and the lights in neighboring offices went out one after another.
Before long...
The entire floor was almost empty.
Only Debbie remained.
She continued working without complaint, though her attention wasn’t entirely on the documents. Every few minutes, her eyes would unconsciously drift toward the office door.
She wasn’t simply working overtime.
She was waiting.
Waiting for Victor to make the move Chloe had predicted.
Deep inside, her heart was beating faster with every passing minute.
She didn’t know exactly what would happen tonight...