The Day I Kissed An Older Man

Annie looked left and right to try and find Aaron, but he was nowhere to be seen. All she saw was her phone charging on the
bedside table. She took it and saw that the topmost unread message was from Aaron.
[I slept in the living room last night. I carried you into the room and didn’t do anything else. Don’t make any assumptions!]
Annie’s heart began beating faster. Her cheeks turned red, and she wondered to herself, ‘What is he trying to do? Gosh, I’m
getting all flustered by his message!’
When she scrolled down, she saw more than 99 unread messages that her boyfriend Marcus had sent to her. Annie was a little
embarrassed. Her feelings were all over the place the day before that she forgot to reply to Marcus’s messages!
When she clicked on Marcus’s chat, she noticed he had sent a flurry of messages asking her location, what she was doing, and
if she was asleep.
The most recent message had been sent in the morning. [Why are you ignoring me, Annie? Please reply if you see my
messages!]
Annie replied apologetically. [Sorry, I was so busy thinking about my aunt and uncle that I forgot to check my message!]
Marcus replied within seconds. [It’s fine! I was just worried about you. I’m glad you’re alright, though! Where are you now?]
Annie answered truthfully, [I’m still with my aunt! I’m fine, don’t worry!]
[Shall I pick you up at noon? Let’s have lunch together, just the two of us!]
For some reason, Annie hesitated before replying, [Umm... Okay! You don’t have to pick me up, though. I’ll go to you!]
[I’ll wait for you, then!]
After ending the conversation with Marcus, Annie got out of bed and went to the bathroom to wash up. When she walked out of
Aaron’s bedroom, she saw Corinne sitting alone at the dining room bar. She had her laptop open and was eating breakfast.
She walked over and said, “Au—I mean, Corinne! What are you doing?”
Corinne pointed to the computer and raised a finger to cover her lips, indicating for Annie to keep quiet.

Annie closed her mouth right away and carefully leaned over to look at the computer screen. She saw her unkempt appearance
in the mirror and hurriedly stepped aside.
Corinne turned out to be on a video call with someone else. There were a lot of people on the other end of the video, and it
appeared as though they were having a video conference. She did not know what was happening, but she did not dare to disturb
Corinne anymore. She gently took her coat and bag before heading out.
She planned to go home and change into a fresh set of clothes before meeting Marcus. After that, she would bring lunch to
Corinne.
Corinne noticed that Annie had left, but rather than turn around to look, she continued with the video conference until it ended.
Xante happened to call her just after she closed her laptop. She drank a sip of milk, then reached for her phone to answer the
call.
“Boss,” Xante began, “Holden Group has bought over the land at the south of the city. They’re planning to develop it into a large
shopping mall, and they want us to handle the project. What’s your opinion on this?”
Corinne took another sip of warm milk and narrowed her eyes. “It’s a good project. We can go ahead once the conditions are
agreed upon. Needless to say, we need to beware of any loopholes in the contract.”
“Understood,” Xante said. “I’ll bring a team of lawyers to discuss this with them.”
Corinne massaged the top of her nose bridge after the call ended. She was already exhausted even though she had just woken
up.
She could not help but feel that Jeremy had something to do with Holden Group’s eagerness to cooperate with Newmoon Group.
Anything that was out of the ordinary warranted much greater scrutiny. Should they refuse to cooperate, Holden Group would
have another project for them. Rather than refuse outright, it would be better to take things as they came and handle everything
one step at a time.
All of a sudden, the doorbell rang.