Chapter 696 - Treating Her Well
Treating Her Well
Yang Chen said helplessly, “I’ve been overthinking everything as well. Actually, it wasn’t a human that betrayed the company. It was the photocopy machine used to print documents in Wu Yue’s office.”
“Photocopy machine?” Lin Ruoxi frowned. “Did Wu Yue make extra copies? That’s impossible. I’ve already told you that I was there to personally monitor the process.”
Yang Chen explained, “I don’t fault you for not knowing this information. Most of the photocopy machines in the market nowadays have an internal hard disk. After every photocopy, there will be a large amount of data stored as a backup in the hard disk. For computer savvy people, all they have to do is to connect the hard disk to their computer, and then it only takes only about ten minutes to extract all the information.
“Situations where confidential data is leaked via the photocopy machine often appear in corporate espionage. That’s why many important departments place heavy emphasis on destroying and replacing the hard disk of their photocopy machines. Understand?”
A look of shock hung on Lin Ruoxi’s face. After all, she studied business, and so she was completely clueless about such technical knowledge.
After sorting out her thoughts, Lin Ruoxi said, “Even if he can extract all the information from the hard disk, the machine is in Wu Yue’s office. Wu Yue knocks off very late from work just like me. Plus no one has easy access to her office as well as mine. The office door is usually locked so…”
“Despite so many beauties in the company, Li Minghe didn’t pursue any of them when he came in. Instead, he went after Wu Yue relentlessly as though he was foolishly in love with her. It’s because he knew very well that he had to gain Wu Yue’s trust in order to not arouse her suspicion when doing things in her office. Perhaps he even made Wu Yue pass him her keys at times, lying to her that he needed to look up some information,” Yang Chen said with mixed feelings, “I can’t help but admire that fellow’s patience and calculations. Ever since he entered the company, everything he did was in preparation for this. Every step he has taken was calculated and planned to not leave a single shred of evidence tracing it back to him.”
Sadness flashed across Lin Ruoxi’s eyes. “Wu Yue, she… she’s genuinely in love with Li Minghe.”
Yang Chen glanced at Ruoxi silently. He recalled the scene when Lin Ruoxi asked him to keep the secret that Wu Yue was romantically involved with Li Minghe. Lin Ruoxi had never shown much concern in her words towards this sole female assistant that she had, and who was also her junior in school. But in her subconscious, perhaps she had hoped that Li Minghe was innocent and was truly in love with Wu Yue.
Yang Chen said flatly, “It can’t be helped. Do you know this? There was this one time I came to your office looking for you and happened to bump into Wu Yue bringing Li Minghe to your office to look for some documents. They even told me that you had gone out to Yucong Building to shop.”
Lin Ruoxi nodded. “I remember. You came to look for me that day.”
“I’ve only realized it now. Li Minghe went to your office to confirm which machine was used to photocopy. After confirming that there was no photocopy machine in your office, he was finally sure that all the information that he wanted was in the photocopy machine in Wu Yue’s office. Ever since the start, he had been executing his plans with sheer perfection.”
Lin Ruoxi shut her eyes, seeming a little sad about this outcome. After a while, she asked, “Then was Li Minghe also the one who poisoned me?”
“The coffee that you drink contains some chronic toxin. I won’t go through the details. If I’m not wrong, Li Minghe probably asked Wu Yue about your daily dosage of coffee and then mixed the poison into your coffee. He then replaced the coffee powder in Wu Yue’s office with the one he had mixed. He had specially calculated the dosage so that the poison would take effect only when he needed it to,” Yang Chen said gravely. “If I’m not wrong, he wanted to let you fall dead sick when Yu Lei is in its most critical period so that you won’t have any chance of retaliating.”
Lin Ruoxi bit her lip and asked with a gleam of hope, “That means, Wu Yue didn’t know about it, did she?”
Yang Chen nodded. “It seems so for now. However, regardless of whether she knew about it, I won’t allow her to stay by your side anymore. You must replace your assistant with someone we can trust. You must listen to me on this. There’s no room for discussion.”
“How can you do this? Even if I can’t use Wu Yue anymore, why should I listen to you on the candidate of my assistant?” Lin Ruoxi was unhappy and she was blaming him a little.
“No matter what you say, your assistant must be someone that I approve of. If it isn’t, I’ll throw them out the window of your office floor,” Yang Chen said with a solemn look, “Although we can break down the process behind this incident now, Li Minghe’s skills are superb in that even if we know how he did it, we don’t have any conclusive evidence. We can’t possibly pin him to the data being stolen from the hard disk. That’s why, after sending you back to the company later, I plan to get a lawyer to bail Mingyu out first. After all, now that we know of another more plausible method of committing the crime, it can clear most of Mingyu’s innocence.”
Lin Ruoxi pouted. “Understood. I’ll handle the matters in the company; you go ahead and save your Mingyu.” As she finished her words, she turned her head to look at the view outside and ignored Yang Chen.
Yang Chen rolled his eyes. It seems like this woman had indeed recovered greatly now that she could be so sarcastic again.
At the same time, in the vice president’s office of Yu Lei International, a secretary opened the door with a look of surprise as she said aloud, “Great news, Vice President Li.”
Li Minghe who was flipping through some forms frowned unhappily and said, “What are you being so agitated about? Don’t you know that the more chaotic the company is, the more we should remain calm?”
The secretary grinned brightly and said, “Yes, yes… It’s just that we received news that Boss Lin has already recovered. She will be back to attend the press conference. Everyone is very excited about it and so I came to tell you about it.”
A dark, puzzled look flashed across Li Minghe’s eyes, but he put on a cheerful grin on his face and said, “That is really good. Continue doing a great job. I’m going out for a while to meet a few important figures. We’ll need their assistance. If there’s anything urgent just report it to Manager Wang and the others.”
The secretary obeyed immediately and ran back to work happily.
Li Minghe clenched his teeth in anger. He reached for his jacket and put it on, grabbed a few of his belongings, and left his office, taking the lift down.
When he reached the parking lot, Li Minghe’s phone started ringing. He pulled it out to see the number and was irritated. But he still picked up the call and said as calmly as possible, “This better be urgent.”
“Pretending that you don’t know?” The person on the phone said with contempt, “Look at what a stupid job you’ve done. Didn’t you say that Lin Ruoxi will be sick for at least ten days to half a month and that she would develop cancer after that? Why is it that she’s already returning to the company after only a few hours’ time?”
“Please calm down. I have no idea why this happened too. But she had indeed fallen sick before this. Perhaps she got lucky this time. I—I’ve really tried my best,” Li Minghe said desperately.
“Hmph, on the account that the other plans are proceeding smoothly, I’ll forget about this matter. Even if Lin Ruoxi returns to Yu Lei International now, there’s nothing she can do to salvage the situation anyway. Yu Lei’s plans for the next half of the year are already completely exposed. Even if Lin Ruoxi is wealthy enough, all she can do is secure a few of their fixed assets. It won’t be easy for them to recover from this incident.”
“Yes, yes. You have a divine strategy. That’s why it was only a matter of time for you to ruin Lin Ruoxi,” Li Minghe hurriedly flattered the person on the phone.
The person sneered and said, “You don’t have to be like this either. You will get what is rightfully yours. Your cover might have already been blown now. Don’t go anywhere other than the place that I have arranged for you.”
Upon hearing these words, Li Minghe replied gratefully, “Thank you for your kindness. I’ll set off right now.”
He hung up the phone. An expression of excitement and viciousness appeared on his face simultaneously as he quickly walked towards his car.
Right at that moment, a pale, skinny figure in a black suit appeared at a short distance in front of Li Minghe and blocked his path.
Li Minghe braked in his steps, his eyes revealing a hint of complicated feelings. And then he said smilingly, “I see it’s Yue’er. Boss Lin is coming back soon. What are you doing here?”
Wu Yue’s eyes were red. Tears glimmered in her eyes as she looked at Li Minghe painfully. She forced a smile and mumbled, “Tell me… that it wasn’t you. It wasn’t you who did all these, was it?”
Li Minghe’s smile slowly faded away. He pondered briefly and let out a contemptuous smile. “Since you already know the answer, do you still need me to say it? Why? Are you going to stop me? Even if that Yang Chen manages to find out anything in the end, he has no evidence to prove it either. And what can you do to me?”
Wu Yue took a deep breath. She raised her head to stop her tears from rolling down. With trembling shoulders, she said, “I should have thought about it. Why would you fall in love with a woman like me? But I was delusional, thinking that you weren’t the kind of man who judged a person by their appearances. I figured that if I treated you well, you would definitely treat me sincerely too. That’s why no matter what you said to me, I chose to believe that you were innocent, that you had no ulterior motives.”
The corner of Li Minghe’s brows twitched a little. But he remained expressionless.
“Li Minghe…” Wu Yue’s eyes were completely red, and her thin neck was strained tightly. She said miserably, “Whether you were manipulated by some competitor of ours, or you did it out of your own will, I could’ve regarded everything that you’ve done to Yu Lei as a business competition. I could’ve found it in my heart to forgive you. Bu—but how can you make use of me to harm Boss Lin whom I respect the most?”
Li Minghe’s facial muscles twitched a little and he sneered, “Say whatever you want to say. Let me tell you, if it weren’t for greater plans in the future, I would have grabbed a knife and stabbed Lin Ruoxi to death. I’m already treating her very well by letting her die of a chronic toxin.”