third person's POV
"Of course it was Vanya. Since you two didn't have feelings for each other, there was no need to keep dragging it out. Now that Vanya had met someone better, and Alpha Cliff, you also liked someone else, you should learn to let each other go."
Aldrich's voice sounded a bit cautious, and his words trembled at the end.
The faint grassy pheromones around him got a bit messed up because he was nervous, and the wolf fur on the back of his neck stood up quietly—he could smell that sense of pressure on Cliff that was about to explode.
"Bang!"
The heavy wooden table shook hard with a slap, wood chips flying, and Cliff suddenly stood up.
The strong scent of cedar pheromones mixed with a sulfur-like anger suddenly exploded, and an invisible pressure hit Aldrich like a huge rock, making him hold his breath and his knees go weak.
Cliff's pupils narrowed into thin slits in his rage, shining with the cold light unique to the wolf clan.
There was faint silver-gray wolf fur rising at his knuckles, and his nails hardened and grew longer so fast you could see it, almost piercing his palm.
He stared at Aldrich, his face looking scary and grim: "A better person? The better person she met, was it Theodore?"
A low, questioning voice, wrapped in a suppressed wolf's howl, sent a tingling up Aldrich's neck glands, like he'd been stabbed with an ice pick.
Aldrich swallowed unconsciously, and the sound of his Adam's apple moving was especially clear in the dead silence.
He didn't dare to answer, just felt like Cliff's pressure was about to crush his bones. The wolf hair on the back of his neck stood up in fear, and even his breathing was shaky.
After all, Cliff now, with that violent look swirling in his slit pupils, was clearly showing: if he wanted to crush the Dalton family, it would just take a flick of his wolf claws.
Seeing Aldridge stay silent, Cliff already had his answer.
"Looks like it really was Theodore."
Theodore made a scene at the Dalton family twice for Vanya.
If there really wasn't anything between these two, Aldridge wouldn't have stayed quiet.
"Tell Vanya I didn't agree to end our relationship, so she should stop thinking about it!"
Cliff turned around and left the Dalton family.
Aldrich wiped his cold sweat and quickly contacted Vanya.
Over here, Vanya picked up the phone, her expression darkened. "Okay, I got it."
Grace asked sleepily, "Who called in the middle of the night?"
Vanya hung up the phone and said coldly, "Looks like the plan's moving up."
"Huh?"
The next afternoon, in the M Group office, Vanya stared at the badge collected on the night of the masquerade and asked, "All checked?"
Stuart answered, "Checked. We figured out who everyone at the party was that night."
"Good, organize these materials and casually let Cliff know."
"Yes, Vanya."
After Stuart went out, Grace asked doubtfully, "Aren't masquerade balls supposed to be anonymous? How did you know who the guests were?"
"This badge was basically an invitation. When I sent it to each family, I put a chip inside. For example, the one for Cliff had the name 'Cliff' recorded in the chip. After collecting them, I just uploaded the chip info to the computer, and then I could easily see who attended M Group's ball that night."
Vanya smiled and said, "Anyone who went to the ball was basically going against Cliff. Cliff couldn't stand betrayal—the day before, he told all the companies that supported the Todd family to go to the Todd family's dinner, and then the next day those companies showed up at M Group's ball. Do you think he'd let that slide?"
"So that's how it was." Grace suddenly understood.
"I wanted to see if those companies that got kicked out by the Todd family would come to me to show their loyalty."
That afternoon, Elliot rushed into Cliff's room: "Cliff, I got the results you asked me to check. Here's the list of all the companies that attended the M Group's ball that night!"
The file listed a long list of names, and a big part of them had just attended the Todd family's dinner the day before.
Cliff frowned. "End all cooperation with these companies."
Elliot was startled: "Cliff! If we call off everything, it'll make too much noise!"
Cliff looked grim. "I just wanted them to know, betraying me never ends well! If anyone else wanted to side with the M Group, they could forget about ever relying on the Todd family again."
The next day, Vanya went to the Thompson family for her internship as usual. Gossip started spreading inside the Thompson family.
"Did you hear? The Todd family ended contracts with a bunch of partner companies today!"
"Of course I heard about it, they said there were more than twenty!"
"Good thing our Thompson family didn't go to the M Group's ball, or we'd be in trouble too. Who in the business dared mess with the Todd family? I really didn't know what M Group was thinking."
"Yeah, a small business dared to go up against the Todd family just because they had a bit of smarts. Just wait and see, M Group definitely wouldn't last long!"
Suddenly, a voice rang out: "Vanya! Sabrina called you over!"
Vanya put down her phone.
Sabrina sat in the office waiting for her to come in. When she saw Vanya, her face wasn't exactly friendly.
"Calvert told you to follow up on his shoot, so you just helped out as an assistant nearby. You didn't need to do anything else for now."
Sabrina's tone wasn't very good, and that look in her eyes clearly meant she thought Vanya had pulled something behind her back.