How can such a big mafia be so clueless about what's happening around them? Ugh, I was so irritated by how dumb he was behaving.

As the elevator signaled we reached our destination, I walked out of it, leaving him where he was. Walking straight to the conference hall, I unlocked the door and saw My Angelwings waving at me.

"You are here," Agnes announced as she got up from her seat. I nodded and saw Aria walking toward me with a bunch of papers. Knowing pretty well what were the papers for, I signaled her to halt and said, "I have a serious headache. Will you please bring strong black coffee for me?"

"Yes mam," Aria said as she noticed the change in my voice.

"I bet she played too much with the kids. Just look at the paint all over her face." Vikrant mocked me, and I threw a paperweight at him.

"She was painting barricades around the pond in the orphanage." I turned my head towards the voice. There was a pin drop silence. Vikrant knew about his past, but others did not. I saw Zearo walking toward me with a smile on his face. He slowly snaked his arms around my waist, sending shivers all over my body, like always. I looked at his side profile and he had a small smirk on his face as the corner of his lips twitched.

"Ah, I guess she forgot to introduce me." He then turned his head towards me and smiled. Pulling me a little more towards him, he waved at the Anglewing again. His manly scent engulfed me.

"Uh, Liara?" Agnes whispered, and I looked at her and then at Zearo. Realizing that they didn't even have an idea about my marriage, I thought of slamming my head into a wall.

"Guys, meet Zearo." I halted as I saw I had finally captured their attention. They stopped staring at him and looked at me.

"My husband," I said and exhaled as if I just put a bomb in my office myself.

"What!" "The hell!" And a series of curses I heard but was so thankful to Vikrant as he made his way towards Zearo and introduced himself so sweetly. "Congratulations man! I'm Vikrant." Of course, they both met before but pretending that they did not was the only thing that gave me a little peace.

One by one, everyone came and congratulated us. They had a disappointing expression on their face and they should be angry at me.

"Well, this was such shocking news," Aliyah confessed, and everyone nodded. I looked at Shan Li and he had a blank expression on his face. He didn't even bother looking at me.

"When did you get married?" Chloe asked as she put her hands on her hips, glaring at me angrily.

"Come on, guys, look at the dashing couple here. You can be angry all you want, but let the man be comfortable around us first." Aliyah suggested, and I couldn't thank her enough, as she was of great help. Shan Li walked towards the conference table and sat at his place, not bothering for us to even talk.

I felt a little pull on my waist and I turned my attention toward Zearo. "What's wrong with you? Why pinch me?" I whisper yelled at him, moving a little closer to his ears.

"You should have informed me we were going to meet one of your close friends." He said as he looked at Shan Li. I sighed and loosened his grip on my waist.

"You will be good to every single one of them. Especially Shan Li." I warned him. I had a smile on my face but my tone was authoritative, making him realize how important they were to me.

"Let's sit," I said, pointing at the center. Slowly the girls gathered up, waiting for us to describe the story which I bet I wasn't in the mood for after seeing how upset Shan Li was. He did not even greet me.

"I know you girls have so many questions, but can we skip that part already?" Vikrant suggested gesturing to the girls to not bring anything up. I looked at the girls and they smiled.

"Whatever was the reason, I just want to say that you will not escape from the punishment of not telling us this before." Chloe stood and walked toward us. I raised my eyebrows and questioned, "What's that?"

Zearo remained silent, but his hands were on my thigh, making me uncomfortable. I slowly shifted, but he gripped it. I felt a hard glare on me and saw Shan Li watching my every move. "Not today," I murmured and Zearo knew I wasn't in the mood to be pissed.

"Here's my wedding invitation. You both are going to come as an apology to conceal your marriage from us." Chloe said, handing me a beautiful card.

"Chloe, I said I can't come before," I spoke gently.

"I've talked to Aria already. She informed me about your schedule and you pretty much will not be there in the office those two days." Chloe said, flipping her hair. I looked at Aria, who scurried behind Vikrant.

"Don't kill the pretty girl with your glare," Vikrant commented, and I rolled my eyes.

"We'd love to attend your wedding." I heard Zearo beside me. He bent a little forward and flipped the pages of the card. I stared at his side profile as his black shirt barely fit his shoulder, showing his bulging muscles. His gray pants tightly fit him. My eyes slowly made my way towards his face and saw him looking at me with an amused expression.

I shook my head and stood up as Aria brought my coffee. "I'll come," I said and Chloe rushed towards me to hug me and stopped as she saw me holding the coffee mug.

I sipped the coffee and let them talk to each other. Slowly I saw Zearo getting to know my ladies as Aliyah, Agnes and Chloe laughed at every stupid joke he said. I felt like vomiting.

"Me too." I heard Shan Li's voice as he stood beside me. It surprised me, as he finally talked to me. "What?" I asked.

"I too feel like vomiting." He said, shoving his hands in his pocket and nodding towards Zearo and the girls.

"The girls are enjoying themselves." I pointed out.

"Because he is charming." He replied and my head whipped in his direction. "Don't tell me-" I started, but he held his hands on my face and shook his head. "Hell no, I'm pretty much into girls." And we both started laughing. I felt like smiling openly after months. Constant battle made me so tough that I forgot how to express myself and openly smile.

"What made you laugh like that?" Vikrant walked toward us and Shan Li moved a little away. I could never understand why he'd do that.

"Just our thing." Shan Li teased him as he got jealous of our friendship.

"You must know that I know some things that you don't." Vikrant winked at Shan Li and then pointed at me.

"You!" He said, and I raised my eyebrows.

"Are you the owner of Shimmers club." He said louder than he could ever. I closed my ears as his voice pained my ears.

"No way!" I heard a faint voice behind me. Turning towards the sound, I saw Aliyah looking at me as if she'd seen a ghost.

"The club is just next to this building?" She asked, and I nodded. I saw everyone holding their laughter and Zearo staring at them cluelessly.

"When? How? Why didn't you tell me about it!" Aliyah bombarded me with questions and dashed towards me, hugging me tighter.

"What is the matter?" I asked, patting her back.

"They found the former owner as one of the suspects for drug dealing. I was going to inform you that Shimmers have an underground path where they hide children." Aliyah said breathlessly.

"What?" I heard another voice looping over my mind. I felt a gust of wind moving past me as if someone just touched my shoulder.

"How sure are you about the information?" Zearo asked Aliyah. She looked at me and then at his behavior.

"He works as a DJ over there," I informed and heard a few gasps. Not bothering to focus on their surprised faces, I tried to focus on the matter at hand.

"If he works over there, he should have known about it." Shan Li walked towards Zearo accusingly.

"What are you implying?" I saw Zearo taking a step further toward Shan Li. I stared at Zearo, confused if he was into that stuff? Or was he helping Julie do those stuff? So many questions, but I couldn't ask him directly in front of my friends.

"He was just pointing out stuff. It's obvious that as you worked in that club, you might have found some sort of clues or something like that." Vikrant butted in. I folded my hands on my chest and contemplated their actions. Zearo had a panicked and confused expression, which led me to conclude that he might not have any inkling about it.

"I joined a few months back. Did not know about this stuff." He said, bringing his fingers through his hair like he always does when he gets frustrated.

"You might have found something suspicious," Aliyah asked. Everyone in the room was very aware of how important saving the kids was for us. We worked hard for years and helped a lot of children from the hell they faced. Aliyah had to be constantly in search of something suspicious, and she always had solid proof.

"No, I minded my business. I never thought of passing the backdoor of the club for whatever reason." He admitted, and I felt he didn't lie.

"I need to go somewhere. I'm so sorry, but I have to take my leave." He hastily made his way out of my building. Perhaps I knew the reason behind his sudden departure.

"What happened to him?" Agnes asked and Shan Li walked towards me and said, "you look like you know where he was headed." I looked at him tight-lipped as I had the answer, but didn't want to share it with them.

"How'd I know?" I said and walked away from their prying eyes. Walking towards my chair, I clicked the pen and asked Aliyah, "I need every detail about it. Before we start the club, I need this fucking shit cleared." Having a negative remark just before you began a business was a bad omen. I had an eye for this club long ago and when I finally had it in my fist, it felt like it was slipping away from my hands.

"I've been finding more clues that led me to the son of the former owner. Logan Johns had few contacts with the underworld team of America who dealt with this stuff. He had been MIA for too long. So now all the more reason to believe that his sister Julie Johns had been monitoring it with him." Aria read out the reports. I tightened my grip on the pen as Julie always behaved as if she was the purest human but had been trafficking behind everyone's back.

"What do we do now?" I asked. I was not in the mood to inform them she was my husband's girlfriend. If she was involved in this, then who was I to stop the doom from falling on her?

"As per the contract, we became the owners yesterday. If we willfully hand over the club, the government will seize it and it will be our loss." Financial expert Shan Li commented.

"How about we take care of those things?" Agnes hopped in, always excited to jump on the wagon.

"We've been helping the chief in so many ways. He might be of some help. We need to contact him." Vikrant suggested. We had our reform running after the Chief of police of Newyork suggested we do something as we had the resources. He had been of great help to my business as well. We helped him find the druggist and the traffickers. He made sure we stayed away from the police records.

"The Shimmers had the highest revenue as per our records." Shan Li said, flipping through the reports.

"I have no interest in shutting that business. If he's of no help, I'd prefer to contact the boss of that group and solve the issue myself." I said as I stared at the setting sun. Every day brings new challenges, and I just hoped that holding onto the club wouldn't be my loss.

**†****†*****†******†****

❤Vote, Comment, and Share❤