Never Judge

"At home, what's wrong Ian?" Camilla responded as she closed the door behind her. 

The past few days had been hectic, it wasn't easy living a double life. Just yesterday Lucius had invited her to dinner just to parade her in front of Guan Ming. 

It seemed that Lucius Ting, despite not knowing that she and Guan Ming were in love, thought that it was best to show Guan Ming what Lucius had that the Chinese businessman didn't.

She was happy when Guan Ming and Lucius Ting decided to call it a night. It was exhausting to pretend that she didn't care about the man in front of her.

Camilla knew that it was crazy to keep waiting for a man you met only once, but something about Guan Ming told her that he was the one. She wasn't wrong to wait, because when he did come back for her their love was stronger than ever.

When she saw Guan Ming pull out his personal phone Camilla already knew that it would either be his mother or Cedric. And when Guan Ming had casually answered, she knew it was Cedric, he would never speak that way with his mom. 

Camilla grew nervous as she waited for word on what had happened, in the end it was Cedric that informed her. He wanted her to get as far away as possible from Lucius Ting, but she was not going to let that happen. She had worked hard to earn his trust and just pulling away may compromise her cover and their plans.

"Ian, are you there?" Camilla asked when she heard no response from Ian.

"Yeah." Ian said as he cleared his throat, sending away the worried tone that she had heard earlier.

"Okay, you can't fool me Ian Lim." She said as she scolded her friend. "Either you tell me what's bothering you or I go do an investigation myself and we both know that Cedric would skin you alive if I did."

To her surprise, Camilla heard Cedric laughing in the background as he overheard the whole conversation.

"Ian!" Camilla shouted.

"I'm sorry, you didn't really leave me space to explain." Ian said as he tried to defend himself. 

In the years that they had known each other, Ian always avoided getting Camilla angry.

Camilla took a deep breath as she composed herself, she couldn't help but wonder what had happened for Ian to panic that way. In recent years he had become much calmer, handling one problem better than the next.

At this point she was surprised to see that something still worried him that way. 

"Camilla, you might need to stay away from Lucius Ting for a while." Cedric said as he took over the conversation.

It seemed that Ian still hadn't recovered from whatever was bothering him. 

"Can I know why?" Camilla asked.

"He might have a spy in the Esteves Family Mafia, if he does then he will know that it was Guan Ming's plane with my people that picked Julia up." Cedric said in a serious and calm tone.

"Then why do I need to stay away from Lucius Ting?" Camilla questioned. She really didn't see the point, it was not like her cover was blown or that there was a trail of breadcrumbs pointing towards her. 

"Do I really need to argue with you over this?" Cedric asked as she sensed some amusement in her boss' / friend's tone.

"Cedric Reyes, you know well enough that I will not sacrifice what we have worked hard for just because there is a little danger." Camilla warned Cedric. 

If anyone had heard the way Camilla spoke to Cedric they would be shocked, it was normally Cedric that was the threatening person in the room, not Camilla. She had become known as the meek and calm assistant, the one that silently observed and whispered to the CEO.

  Eventually, when she was promoted to being Vice President or Mor Co., she continued to carry the same demeanour. She ignored every outburst and every tantrum that her employees had thrown at her.

It scared them more that she was always calm. 

"Camilla, if Lucius Ting suspects anything he will not hesitate to hurt you." Cedric warned. 

"I know that, but right now nothing leads to me." Camilla said as she tried to get Cedric to see her side of things the way she saw it. "Right now I'm in the perfect position to spy on him, to see how he reacts."

"I don't like risking your or Benedict's safety." Cedric said as she slowly wore him down.

"Do you think that my brother would let me go into this if we didn't have a back up plan on how to escape?" Camilla asked Cedric.

"She has a point." Camilla heard Ian say as he understood where she was coming from. 

Both she and Ian had been in dangerous and difficult situations over the years, everything they had managed to get out of.

"Don't side with her on this." Cedric scolded Ian, the frustration quite evident in the tone of his voice. "I thought we were on the same page on this?" He asked.

"Cedric, look, things are fine right now." Camilla said as she continued to try to reassure him. "I promised you that the moment things turned sour I would be out of there and I still have every intention of fulfilling that promise."

Cedric sighed over the phone, frustrated with how stubborn she was.

"I'm guessing that there is nothing that I can say or do that will convince you." Cedric told Camilla.

"Ced, think of it this way. If I'm still with Lucius we will know if he suspects Guan Ming of cooperating with you." Camilla told Cedric as she tried to argue her case. "Guan Ming being on our side is a valuable secret, any signs that it is becoming known to Lucius Ting would be dangerous for Guan Ming."

"Fine, Camilla." Cedric said as he surrendered to what Camilla wanted. "But the first sign of direct danger, you are out."

"Yes." Camilla said in a firm tone.

"Good." Cedric replied.

"Now, are you interested in how Lucius Ting reacted to your actions?" Camilla asked as she remembered that she was about to call Cedric later on in the evening.

"He's already reacting, that's fast." Ian said, surprised that their subtle actions already had an effect on Lucius Ting.

"It seems you found a chink in his armor." Camilla said as she grinned. She was proud of her friends for having found this, it was quite odd that something so simple seemed to bother the businessman so much. 

"I hope you were entertained by his reaction." Cedric said with a laugh as he tried to turn the conversation into a lighter one.

"I did, as a matter of fact he ended up shouting at his sister, thinking that she was the one that leaked information." Camilla informed them. 

"The bodyguards on the other kids not only protect them, but it also keeps his attention away from Dominic, his real son." Ian said as he thought of why they decided to go with this direction.

It was only the first step in many that Cedric was planning, and at the end of it all, Lucius Ting would come crashing down.

"He briefly mentioned Dominic, but it was because he was angry at the world for giving Miguel and Veronica a child." Camilla explained. "It seems that people think that they had Dominic through a surrogate before the couple got married."

"That's funny, Veronica couldn't even stand Miguel before they got married." Cedric said with a chuckle as he recalled how complicated his friends' relationship was at the start.

"Dominic is safe for now." Camilla told Cedric. "But with what you told me I think I will need to see if Lucius Ting suspects anything from Guan Ming."

"I will also need you to see if he is already cooperating with Wu Jun." Cedric said.

"I thought you wanted me to go as far away and avoid Lucius Ting." Camilla teased.

She already knew that Cedric would be rolling his eyes at the other end of the line, making her laugh even harder.

"I'm happy to hear that you find this situation amusing." Cedric said in a flat tone, unamused by her reaction.

"Don't worry Cedric, I already know what you want to find out and I've gotten some information already." Camilla said as she briefly considered annoying Cedric a little more but decided against it. "Wu Jun has contacted Lucius Ting and there are talks."

"Do you know how far along the talks are? Have you told Ming?" Cedric asked.

"I haven't told Ming because he had to rush to the airport yesterday. I'll tell him when he gets back." Camilla told Cedric. "Right now they don't have anything concrete, Lucius Ting is afraid of offending Ming so he is being careful."

"If my suspicions are correct he will only commit once he is sure that he has a deal with Guan Ming in the bag." Cedric said as he analyzed the situation. "I guess I'll need to talk to Ming about this."

"He'll enjoy seeing them fall together." Camilla said with a laugh.

"Yeah, that boyfriend of yours wants to be personally responsible for whatever torture Lucius Ting will recieve." Cedric said.

"And you aren't against it?" Camilla asked.

"Of course not, I find it cute." Cedric teased his friend. "Camilla, please stay safe, I don't want to take too much of your time, be careful."

"I will, I always am.." Camilla promised as Cedric dropped the call, leaving her with her thoughts.

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