True Love Waits

Chapter 1268 The Headache

Feeling a headache coming on, Matthew rubbed his eyebrows. "I'm not—"

Before he could finish saying, "afraid," Erica had closed in. "Oh, Matthew, it's all right! I know you're a man, but there's nothing shameful in being afraid of snakes. Rest assured, there's no danger at all. In any case, I'm not scared, so I can protect you!" As she said this, she hugged him, patted his chest, adjusted his tie, and fussed over his lapels, thus leaving a copious amount of wet dirt smudged across the front of his suit.

Matthew looked down at her hands, his face hardening with disgust. "Erica," he asked dryly, "did you think of washing your hands after handling those snakes?"

Her face was stricken with what appeared to be genuine shock. "Oh! No!" she stammered, backing off a step.

Meanwhile, one of the two snakes she had dropped was creeping aimlessly about the meeting room. Its companion, apparently unsociable, had withdrawn to a corner and coiled itself up there.

As for the members of the Su family, they were huddled together atop the conference table, looking quite ridiculous and pitiable. The security guard they had brought was made of sterner stuff and remained as calm as Matthew. However, since there seemed to be no actual danger, he simply claimed his own corner of the room and waited at attention there.

After taking in the scene, Erica went to one of the snakes and gingerly gathered it up from the floor. She made a show of inspecting the creature; by contrast, the snake seemed uninterested in any of the humans present. "It's so cute, isn't it?" asked Erica innocently. "What are you all so afraid of?" She'd been careful to get ahold of snakes that were not poisonous. Naturally, nobody else in the room knew that. With a casual air, she approached Phoebe, gently pointing the head of the complacent reptile toward her.

'How dare Phoebe tell on me to Matthew! Seems like she hasn't learned her lesson yet!' Erica thought. In recent days, Matthew had been sometimes warm and sometimes cold to her.

Erica had begun to fear, what if he dumped her because of the Su family? Her best chance of preventing that was to scare them all away!

And she seemed to be off to a good start; as Erica neared the desk, Phoebe was already screaming at the top of her lungs. At the last second the poor woman leaped from the conference table and took refuge behind Matthew, who stood like a statue, observing the madness. "Matthew...Matthew, help me! Please..." Phoebe cried hoarsely.

"Honey, don't help her! There's no need for that at all!" Erica countered, trotting after her.

White as a ghost now, Phoebe gave another scream and bolted from the room.

The door closed with a bang.

a moment of dead silence, Lyman gingerly lowered himself from the table, then helped Fanya down as well. Trailed by the guard, they hurried from the room

a noteworthy day for the employees at ZL Group. A great many of them had seen the Su family strut into the building like they owned it;

the snakes managed to get out, they could cause all sorts of trouble and would be hard to catch again. Matthew watched, impressed despite himself, as his wife rounded up the second snake-the one that had gone to the

in the box which the Su family had brought in, adding it to the third snake inside. Arching an eyebrow, Matthew asked, "Aren't you

course not! How could I be afraid of such cute little things?" Erica looked down at the box and tapped the lid, adding, "Isn't

laugh or cry. "This wasn't your attitude when your brother tried to get you to eat a peeled snake," he ventured. That had been during some kind of survival training class. In fact, Erica had run away

I'm afraid of live ones!" 'Well, except for the poisonous kind,' she thought. Now those she did fear. Handling one wrong and

If everyone thought Erica wasn't afraid of any kind of snake, poisonous or not, that was all right with

onto the balcony of the Su family's house. That was when you

I'm so impressed." Her husband was as

then the headache that Matthew had begun to feel moments ago erupted full-force. "Get out of here!" he snapped.

looking down at her dirty clothes. "Can I use a

sprang from his seat and stalked from the meeting

paused to grab the box of snakes, then

the various employees milling about kept their distance. They were perfectly aware of

with false casualness. "So, are you going to take the snakes home and

later, someplace where they

He really couldn't do anything about her. A moment later, he took out his cell phone, dialed a number, and said only

"Send someone here."

Group, and the CEO's special assistant area

about the audacious deeds of Erica, grabbing snakes with her

none were more afraid than Paige. When she saw the couple approaching, particularly the box in Erica's hands, she suppressed a shiver. To her credit, though, she offered a professional smile as

and waved. With terrifying

the special assistant area gasped and left their