Spoiled By The CEO: Why The Wife Is Kinda Sweet? novel Chapter 379

With that, he rose to leave.

Laura blinked, then her expression turned ugly as she reacted and blocked his path. “What are you trying to do?”

Diego sneered at her. “I told you. I’m going to see my son-in-law about some pocket change. That’s not going too far, is it!”

Laura’s chest was about to explode.

“Have some shame, will you? I’ve got nothing to do with him! We just ate together a few times as investor and lead actress. Even if he really did feel something for me, we’re not even together, so by what right are you asking him for money?”

Diego leered. “Not my business. You deal with it.”

“You!”

Laura was getting a headache from her rage. She knew her adopted father was a slimeball, but she’d never thought he’d stoop this low.

All these years, she’d looked carefree and relaxed, but nobody knew her own pain deep inside.

Ever since her birth father had died ten years ago, she’d fallen overnight into hell, and had never climbed back up.

After a while, she sucked in a deep breath with red eyes. “I really don’t have money right now. If you want it, wait until I finish shooting this show right now. That’s the only way. Otherwise, it’ll all come to ruin, so do what you want. I can’t manage anything more…”

Seeing that, Diego was still dissatisfied, but knew there wasn’t a better way out.

So he grudgingly said, “Fine, when do you finish shooting the show?”

“The end of the month, probably!”

“Okay, I’ll wait until the end of the month. Don’t go back on your word, or… heh, you get it.”

Laura choked, not sure what to say.

She rubbed her brow tiredly, saying, “Just go. I’ll tell you when I have the money.”

Only then was Diego content to leave.

…

After Diego left, Laura sat in her room, silent for a long while.

About a dozen or so minutes had passed when she sighed, took up her phone, and dialed a number.

It only took a few trills for the receiver to pick up.

Laura asked carefully, “Maria, it’s… I want to ask a favor, if that’s okay.”

On the other end of the line, Maria’s voice was as cool as always. “What favor?”

“I… I want to have my pay in advance, is that okay?”

Maria frowned.

The agent paused, then replied, “I don’t have a say over it. Do you need it urgently?”

Laura bit her lip, then said yes.

“Let’s do this, then! I’ll ask about it for you. The pay is usually calculated after the cast is dismissed, but if they can do it beforehand, I’ll have them send it to you in advance.”

Maria was talking in completely businesslike terms, but even so, Laura was grateful.

She hastily said, “All right. Thank you, Maria.”

“Sure.”

The line hung up. Laura massaged her nervous heart and relaxed slightly, walking back towards her quarters.

At that moment, on the other side.

After Maria hung up, she told Elsa about the incident.

Hearing what had happened, Elsa was quite surprised.

Considering that Laura might need the money for some emergency, though, she didn’t overthink it.

But this show was primarily being invested in by Annie International. Star Entertainment was just attached to it on the side, and she didn’t have a say over that.

Natalia wasn’t managing Annie International anymore, so this was strictly business. Because of that, she didn’t ask Natalia and handed in a request on that side directly.

The following day, the results came out.

The answer they’d given was that they couldn’t give out pay in advance with no such regulations in the company, so she couldn’t do anything about that.

Laura was gravely disappointed.

But she knew that Maria was doing her enough of a favor by even asking about it. So even though she was disappointed, she still thanked her.

Back at the cast, she was troubled over it the entire morning.

She usually didn’t get called for retakes, but because of this incident, she wasn’t focused today, and the director had to call for cuts again and again.

With so many cuts, the people around started gabbing.

The director was exasperated, too.

He walked out from behind the recording monitor and said, “What’s with you today? Have you got something on your mind? Why couldn’t you get in the zone?”

Laura lowered her head and bit her lip.

After a while, she gritted her teeth and said, “One more time, director, let me try again.”

The director frowned at her.

Even someone hopelessly obtuse could tell that Laura had something weighing on her. With her like this, no matter how hard she worked, the results wouldn’t be satisfactory.

Finally, he waved her off and muttered, “All right, I can see you’re tired. Get some rest. If there’s anything you need to deal with, deal with it first. We’ll shoot the scenes you need to shoot today tomorrow.”

Then he turned to the supervisor to the side and ordered, “Have Sally come over. We’ll shoot her scenes today first.”

“Okay, I’ll call for her.”

The director sat back behind the monitor as the supervisor went to fetch Sally. Soon, the scene switched to the one Sally needed to shoot.

Laura stood there, biting her lip, feeling a rush of shame.

She knew that she wasn’t performing well today. Even though she’d tried to get immersed in the role, she just couldn’t do it.

Seeing Sally saunter over in costume, she could only step to the side helplessly.

Noticing how distracted she was, the director frowned and urged, “You can’t focus on two things at once. If something really has come up for you, deal with that first. Half a day or a day’s delay is nothing in shooting. When you’re done, we can continue with the scene afterwards.”

Laura nodded. “I’ve got it. Thanks, director.”

Leaving the set, she returned to the cast’s hotel, showered, and lay in bed, staring dully at her phone.

She was in a daze. At a time like this, she really didn’t know who to contact.

It wasn’t that she hadn’t thought of turning to Natalia. That amount of money was nothing to her now.

But she had her own pride, and knew her own situation. Diego was a bottomless pit. It was enough for her to be in such bad luck, but she didn’t need to drag her friends into that pit with her.

Unless she absolutely had to, she wouldn’t ask it of a friend.

Just as she was ruminating, her phone suddenly rang.

She jolted, lifted her phone, and saw it was Max.

She was a bit confused.

This man never contacted her at all for as long as she could remember, so what was he doing calling her at a time like this?

She didn’t want to take it and hung up right away. After all, it couldn’t be anything serious.

On the other end, Max sat on his office chair, legs crossed, waiting expectantly for the woman to pick up, but then she just hung up on him!

She hung up!

Max looked at the dark phone screen and steamed.

This damn woman! Hanging up on him?

Max was always popular wherever he went, but it was just her who kept on wising off to him.

What kind of temperament was this? It was so tough and prickly!

He ground his teeth and, after a while, sent her a text.

“Hanging up on me? The hell?”

Laura looked at the text and sneered.

She replied with a single, “Heh!”

Max could almost picture her stubborn, disdainful look.

He was fuming.

He looked at the phone and scoffed.

Fine, let it drag on! She’d end up with him eventually!