Chapter 268 - Talk (2)

[This chapter is dedicated to Jemma_Darlington for being the current top 2 fan of our story. Thank you for your support. Cheers!]

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He paced around the library. All the while, he was moving between rows of bookshelves, he was straining his ears toward the door—waiting for Jess. He could have sat down in one of the seats but his nerves prevented him from doing so. 

He glanced at his watch and it's been twenty minutes. When he told Jess to take her time, he didn't expect her to take this much time.. He exhaled another nervous sigh and craned his neck to the door. It was still firmly shut. 

He bumped his head on one of the shelves of the bookshelves. He was too anxious and he was having a hard time trying to stop himself from going out of the library to fetch Jess. He was never this nervous in the boardroom. 

The old sly Tiefenbacher didn't even have this effect on him. The reason why he was too anxious about Jess's anger was that he knew it was his fault. And he couldn't do anything if Jess decides to dump his sorry ass. 

His shoulder flinched when he heard a soft click from the door. He heaved a deep breath to steady his heartbeat. He wanted to laugh at how lame he was acting right now. He's like a dog with his tail in between his legs. And he wouldn't mind being like that if Jess would promise that she would forgive him and give him a chance to correct his mistakes. 

"Noah?" 

He heard her call his name. And he took his time to approach her. When he emerged from behind the bookcase, he saw her already sitting down in one of the chairs around the round table. 

"Hey," he said awkwardly. He took the seat next to her. He doesn't want her to distance herself just like she did last night. He was expecting her to react negatively when he took the seat next to her but she didn't do anything. She was chill and composed. 

He felt a bead of sweat rolled down at the base of his neck. It is driving him insane how Jess was so collected. With how she is, he could not help but think of the worst. 

"Baby," he cleared his throat. "I'm sorry." 

She sighed and gave him a small smile. "Why did you do it, Noah?" 

He grabbed her hands and kept them inside his. "Jess, I don't have any excuse other than I was scared that what happened in the past would happen again. But believe me when I say that it was a decision fueled by an impulse and I regretted doing it not long after but I couldn't ask for your laptop to remove the program I installed. I just thought that I won't really use it to check on you and decided to leave it. And then, Ellise found out about it." 

He caressed her hands inside his palm. His eyes were begging for her to understand. 

Jess swallowed the lump that had been sitting at the back of her throat. She wanted to be angry at Noah but it was too difficult for her to do that when he looked like a dejected puppy in front of her. 

He was shaking his leg under the table as he kept on caressing and squeezing her hands that he was holding. 

"Did you check my computer?" 

"Yes." He admitted hastily. "I did it when you arrived here to check how far you are on the research that Dr. Sison asked you to work on." 

"Dr. Sison doesn't really ask me to work on that particular research. She just asked me to read some data about it. I don't even understand what she expects me to do while I read the data she gave me access to. But then, since you checked, you know that I don't have that much access to that research." 

Noah nodded. Even he was confused with why Dr.Sison allowed Jess to read that research. Because it was his research study—his and Nicole, he is familiar with the content of the document she was reading.

The company wanted to give up on it but he insisted on continuing funding the research. Even though he was no longer working on it. But Nicole was. She was still part of the said research when they moved it to ANAT's laboratory in Shanghai. Now, the said research will be conducted here in the newly acquired laboratory in Mumbai. 

Dr. Sison is the head researcher for it. Nicole, since she was busy with her own research - the one that got her an invitation to one of the most prestigious laboratories in Switzerland. She resigned from the research. But it was not until the last problem they had in the laboratory in Shanghai. 

He acted on impulse because the research was the same research where some data was stolen. And until now, there's an ongoing investigation about it. It's one of the reasons why he decided to move the research here to Mumbai and have new researchers work on it. 

And he found it too much of a coincidence that with the many studies that Dr. Sison was overseeing, and she gave that research to Jess. And then, finding out the reason why Dr. Sison let Jess have a look at it was that by just reading some incomplete data, she noticed that some of it were missing. 

If he was still working on the lab, he would also be interested in Jess as a researcher. She has discerning eyes. 

"I was also confused and that's why I panicked and did what I did. I already told Dr. Sison that I wanted to talk to her about it. And I want you to be there." 

"How about the program that you installed on my computer? What will you do about it?" 

His eyebrows knitted. "Ellise didn't remove it?" He was surprised that Ellise just told Jess about it but didn't remove the program. 

"No. She told me to ask you about it. But she didn't uninstall the program." 

"I'll remove it."

"You should." 

He cleared his throat. "Am I forgiven?" he asked in a tentative voice. 

"No." She said sternly.