From Ashes of Scandal to His Embrace (Laurinda) novel Chapter 115

Laurinda couldn’t see a trace of emotion in his eyes. That alone told her just how guarded and intense he really was.

“Finn sent me to give you a message. The Austin family is done. You’ll be going to the celebration as Laurinda, just yourself. Finn wants you to know no one’s going to bring up the whole ‘fake heiress’ thing again.”

Laurinda looked Harden up and down, holding his gaze until he started to look uneasy. Only then did she reach out and take the invitation from him.

“Sure. Tell Finn I’ll be there. I just have one question—can I bring someone as my date?”

Her question threw Harden for a loop. He knew Finn wanted to match the two of them, so if Laurinda brought someone else, wouldn’t that kind of ruin Finn’s plans?

“What’s wrong? Is it not allowed? If it’s a problem, I’ll just skip the whole thing. I’m not really the type to show up at parties alone.”

As she spoke, Laurinda started to hand the invitation back.

Harden hadn’t seen that coming. He didn’t take the invite, just reached out and pressed down gently on her wrist.

“I think it’s fine. I’ll talk to Finn about it.”

Harden could guess exactly who Laurinda wanted to bring. The school doctor didn’t even register as competition in his mind.

When Laurinda saw him agree, she lit up with the kind of bright smile that made Harden’s heart skip a beat. For a second, he found himself thinking that being engaged to Laurinda might actually be a really great idea.

“Laurinda, are you ready yet?”

Irvin had just finished helping her clean up and came back to find she was still in the classroom. He hurried in to get her moving, but stopped short when he saw the scene in front of him.

Catching Harden’s expression, Irvin quietly thought, Looks like Adolphus has another rival now…

“I honestly don’t know. He’s hard to figure out. I can never tell what he’s thinking. He just came to give me an invitation from Finn. I’m invited to The Gates Group’s celebration banquet.”

“The Gates Group?” Irvin repeated, eyebrows raised. He didn’t know much about the powerful families in Apex, but even he’d heard of The Gates Group. They had ties to the Charles family.

“You’ve heard of them?” Laurinda was surprised. She’d always assumed Irvin didn’t keep up with these family politics.

“I know a little. Bagot’s wife is from The Gates Group. I saw her name pop up when I was looking into the Charles family, but I’ve never met her in person.”

Laurinda frowned slightly. She hadn’t realized there was a link to the Charles family. It looked like she needed to dig a little deeper into the Gates family's connections.

“If I’m not wrong, Bagot doesn’t actually work for The Charles Group, right?”

“Yeah, that’s right. The Charles family has two sides, one in the open and one in the shadows. Bagot runs the secret side. They used to be involved in all kinds of shady stuff, but after things got really tough for them, they set up a public, respectable front. They actually climbed up by stepping over the James family, and that’s how they became a real force almost overnight.”