### Chapter 108: Ti is running out
"What kind of drink?" Nina Wainwright asked with a frown.
She hadn’t thought about bartending for nearly two months and had forgotten so of the recipes.
Zachary Hawthorne tapped on the bar top, pondered for a mont, and then said, "A Bamboo."
The Bamboo was Nina’s specialty, so she didn’t overthink it and started mixing one for him.
’Anyway, it’s a way to make money...’ She was staying with Sandra Walsh lately, and while she wasn’t spending much, she had less than a hundred thousand in savings... She’d have to think about renting a place soon; she couldn’t live in her teacher’s office forever.
Nina simply treated it as if she were working a part-ti job here.
After finishing the Bamboo, she handed it to Zachary Hawthorne.
Zachary didn’t exchange any words with her. He just took the drink, turned, and found an empty seat.
The mont he left, Lily imdiately spoke up. "Didn’t you say you knew him? You two look like complete strangers."
"I don’t," Nina replied, her tone a bit cold.
Lily pouted and said with a hint of passive-aggression, "If you look down on , just say it. Why put on an act?"
Nina ignored her.
Seeing Nina’s proud deanor, Lily grew more and more irritated and decided to keep her distance. Nina paid her no mind, instead mixing three drinks before walking over to where Adrian Pemberton was sitting.
She gave a drink to him and Catherine Grant, then picked up her own and took a sip.
After taking a drink, she relaxed, leaning back in her chair and gazing at the street outside the window without a word.
"I was going to tell you what I found out, but since soone’s here, I’ll save it," Catherine Grant said, glancing toward Zachary Hawthorne in the distance as she drank.
Nina didn’t look at Zachary. Instead, she said in a low voice, "Then let’s talk about it next ti."
Adrian Pemberton carefully savored the drink Nina had made. After a few sips, he said with a helpless look, "I rarely drink, so I can’t really tell what’s so special about this."
Nina couldn’t help but laugh. "It’s perfectly normal that you can’t tell. People who haven’t studied spirits wouldn’t know their finer points, of course."
"You’ve studied them?" Adrian asked with a smile.
"Not a deep study, but when I first started here, I did a lot of cramming. So I guess you could say I have a little understanding of cocktail culture," Nina said.
As the three of them chatted and laughed, Zachary Hawthorne watched, his expression growing colder.
After they finished their drinks, it was already getting late.
Nina checked the ti and said softly to Catherine, "I have to go. I need to get up early for dance practice tomorrow."
"When the tour dates are set, you have to tell and Adrian! I’ll buy tickets to see you," Catherine said, hugging her, her voice tinged with reluctance to see her go.
Nina humd in agreent.
She grabbed her bag and stood up. Adrian Pemberton rose with her. After they went downstairs, Adrian glanced behind them to make sure Zachary Hawthorne hadn’t followed. He then said in a low voice, "I’ve been looking into your family’s situation. The clues I’ve found so far are about your father’s loan. The bank has already found a scapegoat to take the bla. This whole thing is quite extensive. If we can’t figure it out soon... I’m afraid we might not get another chance, right?"
Hearing this, Nina’s expression turned cold. "Of course they’ll slowly erase all the evidence. Even if I’m just an ant in their eyes, they won’t leave behind any loose ends that could cause them trouble. Are you sure the Sterling Family is involved?"
"Yes. The Sterling Family was behind my hand injury. As soon as my parents heard about it, they started investigating," Adrian said calmly.
Nina looked at him, her eyes filled with apology. "It’s all my fault..."
"There was nothing wrong with you getting pregnant. The ones at fault are the people who ant you harm. You really don’t need to bla yourself. The ones who should feel guilty are the ones who hurt you and , right?" Adrian said.
He didn’t call for a designated driver right away.
He wanted to talk with Nina a little longer.
"If it’s the Sterling Family, then that simplifies things... I just don’t know when I’ll ever see a day where I can finally hold my head high," Nina said, her voice filled with lancholy.
Making a na for yourself just by dancing is incredibly rare.
Nina had always known there was a wall between the rich and the poor, but only now, experiencing it firsthand, did she realize that wall was a world of difference.
Her father’s accident, her own miscarriage, even Adrian’s hand being injured to the point where he could no longer practice dicine... For all of it, they couldn’t find any concrete evidence to sue the perpetrators and put them in jail.
"I believe justice will be served eventually," Adrian said with a smile, then took out his phone to call for a designated driver.
The two of them sat for a mont before soone knocked on the car window.
Adrian, thinking it was the driver, rolled down the window.
However, when he saw Silas Sinclair, his face imdiately fell. Still, his tone was mild as he asked, "Is there sothing you need, Assistant Sinclair?"
"I’m looking for Miss Wainwright," Silas said.
Adrian glanced at Nina, who was sitting in the back with her eyes closed, and replied coolly, "She drank too much. She’s resting."
Silas Sinclair walked to the rear door and knocked on the window.
In the darkness, Adrian’s face looked sowhat grim.
Nina opened her eyes, rolled down the window, and looked at Silas with an impatient expression. "What do you want?!"
She had nothing against Silas personally, but she had been pretending to be asleep precisely because she didn’t want to interact with him.
"Miss Wainwright, Mr. Hawthorne asked to take you ho," Silas said politely.
Nina sneered. "Our designated driver will be here any second. No need to trouble yourself. Besides, we don’t know each other well. I have no intention of getting into a stranger’s car."
Silas was left feeling awkward.
He used to look down on Nina and treated her poorly. He never expected the boorang to co back and hit him so quickly.
Nina rolled up the window.
When the designated driver arrived, Silas watched him get into the car before returning to Zachary Hawthorne’s side, defeated.
"I ask you to do one thing, and you can’t even get it right," Zachary Hawthorne said, taking a drag from his cigarette, his voice full of disdain.
Silas kept his head down, not daring to even breathe too loudly.
Zachary got into the car with a cold expression. After sitting down, he shot Silas a frosty glare. "What are you still doing standing out there?!"
Silas quickly got into the car. He didn’t start the engine right away, though. Instead, he said to Zachary, "Adrian Pemberton is watching the Sterling Family very closely. From how much he’s investigating, he must suspect they had sothing to do with his hand injury."
"Have you looked into it? Is there a connection to the Sterling Family? The Sterlings have no grudge against him, so they wouldn’t target him for no reason," Zachary said flatly.
He had never cared much about Adrian Pemberton’s affairs, so he hadn’t instructed Silas to look into it imdiately.
"I haven’t. I think Adrian Pemberton is just fanning the flas, which is why Miss Wainwright holds such a grudge against the Sterling Family." Silas believed that Nina’s conviction that the Sterlings were responsible was ultimately because of Zachary Hawthorne.
’In her mind, Luna Sterling is the other woman, an enemy.’
’Won... once they think their man is involved with another woman, everything that other woman does is wrong.’
Zachary shot him a cold look. "You haven’t looked into it, yet you assu he’s just stirring up trouble? Do you also think Nina Wainwright hates Luna Sterling just because she sees her as a romantic rival?" Zachary asked in a frigid tone.
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