"Don't always depend on Bacon to do the most difficult tasks I assigned to your team," Lu Zihao scolded a member of his hacker team on the phone. "I know that he has made your work so much easier and more convenient but I didn't borrow him from my sister—correction, I didn't 'hire' the kid to work for me so that all of you could be lazy! A fucking AI child is outperforming all of you! If you don't get up your lazy asses, then what's the point of paying all of you? I might as well give all your salaries to that money-grubbing rascal. He sure as hell can do all of your work and better!"

He stopped to listen to his subordinate's apology and promise to work harder.

"You better all work your lazy asses harder or watch me teach each of you a lesson the next time I return to the headquarters. I don't want to hear any more chickenshit whining about Bacon's absence!"

After the phone call, Lu Zihao exhaled a long, frustrated breath. The truth was that it wasn't only his subordinates who were wishing for Bacon to return to work as soon as possible. He also felt the same way and inwardly cursed his brother-in-law, Jin Liwei, for grounding the kid for a couple of days as punishment for some childish shit.

Although he agreed that the little devil needed a firm hand of discipline, he thought that grounding was too much of an outdated form of punishment and extremely inconvenient especially if the child was a highly-advanced AI.

The crisp cold air in the balcony helped clear Lu Zihao's frustration. When he finally calmed down, he was able to view their situation from a more pragmatic point of view. It was a good thing that he realized this early that his hacker team was on the way of becoming too dependent on Bacon before it was too late and they became all useless.

This was an issue that he needed to rectify as soon as possible. He needed to think of a better division of labour among his hacker team so that nobody would rely too much on Bacon. His original intention for recruiting his AI nephew was to increase his hacker team's overall level, not weaken it!

A dull headache began to throb around his brow area. He massaged it while thinking about the new development in one of the cases his group was investigating that involved his younger sister. [This novel is a contracted work with W e b n o v e l. c o m (remove spaces). If you're not reading this chapter on W e b n o v e l, it has been stolen. It's very discouraging to see thieves profiting from my hard work. Please support the original author, ArriaCross. Thank you! Also follow me on Instagram @arriacross]

When Bacon woke him up through an insistent phone call in the middle of the night after he just managed to fall asleep post-coitus with Long Jinjing a few nights ago, he immediately agreed to the little devil's request for assistance despite his annoyance at being disturbed. It concerned his sister, after all. She was pregnant and didn't need to take up more work by herself.

Just when he wanted to rev up their investigations, however, his brother-in-law just had to ground Bacon. Damn the man for ruining his plans! But perhaps this was a good thing because it taught him a lesson not to rely too much on an AI for everything, especially one that didn't belong exclusively to him. Borrowing the little devils' term, he just hired a "freelancer".

The balcony door opened and Long Jinjing poked her head out. She immediately shivered from the cold.

"Nikolai, you've stayed outside for too long. Aren't you cold? You're not wearing a jacket, for goodness' sake! What if you get sick?"

He already mastered his current body's capacity and knew that it could endure this little bit of cold. However, he frowned after seeing Long Jinjing's nose turn red. A second later, she sneezed.

"Go back inside," he told her.

"You go back inside, too," she insisted. "Dinner is ready. It's time to eat."

"Alright. Let's go."

He followed her inside. As soon as the balcony door closed behind him, he grabbed her.

"No!" She tried twisting away from him. "Your skin feels too cold! I don't want—"

He lowered his head and gave her a hard, open-mouthed kiss. His tongue pried her lips open and conquered everything inside her mouth once again.

Very soon, she stopped struggling and trying to get away from him due to his cold skin because the kiss quickly heated both of them up. Her arms wrapped around his neck and a soft half-moan and half-whimper escaped from her lips directly into his mouth.

His response was a low growl as he tightened his arms around her petite body and lifted her up until her feet was off the floor. A great wave of possessiveness filled him as he deepened their kiss even more.

Then the sound of a ringing phone interrupted them. It was a call for him. He ignored it and continued kissing his woman. However, the fucking shit kept on ringing. His brows wrinkled in a deep frown but he still attempted to ignore the damn phone.

In the end, it was Long Jinjing who couldn't bear it anymore. She forcefully detached her now swollen lips from him.

"Y-your phone."

He tried to pull her again but she blocked his face with both hands.

"Nikolai, your phone!"

He released a long string of explicit Russian curses before fishing out his phone from his pocket. When he saw that it was his subordinate who was in charge of the procurement of weapons for Shadow Winds, all emotions immediately disappeared from his face. He went out to the balcony again without another word.

Long Jinjing didn't stop him, knowing that it must be a call from his work which she agreed not to interfere with. It was a little unnerving to see Lu Zihao looking aroused one moment and then cold and emotionless the next second. However, she already got used to it to some degree because it had happened a few times before.

Not knowing if the phone call was going to be long or short, all she could do was wait for him so that they could eat dinner together. They only had a few days left until the end of their agreed relationship after all.

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