Chapter 210: What’s the plan, Sweetheart?

"Fine," April conceded, her voice regaining its smooth, unflinching composure. "Seven days it is. But there is still an issue regarding this cooking competition I would like to address..."

​"Which is?" Xavier asked, leaning forward slightly as Samuel held his pen ready over the tablet, prepared to make whatever adjustments she required.

​"If this is a world-class culinary competition hosted under the names of three massive families, the participants will expect a formal judging panel," April stated, her dark eyes scanning the room. "How are we structuring the evaluation without exposing my spatial storage process or drawing unnecessary attention?"

Sure in the past she didn’t bother about showing off the fact she could take objects and make them go poof before the very eye, but it was a different case if these said people were expecting to get a result for their brilliance and instead get nothing.

They are world class chefs so they must be expecting judges of their caliber.

​Alexander grinned, instantly catching on to April’s line of thought. "Blind judging, of course." He said. "The official rules we sent out state that to prevent bias, bribery, or family favoritism, all prepared dishes will be immediately whisked away to a sealed, isolated evaluation suite. The chefs won’t know who the judges are, and they won’t be allowed inside the scoring area."

​"In reality, that ’isolated suite’ is just a clean handoff corridor leading directly to you," Xavier added smoothly. "The scoring will be announced round by round. All you need to do is pick the winners."

​April pursed her lips slightly, considering the setup. "I’m not going to randomly pick winners out of a hat, then. These are master chefs—if the scoring seems completely fake or illogical, it will ruin the credibility of the event and raise suspicion before the seven days elapse."

​"So what’s the plan, sweetheart?" Nat asked, leaning back with a dark, amused glint in his golden eyes. "Are you going to sit there and eat thousands of multi-course meals back-to-back? Doesn’t that just ruin the whole idea of trying to store ’em all?"

​"Yes, it does. Which is why I’ll taste a single bite from every dish," April stated flatly. "With my spatial dimension, the rest of the meal will be instantly preserved in its fresh, scalding-hot state the moment it leaves the plate. A single bite is more than enough for me to judge the quality and pick a genuine winner for each round... Though I’m not a professional judge, I think I have the right taste bud to know which of the meals tastes the best."

​Nat let out a low, rich chuckle, highly entertained by the sheer efficiency of it. "A single bite from the world’s best chefs, thousands of preserved Michelin-star meals banked in your pocket, and they’ll all be competing like madmen just to impress an anonymous judge. Brilliant."

Always one for the drama, this one.

​"Then the judging mechanics are completely locked down," Samuel said, his fingers gliding over his tablet as he finalized the details. "Blind submission, single-bite evaluation, instant spatial preservation, and automated scoreboard updates. No loopholes left for anyone to question."

​With that logistics snag cleanly handled, April leaned back slightly, her gaze darkening as her priorities shifted to the next objective.

​"Good," April said cleanly. "Now... onto the Morgans. How many of you got invitations to their party tomorrow night?"

​In an almost comical display of absolute wealth and influence, every single man at the table raised his hand.

​Even Oliver Baxter raised a slender, pale finger. When April’s brow twitched in his direction, the doctor casually adjusted his glasses. "I typically prefer to decline such mundane social gatherings, but they persist in mailing them to my lab."

​April shook her head softly. "Well... it doesn’t really matter, anyway."

​"Technically," Nat drawled, leaning back with a dark, dangerous smirk, "even if we didn’t get an invitation, we could still just burst the place open and paint the walls."

​"No," April said flatly, shutting him down instantly. "We are not ’bursting the place.’ We are going to walk in like the civilized people we are... and then we are going to wreak havoc."

​Alexander chuckled, leaning his elbows on the table. "I like the sound of that. What’s the plan, April?"

​"I need to get revenge on the Morgans in the most devastating way possible," April stated cleanly, her dark eyes flashing with unyielding promise. "From now until tomorrow night, I need all of you to help me gather every single piece of dirt you can find on them. Financial fraud, illegal supply lines, hidden debts—whatever dirt exists, drag it to the light. We are going to wreck them and tear the family down."

​Nat’s eyes gleamed behind his dark lenses. "Consider it done, sweetheart. That’s the kind of party I wouldn’t miss for the world." He chuckled deeply. "And speaking of tearing down families... My boys finished looking into the Le Morenos as well. It turns out they’ll be in attendance tomorrow night too."

​April’s gaze shifted to Nat. "The Le Morenos are going to be there?"

​"Yep," Nat drawled, resting his chin in his hand. "And I found out something rather interesting about their family tree. Remember that guy you beat up at the garage with a bat over and over? The very one put under our brilliant doc over here," his eyes swept towards Oliver. "Cai, was it?"

​April’s brows pulled together into a tight furrow. "Yes. What about him?"

​"He’s apparently a Le Moreno," Nat revealed with a low, amused grin.

​April pressed her palm against her forehead, letting out a soft, exasperated breath. So Cai and Johan were related. Scumbags really did run in the exact same bloodline through and through.

To think that scamming backstabber was tied directly into this web... It was almost absurd, but she shoved the annoyance out of her mind for now. It seems she wasn’t done dealing with Cai, after all.

​"All right then," April said, dropping her hand as her expression turned dangerously cold. "We’re going to fell them all in one fell swoop. Gather everything you can get on both the Le Morenos and the Morgans. Tomorrow night, we go out with a big bang."

​"Understood," Xavier said smoothly, his tone leaving no room for failure, while Samuel made the final security entries on his screen.

"And Dr. Oliver..." she called out, her tone dropping into a cool, sharp register.

​Oliver lifted his gaze from his tablet, resting his pale fingers over the edge. "Yes, Miss April?"

​"Are you going to play spy for the Le Morenos?" April asked, leaning back into her chair. "Given that you were explicitly commissioned by their family to treat Cai."