Chapter 313: Just How Powerful Is He?

On the Plane

Alani sat beside Luca, gazing out the window at the clouds drifting past.

After a while, she turned toward him.

“Thank you, Mr. Hale.”

There was genuine gratitude in her voice.

Although Maison Premier had collapsed, the Stones family hadn’t given up on finding her. They were still searching for her, and Alani knew exactly what would happen if she fell back into their hands.

She would be forced into an arranged marriage.

The Stones Group had struggled to achieve the level of growth its members wanted in recent years. Rather than reassessing their business strategies, however, the family had become increasingly desperate to secure powerful alliances through marriage.

Alani was an ideal candidate.

Her beauty alone made her valuable in their eyes, but she also possessed considerable business acumen. She understood the market, recognized opportunities quickly, and had a natural talent for evaluating business decisions.

Unfortunately, those very qualities made her a threat to certain members of her family.

Her growing abilities could eventually challenge their positions within the group.

Marrying her off would solve both problems at once. They could remove a potential rival from the company’s internal power struggles while gaining a valuable alliance in return.

Two birds with one stone.

For Alani, however, it meant sacrificing her freedom for the sake of other people’s ambitions.

It was a miserable fate to be born into a family that regarded its own daughter as a bargaining chip.

Fortunately, Luca had intervened.

Without his help, she would probably have been found eventually, dragged back home, and forced to accept the future her family had chosen for her.

“Miss Stones, just call me Luca,” he said with a relaxed smile. “We’re friends, aren’t we?”

Alani looked at him in surprise.

Since the day she had fled her arranged marriage, she had experienced more changes than she could have imagined. She had begun to understand how much of her life had been shaped by fear and how often she had allowed other people to make decisions for her.

Yet Luca had never treated her as though she were helpless.

He had given her a choice when her family refused to do so.

And now, he was calling her a friend.

A warm smile spread across her face.

“All right, Luca. Then you can call me Alani, too.”

He nodded, accepting the suggestion.

After a brief pause, he asked, “What are your plans once you go abroad?”

During his time in New Orleans, Luca had already looked into Alani’s background. He knew she had a good head for business and often noticed things that other people overlooked.

Her judgment was sharp, and she had a knack for identifying opportunities.

Her main weakness seemed to be her personality.

Whether it was the way she had been raised or the years she had spent obeying her family, she tended to be overly accommodating. Even when she learned that she was expected to marry Jack Denim, she had initially struggled to stand up to the arrangement.

Instead, she had pinned her hopes on Luca, believing he might be able to help her escape.

Without Arabella’s influence and encouragement, she might never have found the courage to run away from her own wedding.

Still, Luca couldn’t deny her abilities.

Her work with Mr. Vanderbilt had demonstrated that she could handle business matters efficiently when given the opportunity.

Alani studied him for a moment.

“Luca, what do you have in mind?”

She had a feeling he wasn’t asking about her plans merely to make conversation.

And if Luca had something in mind for her future, she was more than willing to hear him out.

He smiled.

“Why don’t you go to the UK?”

Alani blinked, waiting for him to continue.

“Hernandez Finances belongs to me, but we still don’t have a general agent overseeing our North American operations. I’d like you to consider taking that position.”

He leaned back comfortably in his seat.

“What do you think? Would you like to give it a try?”

According to Alani’s original plan, she would leave the country, reconnect with a good friend from her university days, and join his company. With her leadership abilities and business acumen, she was confident she could establish herself in a foreign country.

A few years of hard work should be enough to secure a comfortable life for herself.

But deep down, Alani had always harbored a much more ambitious dream.

She wanted to return to the Stones Group one day, not as the helpless heiress who had fled an arranged marriage, but as a successful woman standing far above the very people who had once tried to control her.

She wanted to return in such a spectacular fashion that the entire Stones family would have no choice but to acknowledge her achievements.

She wanted those who had forced her into an arranged marriage and driven her to flee from her own engagement to realize just how badly they had underestimated her.

Unfortunately, even if she eventually became a senior executive in her friend’s company, how much would that really accomplish?

She could even establish her own business abroad, build it into a company comparable to her friend’s, and become its chairwoman.

Yet, compared with the Stones Group, such achievements would still be little more than a minor victory. They wouldn’t pose any meaningful threat to her family, much less allow her to stand above them.

The revenge she imagined was little more than a comforting fantasy, something she clung to whenever reality threatened to crush her hopes.

Alani had been preparing to let go of that unrealistic dream and accept the life she could reasonably build for herself.

Then Luca spoke.

His words were like a ray of light piercing the darkness, illuminating a future she had almost convinced herself was impossible.

Although she had fled her engagement, Alani had continued monitoring the news surrounding Maison Premier. She needed to know what was happening, especially since the Stones family and Maison Premier might cooperate in searching for her.

While following the news, she had come across several reports about the engagement banquet.

According to online speculation, Phil Hernandez, the heir to Hernandez Finances, had attended the event. More importantly, his unusually respectful attitude toward Luca had attracted considerable attention.

Some people believed Luca and Hernandez Finances were preparing to collaborate on a major project. Others speculated that Phil and Luca were close friends and that Phil had attended the banquet at Luca’s request, deliberately playing along with Maison Premier’s arrangements to help him.

Alani had entertained similar suspicions herself.

No matter how much she thought about it, however, she had never imagined that Luca was actually the man behind Hernandez Finances.

The revelation was almost absurd.

Hernandez Finances had been established in the United Kingdom decades ago, and the Hernandez family’s history stretched back more than a century.

A family with that kind of history and influence was practically taking orders from Luca.

Just how powerful was he?

Alani stared at him, momentarily speechless.

She had no reason to doubt his words. Someone at Luca’s level had little need to exaggerate his connections or use a company like Hernandez Finances to impress her.

His actions in Capital City and New Orleans alone had been enough to make countless business leaders reconsider their positions.

Besides, the revelation finally explained Phil Hernandez’s behavior.

Phil was usually reserved and carried himself with the confidence of a powerful heir. Yet, whenever he stood before Luca, he became remarkably deferential, almost eager to please him.

It wasn’t merely respect between business partners.

The Hernandez family practically regarded Luca as their benefactor, someone whose favor they couldn’t afford to lose.

Perhaps calling him their god of wealth wouldn’t be an exaggeration.

Luca tilted his head slightly when he noticed Alani’s expression.