Wrong Flirt, Right Trouble: His Uncle Pulls Me Close

”Can you cook?”

”A little, but I’m not very good at it.”

”Fine. Got it. You can go.”

Elijah Hawthorne didn’t think cooking was that difficult. ’Isn’t it just a matter of tossing things in a pan and stir-frying them until they’re cooked?’

He looked at the vegetables and decided to wash them and give it a try.

Ivy Sherwood had said Quentin Blackwood was a good cook. ’How hard can cooking be? It’s just that I, Young Master Hawthorne, never bothered to learn before.’

’If I wanted to learn, it’d be a piece of cake. I could master it in minutes.’

He would just show off a little, and tomorrow, he’d let Ivy Sherwood see that Quentin Blackwood wasn’t the only one who could cook.

However, the moment Elijah Hawthorne threw the vegetables into the pan, he was dumbfounded. ’Why don’t these seem to be cooking?’

’Where is all this water coming from?’

’Why are the vegetables sticking to the pan? This hotel’s pan must be terrible.’

Elijah Hawthorne stir-fried for a bit longer before deciding to plate it. He had no idea if the stuff was cooked through, but ’with my cooking skills, it should be fine, right?’

He picked up a piece with his chopsticks, put it in his mouth, and almost spat it out.

’This thing... why is it so bland?’

His young assistant was still outside. Elijah Hawthorne called him over. ”Come taste this and tell me what you think.”

The young assistant already thought the world had gone mad when he saw Mr. Hawthorne cooking personally. Now, seeing that Elijah Hawthorne had actually finished a dish, he felt like the entire universe had been turned upside down.

”Mr. Hawthorne, I... I don’t dare,” the young assistant said, shaking his head frantically.

He was afraid the stuff was poisonous.

”I told you to eat it, so eat it!”

The young assistant had no choice but to pick up his chopsticks, take a bite, and force himself to swallow. ”Mr. Hawthorne, did you... forget to add salt? And I don’t think you added any oil, either.”

Elijah Hawthorne: ”?”

”You have to add that stuff?”

He thought just cooking the vegetables was enough.

”Yes, you need all sorts of seasonings to make it taste good.”

”Then what are you waiting for? Go buy them!”

Elijah Hawthorne felt it wasn’t his fault that he didn’t know these things.

”Mr. Hawthorne, if there’s something you’d like to eat, I can go buy it for you right now.” ’Some things just aren’t meant to be. Don’t make things hard for yourself.’

Elijah Hawthorne frowned. ”Did you not understand what I said?”

”I’ll go right away!”

Elijah Hawthorne nodded. ’So it wasn’t my cooking. It was the seasonings—or lack thereof.’

Soon, the young assistant returned with a full set of seasonings, even including scallions, ginger, and garlic.

Elijah Hawthorne went back into the kitchen. A while later, he came out with another plate of food. He had clearly added the seasonings this time, so why did it taste so strange?

Elijah Hawthorne refused to believe it. The assistant suggested, ”Mr. Hawthorne, if you absolutely insist on cooking, why not look at a recipe?”

”Hilarious. As if I would ever need a recipe!”

And yet, after a whole night of trying, Elijah Hawthorne hadn’t managed to make a single decent dish.

He worked until dawn, but in the end, there wasn’t a single dish fit to be given to Ivy Sherwood.

The young assistant hadn’t gone home and had been there the whole time. He’d even dozed off for a bit, and he couldn’t believe that when he woke up, Mr. Hawthorne still hadn’t given up.

”Mr. Hawthorne, why don’t you try making some congee? It would be perfect for breakfast.”

”Congee?”

”Yes, it’s very simple. You just add water to rice.”

”Where’s the rice?”

The young assistant: ”...”

’Mr. Hawthorne didn’t say anything about needing rice yesterday.’

”I’ll go buy some now.”

The young assistant quickly bought the rice and brought it up. To his surprise, Mr. Hawthorne even managed to mess up making congee.

Because Elijah Hawthorne had dumped all those seasonings into the rice as well, the final pot of congee was a mess of chaotic flavors.

The young assistant was at his wit’s end and had to tell Elijah Hawthorne not to add anything at all while making the congee.

Finally, there was something edible—plain congee!

Elijah Hawthorne was about to leave with the congee when he went downstairs and discovered he had a flat tire.

He hadn’t been in Lustre for long and didn’t have many cars brought over.

Elijah Hawthorne hailed a random taxi and headed for Ivy Sherwood’s house, only to find no one there. He called Ivy, who said, ”I’m sorry, Mr. Hawthorne. I’ve already left for the office at this hour.”

In truth, Ivy Sherwood had just left home not long ago and still had a ways to go before reaching the office.

When Elijah Hawthorne arrived at Ivy Sherwood’s company, he saw her getting out of her car. He got out as well, and just as he was about to follow her inside, he saw someone approach her from behind. The person held a handkerchief laced with chloroform to Ivy’s mouth and nose. Before she could even struggle, she collapsed.

The attackers had planned this for a long time, lying in wait for her. Their target was clearly Ivy Sherwood. Even the bodyguards Quentin Blackwood had arranged to follow her didn’t expect something like this to happen.

The men grabbed Ivy Sherwood and were about to get into a car. Seeing this, Elijah Hawthorne immediately put down the congee.

However, the moment they got in the car and prepared to flee, Elijah Hawthorne pulled out a gun and aimed at the tires.

BANG! The tire exploded.

The kidnappers still tried to get away, but Elijah Hawthorne immediately shot out the other tires, making it impossible for them to escape.

The men who had kidnapped Ivy Sherwood were forced to get out of the car, using the unconscious woman as a hostage. ”Who are you? Get out of the way, or I’ll kill her!”

There wasn’t a trace of fear in Elijah Hawthorne’s eyes. ”Then let’s see which is faster—your hand, or my gun.”

Elijah Hawthorne advanced step by step. His cold expression was terrifying, and his powerful, indifferent aura sent a chill down the spine.

The kidnappers were momentarily stunned with fear. Just then, the bodyguards Quentin Blackwood had assigned to protect Ivy Sherwood arrived and surrounded them.

”If you’re in this line of work, you should have heard the name Elijah Hawthorne.”

”You... you’re Elijah Hawthorne!” Hearing the name, the men’s faces went pale with shock.

Although Elijah Hawthorne was a businessman, his early ventures were not exactly on the straight and narrow.

He was known for his ruthlessness, just like Quentin Blackwood.

”I can find out all of your identities within three minutes. I can’t guarantee what will happen to your families—your wives and children—after that. Besides, with so many of us here, are you sure you can get away?”

The men were on the verge of dropping to their knees. ”We were just hired to do a job! It was Caleb Blackwood who told us to bring Ivy Sherwood to him.”

”I don’t care who hired you. Hand her over now, or else...”

All the men heard was a CLICK—the sound of a bullet being chambered.

”We were wrong! Take her! Just let us go.”

The men handed Ivy Sherwood over, placing her directly into Elijah Hawthorne’s arms, and then hastily fled.

Quentin Blackwood’s bodyguards didn’t stop them, knowing that the mastermind was Caleb Blackwood.

Elijah Hawthorne held her. In his arms, Ivy Sherwood was very still.

He swept Ivy Sherwood up into a princess carry, but Quentin Blackwood’s bodyguards blocked his path.

”Mr. Hawthorne, please hand her over to us.”

Elijah Hawthorne sneered. ”So you’re the bunch of useless fools Quentin Blackwood arranged? If she had really been taken away by those men today, could you have guaranteed her safety? Could you have answered to that useless boss of yours?”

The others: ”...”

”I’m taking her with me for now. We can talk after she wakes up.”

With that, Elijah Hawthorne carried Ivy Sherwood into the taxi he had arrived in and told the driver to go to the hospital.