My Best Friend's CEO Uncle

Deductions on payout

Aliyah leaned against the back of the car seat, her mind wandering.

It wasn't like she and Luca were total strangers. In fact, their paths had crossed just a few days ago under circumstances almost as absurd.

She had received an anonymous tip that her ex-fiancé was cheating on her in a high-end residential complex downtown. Determined to get to the bottom of the situation, she went alone. Anger and shame was consuming her.

The moment she stepped into the elevator of the building, the doors had opened to reveal Luca Delacroix.

He was towering, sharp, and radiating an intimidating, boardroom-ready aura that made ordinary people step back without a word. Out of sheer nervous politeness to her best friend’s uncle, she had squeaked out a greeting.

To her surprise, the great billionaire actually recognized her as Agatha's friend, casually asking if she lived in the building too.

Too mortified to admit she was there to bust a cheating partner, Aliyah had just nodded vaguely.

Then, she had pressed the button for the 33rd floor. Luca hadn't moved.

She stepped out at 3301. Luca stepped out right behind her, walking straight up to the same door.

Just as he raised a hand to the keypad, Aliyah had panicked and grabbed his arm.

"Um... Uncle Luca, do you live here?"

"No," the man had replied in a cool, detached tone. "This is the apartment prepared for me and my arranged fiancée. I'm just here to inspect the interior work."

That was the exact moment Aliyah’s brain had short-circuited.

She looked up at him, feeling an unexpected wave of bitter, kindred solidarity. They were both victims of the high-society marriage market.

When she arrived infront of the door where the said 'affair' was happening, she composed herself before pushing open the heavy double doors and stepping inside.

The illicit couple, who had just been gearing up for a round of heavy action, scrambled into a chaotic mess at the sudden intrusion.

The two cheaters were none other than her fiancée, Christian Vance, and Luca Delacroix’s arranged fiancée, Ms. Taylor.

Childhood sweethearts who had grown up together, reduced to this absolute trash.

A wave of hot fury surged through Aliyah. After landing a stinging slap across Christian’s face, she broke off the engagement right on the spot. She didn't want to make a fuss but she couldn't help herself and lashed out on the both of them.

Luca’s reaction, however, had been entirely the opposite.

He had remained as cool and detached as an android. His dark gaze swept indifferently over the ruined, chaotic bridal suite before he looked at his fiancée with polite, clinical distance.

"Since Ms. Taylor has found herself new company, the engagement is officially canceled."

Enraged by his chilling indifference, Ms. Taylor had first launched into a vicious screaming match, followed by a bitter, tearful accusation.

She screamed that after their families finalized the arrangement, Luca had immediately fled abroad for two years, flat-out ignoring her friend requests. He had subjected her to a slow, freezing emotional execution, which was why she couldn't handle the loneliness anymore!

Hearing the accusation, Luca hadn’t even bothered to lift an eyelid. He simply reiterated the cancellation of the engagement and turned on his heel to walk away.

Even now, Aliyah could vividly recall the cold, ruthless silhouette of his retreating back.

She couldn't entirely blame Ms. Taylor for breaking down.

Stepping out of the room afterward, she had casually dialed the local authorities to report suspected illicit activities on the premises.

Given that both the Vance and Taylor families were prominent high-society dynasties in the capital, half the luxury residential complex knew about the impending wedding, and neighborhood gossip spread like wildfire.

Their reputations had been thoroughly, publicly dragged through the mud.

If people hadn't been terrified of offending the Delacroix family, the scandal would have dominated the city's trending feeds for weeks.

And now, a few days later, she had managed to turn a shared moment of mutual pity into the absolute worst mistake of her life.

Luca Delacroix—a man whose mere shadow made the heads of the most powerful corporate empires back away in caution—had been accidentally, drunkenly compromised by her.

Aliyah felt a massive migraine coming on.

If she didn't handle this disaster carefully, it was going to blow up right in her face.

Her brain was a total mess, completely incapable of formulating a survival strategy, leaving her with only one option: her best friend.

"Aga, last night was a total accident. I never want to cross paths with that man again. What am I supposed to do?"

"Simple."

Agatha flashed a row of bright white teeth, looking at her with a mischievous grin.

"If you're satisfied, you pay for the service. If you're dissatisfied, you leave a bad review and dine-and-dash. Babe, which one are you picking?"

And there it was, looping right back around to the exact topic Agatha was dying to know about.

Honestly, aside from him giving her a proper shower afterward, Aliyah’s experience across the board had been less than stellar.

Luca Delacroix looked like a stiff, untouchable monk in broad daylight, but behind closed doors, he completely transformed into an absolute lunatic with zero concept of moderation.

When she cried, he would whisper sweet, comforting nonsense with his lips, while his body drove her relentlessly harder.

He had literally made her pass out... cold.

She had never, *ever* experienced a level of humiliation like that.

Still, attempting a dine-and-dash on Luca Delacroix was a suicide mission. She had to pay up.

"Aga... how much do you think I should give him?"

Agatha’s eyes lit up instantly. "Oho, so this model-guy was a powerhouse? You were satisfied?"

Aliyah coughed defensively. "Just get to the point."

"My usual baseline for hiring a VIP companion or private lounge singer starts at a few grand. Given that your personal experience was... well, high-performance..."

Agatha paused, genuinely deep in thought.

"You should at least drop a ten-thousand-dollar baseline."

"Right." Aliyah decided her friend had a point. She pulled out her phone, planning to check her mobile banking balance.

The moment she unlocked her screen, a flurry of bank deduction notifications popped up. The final balance at the bottom read a devastating $2,350.

Aliyah stared at the text string, her fingers gripping her phone so hard her knuckles turned stark white.

Her family really wasn't going to leave her a single breathing path, were they...

Noticing the drastic shift in her expression, Agatha furrowed her brows. "Babe, did those bloodsuckers at home swipe your fresh paycheck again?"

"Yeah."

"Whatever, it's just ten grand. I'll spot you."

"No way!" Aliyah blurted out, frantically stopping her.

To accidentally treat your best friend's terrifying uncle like a hired gigolo was bad enough—if she had to borrow the payoff money from the best friend in question, what kind of subhuman trash would that make her?

Agatha jumped slightly at the sudden yell, giving her a confused look.

"Babe, I'm just offering to spot you cash. We've skipped out on tabs at your old man's restaurant plenty of times before, why are you suddenly acting like you've seen a ghost?"

Aliyah rubbed the bridge of her nose, sweating bullets.

"I'd rather just apply for a salary advance. Otherwise, those vultures will just swipe it again next month. Such a waste."

"Fair point." Agatha looked at her with profound pity.

The Keller family had made their fortune in high-end culinary hospitality, rising into the city’s upper crust decades ago. But they ruled their daughters with an iron fist—zero allowance, zero independent cash flow. Every single expense had to be charged to a family-approved corporate account, which the family steward audited ruthlessly at the end of every month.

That was the exact reason Aliyah had let herself get sweet-talked into taking a job at the Delacroix corporation after graduation.

Little did she know, her family had upped the cruelty by forcing her to link a mandatory family-control digital wallet, instantly siphoning her salary the second it hit her account.

It was like they had a terminal psychological disorder!

The reigning CEO of Delacroix Corporation was the eldest son of the family patriarch, Lucas’s older brother, Arthur Delacroix—who happened to be Agatha’s father.

The company had an unusually progressive HR policy allowing employees to draw salary advances of up to several months based on tenure.

Since Aliyah had been there for a year, she immediately sent a message to her direct supervisor, Anna, requesting a one-month salary advance for an "urgent personal emergency."

Anna replied almost instantly.

[Aliyah, the corporate office is going through an executive leadership reshuffle right now, so regular approval pipelines might crawl a bit. If it's a true emergency, let me spot you the cash out of pocket first, and you can pay me back once official approval clears.]

Aliyah hesitated, her fingers tapping against the screen.

[It's definitely urgent. Thank you so much, Anna~]

[Cat_Heart_Sticker.jpg]

Within minutes, Anna’s transfer hit her account.

Since she didn't have Luca’s banking routing number, Aliyah went straight to a local financial branch and exchanged the funds into exactly ten thousand dollars in crisp cash.

She stuffed the bills into a black plastic shopping bag, tossed in a formal apology note, and booked an express courier service to deliver the package directly to the top-floor executive suite at the Grand Azure.

Grand Azure Hotel.

Inside the private VIP lounge, a cold, sharply handsome man sat with his long legs crossed lazily over a black leather sofa.

Fresh out of the master shower, he was practically radiating damp heat. Short, ink-black locks still dripped water, tracking heavy droplets down his broad, solid chest, tracing the deep V of his chiseled abs before vanishing into the loose white bath towel slung low across his hips.

Across his pale, perfectly sculpted shoulders and back, several vivid, aggressive scratch marks crisscrossed his skin—silent, damning evidence of the wild, unhinged loss of control from the night before.

Sitting on the edge of the glass coffee table was a neat, dense stack of banded cash.

Luca picked up the scented note card left inside the delivery box, unfolding it to read with absolute, deadpan seriousness.

He read it from top to bottom twice, making sure his eyes weren't playing tricks on him.

Then he glanced sideways at the pile of cash, his sharp, forbidding brows arching slightly.

What in the world was this supposed to be?

A performance bonus for doing a good job last night?

Or... his actual going rate as a gigolo?

Ding-dong.

Luca’s phone buzzed on the armrest. An automated corporate HR notification popped up on his screen.

Employee emergency salary advance request: One month’s base pay.

Applicant: Aliyah Keller.

Luca tapped into the file. He looked at the requested advance amount—$12,666—and then cast another glance down at the $10,000 sitting in a neat stack by the coffee table.

So, the little trickster wasn't even being sincere. Her apology letter explicitly claimed she was willing to compensate him with a full month's salary, yet she had quietly skimmed off $2,600 for herself.

Ghosting him the second she put her dress back on was one thing.

Was she actually trying to shortchange her gigolo bill too?

Luca’s dark gaze grew dangerously heavy. He tapped his phone screen, his long, elegant fingers swiftly editing a quick message before hitting the hard [REJECT] button on the HR dashboard.

[System Note: Due to recent spikes in digital wire fraud, all employee salary advance requests require a mandatory in-person appearance at the CEO’s Office to state a valid purpose. Otherwise, approval will be denied.]