From His Wife to His Uncle's Wife novel Chapter 87

When Max walked in, the first thing he saw was his mom sitting in the living room.

“Hey, Mom.”

Marleigh barely glanced up, her voice dripping with sarcasm. “Well, look who finally decided to come home.”

Max actually visited pretty often, but he never stayed long. And because he refused to settle down and get married, Marleigh always seemed ready to pick a fight with him.

“Katie!” he called out. Katie was home too. Earlier, she had helped entertain Autumn, mostly because Jessie was her friend and she wanted to be polite.

“Perfect, you’re here,” Max said, his tone serious. “I need to talk to you about something.” He nodded toward the stairs, clearly wanting some privacy.

Katie hesitated, looking a little nervous. “Can’t we just talk here? Grandma’s right here, it’s not a big deal... right?”

Max almost never got angry. He was always calm, sometimes a little distant with the younger family members, but he never raised his voice or lost his cool. Still, Marleigh couldn’t figure out why Katie seemed so scared of him.

Just then, Hunter arrived, keys jingling as he came through the door. He offered a relaxed smile. “Guess I’m the last one home today.”

Max didn’t smile back. “Hunter, you got here just in time. Since Katie wants to have this conversation here, let’s do it.”

Katie’s stomach dropped. She had a bad feeling about this.

“Hunter, there was an incident in the lab yesterday. Someone threw a cigarette butt in there.”

Katie’s hands tightened in her lap.

Hunter frowned, picking up on Max’s tone. “Did Katie do something wrong?”

Max pulled out his phone and tapped the screen. “She did screw up, though it’s not the end of the world. Still, it’s a really bad look for the company.”

Katie bristled, feeling unfairly accused. “Are you just going off what someone told you? I swear, I have no idea what I’m even being blamed for.”

Max didn’t even look at her. He sat down next to Hunter. “Hunter, yesterday, one of our new researchers had her project sabotaged. Someone threw a cigarette butt in her lab, clearly trying to frame her. The R&D department is supposed to be completely off-limits to meddling from other executives or shareholders. Only I get reports from them. So I never expected Katie to get involved like this.”

He held up his phone. “Here are two videos. One came from Billy, who got it from security. The other one, I pulled myself. Billy’s version was obviously edited. Mine is the raw footage. And all of this was done just to get rid of a new employee.”

Hunter’s face darkened. The incident itself might not be huge, but the implications were serious, and everyone in the room could feel the tension.