He Lent His Laptop to a Girl for an Interview — Unaware She Was the Disguised CEO!
Chapter 1
At 8:17 on a rainy Monday morning, Ethan Cole was sitting alone in the lobby of the Sterling Grand Hotel, watching an interview candidate panic over a dead laptop.
He had been traveling since five that morning.
A delayed flight.
A missed connection.
A meeting he had canceled at the last minute.
All he wanted was twenty minutes of quiet before heading to the corporate office across the street.
Instead, he found himself watching a young woman standing beside a charging station, pressing the power button on her laptop again and again.
Nothing happened.
She looked at the screen.
Then at the clock.
Then at the receptionist.
“Excuse me,” she said. “Do you have another charger?”
The receptionist shook her head.
“I’m sorry. The interview team is already waiting.”
The young woman took a breath.
“I understand.”
Ethan glanced over.
She was probably in her late twenties.
Dark blonde hair pulled into a simple ponytail.
Gray coat.
Black trousers.
No expensive jewelry.
No designer handbag.
She looked nervous, but not helpless.
That caught his attention.
She opened her bag and searched through it.
Nothing.
Her hands were beginning to shake.
Ethan closed his newspaper.
“You can use mine.”
She looked at him.
“What?”
“My laptop.”
She stared.
“You don’t know me.”
“I know you’re about to lose an interview because of a battery.”
She hesitated.
“I’ll be careful.”
“I believe you.”
He opened his laptop and handed it to her.
She looked surprised.
“You’re serious?”
“Yes.”
“Thank you.”
She sat at a nearby table.
Ethan watched her connect to the company’s interview portal.
She typed quickly.
Her anxiety disappeared almost immediately.
She became focused.
Confident.
Precise.
Ethan noticed the file she was preparing.
It was a financial analysis.
A very good one.
She finished with two minutes to spare.
She stood and walked toward the elevators.
Then she turned.
“I really owe you.”
“You don’t.”
“I’ll return it after the interview.”
“Take your time.”
She smiled.
“What’s your name?”
“Ethan.”
She hesitated.
“Ethan what?”
“Cole.”
Her eyes widened for the briefest moment.
Then she smiled.
“Thank you, Ethan.”
She entered the elevator.
He watched the doors close.
He had no idea that the woman he had just helped was not an ordinary interview candidate.
Her name was Olivia Bennett.
And she was the new CEO of the company he had been trying to expose for months.
She had deliberately entered the company under a false name.
She wanted to know what her employees were like when they didn’t know who was watching.
And the man who had just lent her his laptop was about to become the most important person in her investigation.
