Ernest drove pretty fast and arrived at the airport shortly.
It was a quarter to two.
The passengers were boarding the flight set off at two o’clock.
Harold followed Ernest and asked anxiously, “Ernest, they should have been boarding. We can’t get in the security check. What should we do?”
Ernest’s eyes were cold and sharp.
He said in a domineering matter, stressing each syllable, “None of the flights here could take off.”
Since he wanted her to stay, she wouldn’t be able to leave.
Ernest strode over to the special passage where Timothy was waiting for him long ago.
Seeing Ernest, he looked quite delightful. Immediately, he reported, “Mr. Hawkins, everything is arranged. We’ve blocked the airport. Before you could find Ms. Fraser, no flight is allowed to take off.”
“Ehn,” Ernest answered in a deep voice, fastening his speed when walking forward.
Harold’s mouth corners kept twitching. Blocking the whole airport? All the flights were delayed to take off?
It seemed that Ernest had put a lot of effort. No wondered he wasn’t afraid of anything.
In this case, even if Florence had wings, she couldn’t fly out of City N at all.
Ernest passed the special passage and got on the car that was arranged for him ahead, heaving to the flight, of which Florence bought the ticket.
Since it was almost time to take off, all the passengers were delivered but the shuttle buses to the entrance of the plane. There was a long line in front of the entrance.
However, the crew members blocked the gate, now allowing anyone to board.
The chief attendant announced to the passengers with a big speaker while standing on the steps, “Passengers, I’m sorry. Due to the emergency, we have to delay the boarding time. Please wait here patiently. Don’t walk around.”
Upon hearing the announcement, some passengers were quite unhappy.
One of them said, “We’ve been waiting here, but now you announced it’s delayed. Why can’t we wait on the plane? We have to stand in a line here. How long will we wait?”
“Indeed, what is your problem? It’s getting cold. We feel so cold when standing here,” someone echoed.
The passengers were discussing unhappily.
The crew members had to comfort them. However, they didn’t allow any passengers to board in a determined manner.
They waited for almost twenty minutes.
Passengers were getting more upset, raising an uproar.
“Creak–”
They heard a car brake suddenly, only to find a high-end luxurious car turned around and parked steadily.
No private cars were allowed to the airport. They wondered why this car would appear in front of the plane.
Besides, the car was arriving so fast and arrogantly.
All the passengers’ attention was drowned by it. They all stared at the luxurious car.
“Click.” The door of the car was opened.
They saw the shiny leather shoes first, and then the slender and straight legs, a neatly tailored suit, and the handsome face that took their breath away after a glimpse.
Passengers were all agape. Staring at the man, they immersed in his charm and couldn’t utter a sound.
Women couldn’t help but exclaim in low voice.
“So handsome! So overbearing!”
“Who is he? I want to be his date!”
“Dream on! He must be wealthy and powerful since he could drive the luxurious car to the airport. We are just common people. We can just look at him and worship him.”
All the women discussed in low voices. Even they were just looking at him, they almost drooled excitedly.
“Wow, he’s looking towards us.”
“Is he looking at me?”
“He seems to look at me. He’s looking at me!”
Shortly, the women exclaimed in excitement, stronger and more fiercely than just now.
It was because they saw Ernest strode over them directly.
His deep and charming eyes scanned on them one after another.
He didn’t miss anyone.
However, the more Ernest looked, the colder his eyes became.
He had scanned through the crowd three times in a row, but he didn’t find Florence at all.
Where was she?
“Are all passengers here?” he asked coldly.
Timothy was quite confused. He had looked up the flight that Florence was taking, so he took Ernest to this plane to find her.
Wiping off the cold sweat on his forehead, he called over the chief attendant.
“Where is Florence Fraser?”
The chief attendant knew they were here looking for someone, so he was well-prepared. Immediately, he pulled out the passengers’ name list.
He looked through the list and answered gingerly, “Mr. Hawkins, Florence Fraser isn’t on our flight.”
“What? Impossible!”
Timothy was shocked. “I’ve checked before noticing you. Florence should be on this flight.”
To avoid that Florence could sense something wrong or leave here, he even didn’t stop the shuttle bus from coming over. Instead, he let the shuttles take all the passengers to the plane.
There shouldn’t be any mistake before it was announced that nobody was allowed to board.
With a sad face, the chief attendant answered, “She’s truly not here.”
Ernest’s face kept falling. A bad hunch raised in his heart.
He asked in a deep voice, “How about other flights?”
After a pause, he squeezed a few more words from his hoarse throat, “Including those that had taken off.”
“I’ll check on them now.”
The chief attendant immediately pulled out a tablet and checked. After a long while, he said, “I’ve found it. Ms. Florence Fraser had bought the ticket of this flight indeed, but she canceled the ticket not long ago.”
Ernest’s eyes became a bit excited. “Didn’t she leave?”
The chief attendant looked timider.
He stammered, “Probably, she’s left. Fifteen minutes ago, there was a flight to Paris. Three passengers were taken to that flight by the company director in person.”
It was quite rare to arrange passengers into the flight directly, not to mention that it was arranged by the director in person.
Since Ernest put so much effort to look for someone, the chief attendant was certain that those passengers much be the ones that Ernest was looking for.
Ernest’s face went extremely darkened. He said, stressing each syllable, “Show me the surveillance.”
“Yes… Sure.”
Immediately, the chief attendant applied to get the surveillance as soon as possible. Usually, the surveillance videos were supposed to be confidential to the airline companies, but it was Ernest Hawkins who wanted to see it. Their CEO had already informed them ahead, asking them to be cooperative to any request from Ernest.
He had blocked the whole airport. The surveillance video was not that important.
Shortly, the chief attendant got the surveillance video and passed his tablet to Ernest respectfully.
In the video, Florence was walking with another two men. With the lead of a mid-aged man with a fawning and eagerly attentive face in the suit, they boarded the flight to Paris.
And the flight had just taken off before the airport was blocked.
“Click.” The tablet in Ernest’s hands directly snapped.
He was late.
“Fuck! They must have done it on purpose!”
Harold stared at the video, almost vomiting blood in anger. They had rushed to the airport fast enough but Florence brushed past them. She escaped.
Besides, Florence and Ernest didn’t have a conflict that she must dodge him. Hence, she didn’t need to escape at all. There must be someone who had manipulated it.
“It’s Stanford Fraser! It must be him!”
Pointing at the graceful man in the video, Harold gritted his teeth.
Ernest’s darkened eyes turned to him. “What do you mean?”