Being Dumped by My EX, I Marriied His Older Brother-Chapter 131: Inferior Skill

Nina Thorne followed the GPS to the tech building.

The sound of an engine growled behind her. Justin Kane, looking travel-worn, hurried over after getting out of his car.

He lifted his wrist to check his starry sky watch, a gentle smile gracing his lips. "Perfect timing. It must have been hard for Mrs. Kane to rush over here alone."

"You bet. You didn’t come to pick me up, so I ran into that lingering ghost again," Nina Thorne grumbled, seeming much livelier than before.

Justin Kane led her into the building and raised an eyebrow at her. "Cole Kane again?"

Nina Thorne shrugged helplessly.

Justin Kane’s expression darkened imperceptibly. He said in a self-deprecating tone, "Mrs. Kane is just too charming. I’ll have to be more careful from now on, lest someone tries to steal you away."

Nina Thorne gave a helpless, silent smile.

They entered the elevator and went up.

When they reached the technology floor, the elevator doors opened.

Mr. Wagner was already waiting by the elevators with a group of people.

The moment they appeared, the group greeted them respectfully.

"Mr. Kane, Miss Thorne, you’re here. Please, come in."

Nina Thorne followed Justin Kane into the vast engineering department.

April Graham was sitting in a conspicuous spot, clearly impatient.

Her expression soured even more when she saw them arrive together.

"I thought you’d chickened out and wouldn’t dare to show up," April Graham said, shooting Nina Thorne a disdainful sidelong glance.

That sheer arrogance reminded Nina Thorne of herself before she was twelve.

’Back then, I was willful, spoiled, arrogant, and flamboyant.’

’But Mom and Dad, Grandma and Grandpa, they all adored me, doted on me.’

’Dad used to say I was smart, kind-hearted, and always stood up for the underdog.’

’Whenever I saw a kid being bullied, I’d step in to help.’

’Mom said I wasn’t being willful, just confident.’

’I wasn’t spoiled or unruly, either; she said I just had my own independent way of thinking.’

’That I was actually polite and treated others with sincerity...’

’I’ll never hear Mom and Dad praise me again, and I no longer have them to dote on me.’

A pang of bitterness shot through Nina Thorne’s heart.

She pushed her thoughts aside and looked up, her gaze sharp. "Have you picked out which street you’ll be streaking on?"

April Graham hadn’t expected her to be so brazen right from the start. She was indignant. "If you don’t have someone helping you cheat, you’re guaranteed to lose."

Compared to April’s anger, Nina Thorne appeared much calmer and more composed.

It was as if what was about to happen was as simple to her as a grade-school project.

Seeing her confidence, April Graham couldn’t help but look worriedly at Justin Kane. "Justin, you’re not going to interfere, are you?"

Justin Kane’s deep eyes turned to Nina Thorne as he said cryptically, "I’m afraid that in a moment, you’ll be wishing I had interfered."

’At least then, she wouldn’t lose too badly.’

Ten years ago, he had heard Mr. Thorne mention that Nina Thorne had inherited his talent for computers.

And that she was even better than him.

With time and practice, she would surely accomplish great things.

At just nine years old, Nina Thorne had already developed an intelligent system.

At the time, the Thorne Family was collaborating with a new energy company from Vistara. They put that system into development, and it was successfully brought to market.

For so many years, Nina Thorne hadn’t set foot in the field of tech R&D again.

But talent is innate; you can’t just get rid of it.

"You might be overestimating her."

April Graham sneered dismissively and looked at Nina Thorne. "Let’s begin. I hope you won’t regret this in a little while."

"Is that so? I could say the same to you," Nina Thorne replied with a faint, calm smile, her eyes gentle.

She looked harmless, but her words made April Graham’s heart skip a beat for some reason.

’Could Nina Thorne really know what she’s doing?’

But April Graham quickly dismissed the thought.

’In Sylport’s social circles, who didn’t know that the Thorne family’s heiress was a good-for-nothing who did nothing but chase after Cole Kane?’

’How could a good-for-nothing like that possibly compare to me?’

The competition began.

The rules were simple: Nina Thorne and April Graham would each lead one engineer to identify the problem with the system and fix it.

The entire process would be conducted under everyone’s watchful eyes.

Before starting, April Graham glanced in Nina Thorne’s direction, her eyes cold and contemptuous.

’Before long, Nina Thorne would suffer a crushing defeat.’

’When that happened, she would make Nina Thorne get lost and never come within half a step of Justin Kane again.’

Assistant Cheney’s phone rang.

He was startled by the message and leaned in to whisper in Justin Kane’s ear, "Mr. Kane, Wade Bishop confessed. It’s just as you suspected—he was instructed by someone to maliciously tamper with and sabotage the system."

Wade Bishop was the engineer who had tampered with the system.

He had been taken to the police station a few days ago and had staunchly denied everything.

He had finally confessed just now.

Justin Kane’s deep eyes filled with a stern coldness. "Understood."

Then, he looked toward Nina Thorne. The sternness from a moment ago was gone, replaced by a gentle warmth.

Nina Thorne was talking with Mr. Cheney, occasionally tapping her fingers on the large screen in front of her to make adjustments.

Her fair face remained placid. She looked well-behaved and quiet, yet focused and serious, making it impossible for anyone to look away.

On the other side, April Graham was also communicating with her engineer.

Her expression was comparatively forceful, and she exuded an unstoppable momentum, as if victory was already in her grasp.

After talking with her engineer, she had basically identified the problem area. Growing excited, she subconsciously glanced at Justin Kane.

But she found that Justin Kane’s gaze was fixed on Nina Thorne.

The tenderness in his eyes was something she had never seen in all the years she had known him.

’Damn it!’

’I have to win.’

’I have to make Nina Thorne humiliate herself!’

’I’ll make her understand the gap between us.’

’A useless person like her doesn’t deserve to be with Justin Kane at all.’

April Graham said something to the engineer beside her, then glanced at Nina Thorne again. She saw that Nina hadn’t even started yet and seemed to have no idea what to do.

’Heh.’

’Of course she hasn’t found anything.’

’Because she doesn’t know how.’

"Useless."

April Graham shot her a cold glare.

The engineer beside her followed her gaze and looked at Nina Thorne, shaking his head helplessly.

It wasn’t just him.

Everyone in the entire engineering department, even Mr. Wagner, thought that Nina Thorne was just asking for humiliation by competing against April Graham.

But Mr. Kane hadn’t objected.

So they just had to play along.

April Graham retracted her gaze and got to work.

Nina Thorne, in contrast, was still chatting with Mr. Cheney about something.

No matter how you looked at it, her youthful, well-behaved appearance was impossible to associate with the image of an engineer.

’Not just anyone can be an engineer.’

Someone whispered.

"It looks like Miss Thorne really doesn’t know anything. She’s going to lose."

"Shh, keep your voice down. I heard Mr. Kane dotes on her and is very protective."

"I’m not talking nonsense, so what’s there to be afraid of? Besides, Miss Graham really is an engineer with dual degrees from overseas. Forget a little girl like Miss Thorne—

even among us, very few can compare to her."

The few of them nodded in agreement.

"Honestly, if she loses, she loses. We can just think of it as Mr. Kane spending some time to humor the young lady."

"But didn’t Miss Graham and Mr. Kane have a thing...?"

The speaker was forcefully bumped by another person, whose face changed color.

"Shut up, quick! You’re finished if he hears you."

The person looked worriedly toward Justin Kane.

Just as expected, Justin Kane’s sharp, knife-like gaze shot right at them.

Terrified, the person quickly averted their eyes, not daring to look again.

April Graham was confident she had this in the bag.

Her fingers flew as she typed in code, watching the progress bar fill up bit by bit.

Suddenly, Nina Thorne began working on her screen.

Her fair, delicate fingers tapped the screen a few times in a seemingly casual manner.

Then, Nina Thorne stopped. "Done."

As her voice fell,

large English letters spelling out ’COMPLETE’ popped up on the screen.

Mr. Cheney exclaimed in excitement, "She did it! She really did it!"

Everyone was stunned, unable to react for a long moment.

Nina Thorne was amused by Mr. Cheney’s reaction and chuckled. "It was just a small problem."

Mr. Cheney was in utter disbelief.

’When he was chosen to be Nina Thorne’s assistant, he had actually been very resistant internally.’

’Something this critical to security shouldn’t be treated like a child’s game.’

’He even thought Justin Kane was mixing business with pleasure, using something like this to humor a woman and play around.’

’But he never expected that he—that they—were the narrow-minded ones.’

With the precision and speed Nina Thorne had just displayed in solving the problem, forget April Graham—

even Sylport’s own Albert Locke, the great Chief Engineer Locke, might not have been able to do it.

After her shock wore off, April Graham came to her senses and strode over to Nina Thorne.

The page displayed on the screen was unbelievable to her. "Impossible! How is this possible? Nina Thorne, you really did cheat!"

She glared furiously at Nina Thorne, unwilling to believe it was real.

Nina Thorne stood ramrod straight, her expression calm. "April Graham, I didn’t cheat. You’re just terrible."

Although the system had been tampered with and was full of misleading information,

it was easy to rule out the red herrings and find the root cause with careful analysis.

Of course, the most important reason was that she was the original creator of this system.

So naturally, she was far more familiar with it than April Graham.

"Don’t you dare get cocky with me! You don’t know anything, so how could you possibly solve the problem in such a short time!"

April Graham continued to voice her doubts. "Everyone, just think about it! Isn’t it just as I said?"

A few of the engineers exchanged glances.

They all agreed with her reasoning. 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝒆𝒘𝙚𝓫𝙣𝙤𝒗𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

But if you were to say Nina Thorne cheated, where was the proof?

"Resorting to baseless accusations just because your skills are inferior?"

Justin Kane strode closer on his long legs. His face was as stunning as ever, but he gave off a profound, unapproachable aura that kept people a thousand miles away.

His imposing presence was so strong that no one dared to look him in the eye.

April Graham protested, "I’m a distinguished senior engineer! How could I lose to a little screenwriter who doesn’t know the first thing about this? Justin Kane, do you take everyone for an idiot? Do you think they’ll believe this?"

"And how are you so certain that the esteemed daughter of Thorne Tech wouldn’t know how to do this?" Justin Kane said coldly, his gaze icy and indifferent.

Although he had expected Nina Thorne to solve it, he hadn’t anticipated such a pleasant surprise.

Her movements just now had been smooth as flowing water, and she had remained calm and composed throughout. It was enough to prove her abilities went far beyond just this.

Justin Kane’s pupils suddenly contracted.

’So that Mr. Locke...’

"I don’t believe it. No matter what anyone says, I won’t believe it." April Graham was still in a daze.

Nina Thorne had expected this reaction and sneered, "Fine. Then what will it take to make you believe it?"

’If we’re going to compete, then I’ll make her accept her defeat completely.’

April Graham said resentfully, "If you’re so capable, then write some code in front of everyone. If you can do it, I’ll believe you."

’Writing code is the most basic skill.’

’Besides, she was certain that Nina Thorne had only been able to solve the system problem because Justin Kane had arranged everything beforehand.’

’But making her write code on the spot would expose Nina Thorne’s true colors.’

Nina Thorne agreed without hesitation. "Then I’ll make sure you lose so badly you have no choice but to accept it."

As she finished speaking,

her expression turned serious again. She became focused and composed, her fingers flying across the screen so fast they almost left afterimages on the touch keyboard.

In no time at all, Nina Thorne had successfully written a program.

Everyone was once again dumbfounded.

April Graham, in particular, turned deathly pale in an instant.

’How...’

’How could this be?’

’Nina Thorne... actually knows how to do this?’

"So? Do you believe me now?"

Nina Thorne looked at April Graham, her red lips curving into a smile as she raised an eyebrow. "Same question as before: have you picked out which street you’ll be streaking on?"

April Graham’s body swayed, and she looked completely stupefied.

’S-Streaking?’