Chapter 1411: Chapter 1411: Right into the Trap
"Mr. Battleson, this..."
The person seated lower right of Justin Battleson withdrew his gaze from the direction of the door, his expression visibly sour.
Yet, what surprised him was seeing Justin Battleson curl his lips into a smile.
The current situation played perfectly into Justin’s hands.
Indeed, Riley Group was founded single-handedly by Justin, but naturally, the company faced numerous challenges in its early days. As the enterprise gradually expanded, shareholder investments became inevitable.
Now that Riley Group has reached its current scale, certain shareholders were reluctant to cooperate any further.
And individuals like them, no matter where, tend to be disliked.
However, they’ve been with the company long enough that Justin had yet to find a particularly appropriate reason to reclaim their shares.
Yet, today’s circumstances seemed to present Justin with the perfect opportunity.
While Justin’s shareholder meeting had just concluded, Charlotte Thompson was dealing with excitement of her own.
"Charlotte, what’s going on? What’s the deal with all those online news stories?"
Zara Ward’s call came while Charlotte was caught in a flash of inspiration, sketching at her design station.
"Are you talking about the plagiarism thing?" Charlotte placed her phone, set to speaker mode, off to the side and answered Zara nonchalantly.
But Zara, being of an impatient disposition, couldn’t stand Charlotte’s leisurely response. Hearing her speak so unhurriedly, Zara was practically ready to crawl out of the phone and confront Charlotte face-to-face.
"Oh for heaven’s sake, when did this happen? You’re keeping me in suspense here. What’s going on? How could anyone falsely accuse you of plagiarism? And who is this Florienna Ellis anyway?"
Listening to Zara’s barrage of words, Charlotte paused for a moment before slowly recounting the events of yesterday to her.
"XTZ’s plagiarism accusation? Wasn’t that project handled entirely between the two of us and Elijah Walker? How could there even be plagiarism? It’s completely original."
The mention of XTZ heightened Zara’s tone of surprise even further.
After all, it was a project she had personally been involved in, even meeting up with XTZ’s design lead afterward. As for the plagiarism claims, Zara could hardly believe them, categorically denying them in her mind.
"The plagiarized designs aren’t ours; they were from the public showcase held on XTZ’s runway." Charlotte responded calmly.
"XTZ’s public runway? You mean the XTZ’s rookie designer showcase?"
Luckily Zara was speaking only to Charlotte; had her words been overheard by the online masses, it might have sparked yet another controversy.
This was because the rookie designer showcase hosted by XTZ, in actuality, hadn’t made any notable waves.
Though the collaboration between Riley Group and XTZ bore much publicity, the majority of the final pieces were crafted by the rookie designers XTZ had recruited this year.
As for Riley Group’s segment, it was created based on assignments given by Charlotte.
The true details of this situation were, however, known only to a select few.
"Since there’s such a misunderstanding, just clarify it directly. Some unknown rookie designer dares accuse you of plagiarism—really, who knows what they were thinking."
Zara couldn’t help but throw out a sarcastic remark, yet her tone grew tinged with doubt afterward.
"But seriously, what’s the deal with the outfits on the e-store? They did get released way earlier than the designs you submitted to Worsen, the brand partner."