Melted: A MaxTul AU story

Chapter Twenty-eight: Metinee Pakorn

As Pongpat Tappitak sat in the supremely elegant office space of Mettinee Pakorn waiting to be called in, he felt really calm and, frankly, vindicated. This past week as everything seemed to be spiraling against Team 2, he had started to fell left out. Everyone else had been "attacked" but him.

Tul had had his hotel room bugged along with the laptop their department had provided (for which Prin could be blamed). The enemy had tried to lure Ann away, bugged Wanna's highlighters, and offered a bribe Sukrit's family. Was he so old and useless that they weren't even going to bother with him? He had even consciously made sure that he could be seen by the company CCTV, so whoever was watching them would have an easier time to pick him out.

Thus, while everyone else looked concerned when one of Metinee Pakorn's minions had shown up in the office looking for him, Pongpat felt vindication. If not downright glee.

To be truthful, there was a part of him that admired Metinee Pakorn. She was beautiful, and she had a mind for business. Shilapath had grown its profits exponentially after she became part of the executive team. And she hadn't been promoted just because she was Channarong's wife.

Initially, Pongpat had been excited to see the future Queen of Pakorn (as one of the magazine articles had called her early on) join the company. Before she came, she had a reputation for her brilliance and her charity work. Clara had teased him for reading every single article he could find about her as if she were a celebrity, but Pongpat had told her he felt like he was connected to a fascinating family with a fascinating story, and that Metinee seemed like a character right out of a drama. Little did he know how accurate this would turn out to be.

Metinee had an undergraduate degree in business from Harvard when she married into the Pakorn family. Then when Plustor was young, she took him to London with her where she earned a Master's degree in economics from the London School of Economics and Political Science. Once Plustor was in school, she started working in various departments at Shilapath because she wanted to learn the ropes.

In the beginning, this had further endeared her to the people in the company because it appeared that the Queen of Pakorn was willing to start from the bottom just like everyone else. Even though everyone knew that she would eventually climb higher than the rest, it still helped people swallow the expected nepotism.

Also, no one would disagree on the fact that Metinee was a hard worker. She came early and stayed late. She seemed to be on a mission to the point that some also wondered why she worked as hard as she did.

Pongpat and others who carefully observed her realized that Metinee really didn't care what anyone thought about her except for Channarong. Everything she did, especially in the beginning, was to earn praise from him. What they did not and could not know was how desperately she wanted his praise and admiration.

When Channarong had told her that he didn't love her and shouldn't expect him to love her like he loved Apasiri, she thought she had accepted that, but really it was because deep down she didn't believe him. She figured that he might be broken hearted for a year maybe two, but she did not believe that after she showed him everything she could do that he would not fall for her.

She did the new wife/homemaker bit for a while while also talking to him intelligently about busines matters in the evenings, and he didn't change. He was pleasant and attentive but nothing more. Her next strategy was to give him an heir.

What Metinee hadn't known before she married him was that Channarong loved babies and kids (it was one of many things he and Tul didn't know they had in common). It was under his management that Shilapath had started its own onsite daycare and pre-school, and Metinee had heard that he would go there during breaks in work or when he had a stressful day to play with the kids.