Chapter 15

Gu Huai’s single sentence stirred up a storm.

The dinner table was suddenly charged with tension; everyone had their own thoughts.

He Songjun broke into a smile. “Your father already said he wanted to transfer you back to headquarters. It’s a waste to keep you at the branch office, Yanqiu. You really have to work hard this time. Look at your brother; he’s still slogging away at the branch office. If he had even half your talent, he wouldn’t have made so little progress for so long.”

Her pale, slender face wore the same impeccable, gentle smile as she raised the goblet beside her. “Congratulations, Yanqiu.”

Gu Yanqiu glanced at Gu Huai; Gu Huai gave a slight nod.

So Gu Yanqiu lifted her glass and clinked it lightly against his.

“Thank you.” Proper, restrained, and courteous.

Lin Yuewei blocked out everything around her and quietly watched this family perform. The Gu family didn’t talk much while eating; aside from the few words stirred up by Gu Huai’s topic, the table remained silent, so quiet that even the clink of bowls and chopsticks was kept to a minimum.

Lin Yuewei’s appetite would have needed to be miraculous to stay intact in such an oppressive atmosphere. She ate just over half a bowl of rice, pacing herself so she finished at the same time as Gu Yanqiu. Silently, she prayed that Gu Huai absolutely would not try to have a talk with her, his daughter-in-law. As expected, he didn’t. Just as she was thinking about slipping away unnoticed, He Songjun called out to her.

“Xiaowei.”

Ever since Lin Yuewei learned that this mistress and her son had planted listening devices in Gu Yanqiu’s room, her disgust for this family only deepened. She didn’t like Gu Yanqiu much, but she disliked this family even more. She needed to give Gu Huai face; she certainly didn’t need to give a mistress any. If she could spend more than twenty years as a kept woman outside, then she probably didn’t have much backing at home and wasn’t afraid of offending anyone.

She especially hated that form of address. Every time she heard it, it reminded her of that song her father used to hum in childhood. Grinding her back teeth together, she turned around slowly with a smile. “Auntie, what is it?”

“Wait here for me.” He Songjun turned and walked gracefully toward the bedroom. She had a slender waist and a generous figure; with the high slit of her qipao, a pair of jade-like legs flashed in and out of view as she moved. Her allure was undiminished; if anything, she carried more mature charm than a young girl.

Any man would have let his eyes linger.

Lin Yuewei wasn’t a man, and she didn’t like femme fatales. She looked at Gu Yanqiu standing beside her instead. Gu Yanqiu lifted a brow very slightly, and Lin Yuewei immediately looked away from her and back at He Songjun, sighing over those legs and that waist; then she compared Gu Yanqiu with her in her mind.

Strictly speaking, Gu Yanqiu always wore long sleeves and long pants, at most rolling up a shirt cuff to expose a stretch of white forearm. Why wasn’t it summer now? Lin Yuewei appeared to be waiting attentively, but in truth her mind had already wandered off a thousand miles.

Gu Yanqiu slowly rolled the Buddhist beads in her hand. Her other hand, hanging at her side, lifted slightly and gently touched Lin Yuewei’s arm.

Lin Yuewei straightened her expression and watched as He Songjun approached with a box in hand.

By the usual script, Lin Yuewei guessed it was probably some gift from mother-in-law to daughter-in-law. Sure enough, when the box was opened, there was a jade bracelet inside. The color and quality made it look expensive. He Songjun held the bracelet in her hand and said, as expected, “This was handed down from my maiden family. I originally planned to give it to Feiquan’s wife when he got married, but now...” She skipped over the rest of the sentence. “I’m also considered Yanqiu’s elder, and since she married first, this bracelet will go to you. May you live in harmony, and may your marriage be bless—”

Lin Yuewei keenly felt the chill radiating from Gu Yanqiu beside her; from the corner of her eye, she saw Gu Yanqiu’s fingers digging into the gaps between the beads.

Lin Yuewei lightly dodged the hand He Songjun reached out to take her wrist.

This time, didn’t Gu Yanqiu owe her another favor? Lin Yuewei sneered inwardly.

“Auntie.”

“What is it?” He Songjun smiled faintly.

“My biological mother’s bones are still barely cold,” Lin Yuewei deliberately emphasized the word biological. “It doesn’t seem appropriate for me to accept your gift like this. You’d better keep your bracelet for your own daughter-in-law.”

To show warmth, Lin Yuewei even patted the back of He Songjun’s hand, making the whole thing look like a harmonious mother-in-law and daughter-in-law exchange.

He Songjun’s smile froze on her face.

He Songjun had always been smooth and tactful. She genuinely wanted to build a good relationship with this Miss Lin of the Lin family, and even Gu Huai didn’t know she had prepared this gift. The bracelet was indeed valuable, but it wasn’t a family heirloom. Her family was ordinary; both her parents had been farmers all their lives, living off the land. She alone had made her way out, and once she had, she had never gone back. Where had she gotten the money for the bracelet? She’d saved it over the years from the living expenses Gu Huai gave her. Seventy to eight hundred thousand; it wasn’t cheap.

She hadn’t expected Lin Yuewei to suddenly change her attitude and embarrass her so publicly.

Gu Feiquan’s face changed too; his fists clenched behind his back. After a long while, he finally loosened them again.

He Songjun’s smile only stiffened for an instant before it returned to normal, bright and cheerful. “You’re still being formal with me. Fine, suit yourself.” She nonchalantly took the jade bracelet back and set it on the tea table with casual ease, showing not the slightest awkwardness; that alone revealed how skilled she was.

The whole family was full of nothing but hard nuts to crack. While Lin Yuewei wanted to keep her distance, a trace of competitiveness also rose in her. She wasn’t some clueless sweet heroine; how could she fail to see the undercurrents within this family? With too little information in hand, she couldn’t analyze things in detail. If she weren’t going to a program in a couple of days, she might even have spent her free time sparring with He Songjun and Gu Feiquan, helping Gu Yanqiu resolve this sooner and, incidentally, shortening the duration of her marriage.

What a pity; all of this would have to be faced by Gu Yanqiu herself.

Lin Yuewei glanced at Gu Yanqiu, who kept clutching her Buddhist beads all day long, and always felt a faint worry that she would be bullied. Could she really achieve her goal?

***

The night outside was deep and dark.

Gu Feiquan loosened his collar, hooked a finger around an opened can of beer on the bay window, and tipped his head back to gulp it down.

He Songjun pushed open his bedroom door and walked in uninvited. She strode forward and snatched the can from his hand, then lowered her voice to scold him. “What are you doing? If your father sees you like this, do you want to be reprimanded?”

“Reprimanded?” Gu Feiquan looked down at his now-empty hand and let out a sharp, mocking laugh. “Does he even have the time to reprimand me? I drink in my room and don’t even get nervous when I hear footsteps, because there’s no way he’d ever come into my room.”

“How can you talk like that? He’s your father!”

Gu Feiquan didn’t snatch the beer back. Instead, he reached for another can, opened it, and took a drink. “He’s your sugar daddy, not my father.”

“Gu Feiquan!”

Gu Feiquan picked at his ear with his pinky, stretched out his long legs on the bay window, and the obedient look in his brows and eyes revealed a viciousness ordinary people never got to see. He sneered. “He Songjun sounds better to me. There’s nobody else here anyway.”

He Songjun was furious beyond words. Her hand shot up high, but Gu Feiquan didn’t care in the slightest; he continued drinking his beer. The liquid trickled down his throat and soaked into his shirt collar, and before long the fabric over his chest was soaked through.

That slap landed on her own face instead. Crack; the sound was loud and crisp.

“Mom!” Gu Feiquan was instantly sober. He stopped her next move first and said in a low voice, “What are you doing?”

He Songjun’s eyes were filled with tears as she said in self-reproach, “It’s all Mom’s fault. I didn’t give you a good background, but son, we’ve already come this far. We finally have the best chance, and you can’t give up.”

“Mom only has you as a son.”

“Your father isn’t the kind of man anyone can spend a lifetime with. For the rest of my life, who else can I depend on besides you?”

“Feiquan.” He Songjun gripped Gu Feiquan’s arm, her gaze hot and frenzied, filled to the brim with ambition. “Whether it’s education or intelligence, how are you any worse than that dead woman’s daughter? This Gu family should have been yours from the start. You’re just taking back what belongs to you; what’s wrong with that?”

“I know.” Gu Feiquan gathered up the beer cans from the bay window, washed his hands and face, and changed into a fresh shirt. He looked every bit the handsome, polished young man.

He Songjun examined him and said with a satisfied smile, “My son is so handsome.”

Gu Feiquan smiled, sat down at the small desk in the room, and opened his laptop. “Then I’m going to work. I have a project in hand; Dad asked me about it before, so he should care about it. I’ll make this project very good.”

He Songjun stroked the young man’s soft short hair. “Mom believes in you. I’m heading back; your father should be looking for me.”

Gu Feiquan: “Mm.”

Just as He Songjun’s hand touched the doorknob, she turned back and added, “Oh, Feiquan; next time you drink, don’t drink beer anymore. Drink red wine. Red wine looks more cultured.”

Gu Feiquan: “...Okay.”

Inside, he thought blankly: But I don’t even like drinking red wine.

He Songjun clenched a fist and cheered him on. “Son, go for it.”

Gu Feiquan turned back and focused intently on the computer, the cursor moving across the screen.

***

“Just now, thank you.” After they returned to the room, Gu Yanqiu sincerely thanked Lin Yuewei. Her brows and eyes were vivid, completely unlike her expression downstairs.

Lin Yuewei knew this change was because of her, and a trace of secret pleasure surged in her heart. But she still remembered how, before dinner, Gu Yanqiu had just put her down soundly, leaving her speechless, all with that whole “my family matters are none of your business” attitude. And now she knew how to thank her? Changing faces shouldn’t be this fast.

She needed her, so she thanked her in every possible way; when she didn’t need her, she kicked her aside. Since when were things that simple?

Lin Yuewei’s eyes darted as the corners of her lips curled into a not-very-kind smile. “How are you planning to repay me?”

“How do you want me to repay you?” Gu Yanqiu toyed unhurriedly with the Buddhist beads in her hand.

Lin Yuewei beckoned her over, and Gu Yanqiu leaned her ear close to Lin Yuewei’s lips.

Lin Yuewei exhaled warmly against her ear and said a few words.

Gu Yanqiu’s eyes widened; a flush rose hotly over her fair ear.

“Th-This...”

Author’s note: Actually, the most pitiful one is Gu Huai. The mistress doesn’t love him, his son doesn’t love him, and now even his daughter doesn’t love him anymore ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Guess what dirty thing Miss Lin said ╰(*°▽°*)╯