Morning light filtered through the gauze curtains, casting mottled patterns across the wooden floor of the guest room. When Jiang Yi opened his eyes, a brief moment of disorientation washed over him… this was not the familiar master bedroom, but the rarely used guest room.
Memory surged back like a tide. The unfamiliar men’s shoes in the entryway last night, Shu Jin’s disheveled nightdress, and that sharp, cloying scent of cologne lingering in the air.
He got up and pulled open the door. The aroma of food drifted in from the kitchen. Shu Jin, wearing an apron, was frying eggs. On the dining table sat his usual Americano and perfectly toasted bread. She turned back and gave him an overly bright smile, though the dark circles under her eyes betrayed her true state.
“You’re awake? Come try the breakfast I made. I learned how to cook sunny-side-up eggs these past two days while you were away.”
Jiang Yi sat down at the table, holding the coffee cup in his palm. The temperature was just right. He remained silent, watching his wife’s busy figure, watching her arrange the eggs into a heart shape and carefully cut the fruit into the shapes he liked.
Scenes like this had repeated countless times over the past five years. Every reunion after a short separation, Shu Jin would welcome him with such thoughtfully prepared breakfasts. Yet today, everything was veiled in a faint, indescribable falseness.
“About yesterday…” he had just begun when Shu Jin hurriedly cut him off.
“Oh right, hubby, I was just about to tell you about last night.” She pushed the plate toward him, her fingers unconsciously twisting the apron strings, “That was my high school classmate, Gu Chen. Do you remember? I mentioned him to you before.”
Jiang Yi lifted the coffee and took a sip, bitterness spreading across his tongue. He did not respond, waiting for her to continue weaving her lie.
Shu Jin sat down across from him, forcing a light tone, “He just came to this city recently to develop his career and hasn’t found a place to stay yet. Yesterday we happened to run into each other nearby. Seeing him dragging a suitcase like that, I felt bad, so I let him stay in the guest room for one night.”
As she spoke, she reached out to hold his hand, but Jiang Yi quietly avoided it.
“You know me… I’m soft-hearted.” She withdrew her hand awkwardly, her tone tinged with grievance, “And he came all this way. I couldn’t just let him sleep on the streets, could I?”
Jiang Yi set down the coffee cup. The porcelain struck the wooden table with a crisp sound. His gaze passed over Shu Jin and landed on the tightly shut master bedroom door. When he woke up earlier, that door had still been closed.
“So,” he finally said, his voice calm and emotionless, “you let a male high school classmate stay in our home?”
Shu Jin’s expression shifted, and she quickly explained, “It’s not what you think! We’re just ordinary classmates. We haven’t seen each other for years. And I had him stay in the guest room, you know that…”
“What I know is,” Jiang Yi interrupted, his gaze as cold as a frozen lake, “when I returned from my trip, I saw a stranger’s shoes in the entryway, and my wife ran out of the bedroom with her clothes in disarray.”
Those words instantly agitated Shu Jin. She shot to her feet, her eyes reddening, “Jiang Yi, what do you mean? You’re suspecting me? We’ve been married for five years, and this is how little you trust me?”
Her voice trembled, her performance so convincing that it almost shook him for a fleeting moment. In the past, he might have softened and stepped forward to comfort her.
But this morning, he had already checked the smart doorbell at the entrance. His phone now lay on the table, screen facing down.
“I’m just stating facts.” His tone remained steady, “You said he stayed in the guest room. Then why does your nightdress carry a scent that doesn’t belong in this home?”
Shu Jin’s face turned pale. Her fingers tightened around the edge of her apron, “Th… that might have happened when he passed by me. Jiang Yi, you’re really overthinking this. I was just helping someone out of kindness. How could you think of me like that?”
As she spoke, tears slid down at just the right moment… a tactic she had always used. Whenever they argued, she relied on tears to soften his heart.
But this time, Jiang Yi simply watched her cry, his gaze completely unmoved.
“Since you said he only stayed for one night,” he said slowly, “where is he now?”
Shu Jin’s crying stopped abruptly. She glanced nervously toward the master bedroom before quickly looking away, “He… he left early this morning. He couldn’t just stay here forever…”
At that moment, a faint sound came from the direction of the master bedroom… as if someone had accidentally bumped into something.
Jiang Yi’s eyes sharpened instantly. Shu Jin’s body stiffened, her breathing halting for a brief second.
“Looks like your ‘guest’ hasn’t left.” He stood up, his voice cold enough to freeze the air.
“It’s not like that, listen to me…” Shu Jin hurried to block him, tears welling up again, “Gu Chen… he might have come back to get something…”
Jiang Yi looked at her panicked expression and suddenly felt exhausted. In five years of marriage, he had never imagined facing such a scene.
He said nothing more. Instead, he picked up his phone, unlocked it, found a familiar number, and dialed. At the same time, he pressed the speaker button.
The call was answered after just one ring. Qin Feng’s efficient voice came through, “CEO Jiang, the surveillance footage has been sent to your email. Over the past three days, the same unfamiliar man has entered and exited the residential complex multiple times with Miss Shu. The earliest record shows him entering the building at 9:17 p.m. on the night you left for your trip, and there is no record of him leaving.”
Each word struck Shu Jin like a heavy hammer. Her face lost all color at a visible speed, even her lips turning pale.
Jiang Yi’s gaze never left her face. He watched as her expression shifted from panic to despair, and finally into a lifeless, ashen white.
“Additionally,” Qin Feng’s voice continued from the phone, “do you need me to inform property security to come upstairs?”
Shu Jin shook her head frantically. Large tears rolled down her cheeks, but she could no longer utter a single word in defense. She clutched the edge of the table, her knuckles turning white from the force, her entire body swaying as if she might collapse at any moment.
Jiang Yi watched her in silence. He remembered the day he proposed, when she had thrown herself into his arms wearing the ring, saying that the luckiest thing in her life was marrying him. He remembered staying awake all night by her bedside when she was sick, afraid she might feel even the slightest discomfort.
And now, she stood before him, lying for another man… and even after being exposed, she still refused to speak a single truth.
“No need for now,” he said into the phone, his voice so calm it felt unfamiliar even to himself, “that’s all.”
After the call ended, the living room fell into a deathly silence. Only Shu Jin’s suppressed sobs and the occasional chirping of birds outside the window could be heard.
Jiang Yi put away his phone and gave one last look at the woman he had once been willing to give everything for. Then he turned and walked toward the entryway.
The moment his hand touched the doorknob, Shu Jin finally found her voice, calling out through tears, “Jiang Yi! Listen to my explanation…”
He did not turn back. He only said calmly, “Until you’re willing to tell the truth, there’s nothing for us to discuss.”
The door closed softly behind him, cutting off the place he had once called home.
As the elevator descended, Jiang Yi leaned against the cold wall of the cabin and slowly closed his eyes.
His phone vibrated in his pocket… a message from Qin Feng with surveillance screenshots.
He opened the image and saw Shu Jin intimately holding the arm of that unfamiliar man, her smile dazzling… painfully so.
The timestamp on the first photo clearly showed the night he had left for his business trip.