Completely exhausted after returning to her tiny apartment, Shi Ying kicked off her shoes, tossed aside her bag, and collapsed onto the sofa.
She lay there playing on her phone for a while. Only after the sky had darkened did she finally drag herself up to take a bath.
Warm water wrapped around her slender body. Leaning back against the tub, Shi Ying let out a long breath, feeling utterly comfortable.
The misty steam washed away the fatigue clinging to her body, and her eyelids gradually began to droop with sleepiness.
Ripples swayed gently across the water. The rising heat flushed her fair cheeks pink. In her hazy daze, Shi Ying vaguely felt someone embrace her from behind.
No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t open her eyes. All she could feel were fierce, burning kisses landing across her back and neck one after another.
Suddenly, a pair of arms wrapped around her waist, lifting her up before lowering her back down again.
“Mmh…”
The instant the sound escaped her lips, Shi Ying froze.
That soft, breathy, coquettish voice…
Was that really her?
Very quickly, though, she lost the ability to think about anything else.
She felt like a tiny boat tossed helplessly upon rough waves, drifting with the current—one moment swept high by the storm, the next crashing heavily back down again.
……
When Shi Ying opened her eyes again, she realized her whole body felt cold.
The water in the bathtub had already gone chilly.
She had fallen asleep while soaking in the bath.
Sitting up, she stared at her reflection in the mirror—her cheeks flushed crimson, her eyes misty with tears—and felt both disbelief and overwhelming embarrassment.
Why had she had another erotic dream?!
Shi Ying nearly lost her mind.
Which bastard was flirting with her in her dreams every single day?!
***
Monday arrived with Shi Ying looking completely wilted as she walked toward the company.
She hadn’t slept well these past two nights. The moment she closed her eyes, she would fall into those strange erotic dreams again.
In the dream, that man called her “baby” and “wife.” While cursing him shamelessly in her heart, she still couldn’t stop herself from sinking deeper under the rhythm of his movements.
Every time she woke up, her body would be covered in sticky sweat.
By the time she entered the company building, she looked as though all her life force had been drained away. She shuffled listlessly with the crowd toward the elevators.
She sat down at her workstation in a daze. Jiang Mingxue and Su Wan still hadn’t arrived yet, though the president’s office door already stood open. She had no idea whether anyone was inside.
After hesitating for a while, Shi Ying decided it was safer to stay quietly at her desk for now.
She absolutely did not want to get called inside again.
Honestly, she really hoped Secretary Jiang had already returned.
Unfortunately, heaven clearly had no intention of taking pity on her.
Because before her chair had even warmed up, a familiar voice came from inside the office.
“Shi Ying. Come in.”
Shi Ying let out a miserable groan, patted her stiff face, and lowered her head as she slowly dragged herself inside.
Shang Chenyan noticed the dark circles beneath her eyes immediately.
They had only gone one day without seeing each other. How had she managed to wear herself down into this state already?
Sure enough, without him around, she still didn’t know how to take care of herself.
“Didn’t rest well over the weekend?” the man’s deep voice sounded out.
Shi Ying blanked for a second before replying, “Not really… I just slept a bit late. President Shang, did you need something?”
Shang Chenyan scanned through a document in his hand without even lifting his head.
“Jiang Wen went on a business trip. You’ll still be staying by my side and assisting me this week.”
“Go make me a cup of coffee.”
Shi Ying responded with a weak “okay” and resigned herself to heading for the break room to make his coffee.
When she returned carrying the cup, she stood across the desk from him and was just about to set it down when the man tapped the space near his right hand with his knuckles.
“Put it here.”
Shi Ying pouted silently.
Was he seriously too lazy to reach for it himself?
She could only walk around the desk to his side and place the coffee in the spot most convenient for him.
Just as she turned to leave, Shi Ying suddenly felt something catch against her foot. Her body lurched forward uncontrollably.
At that exact moment, someone abruptly grabbed her wrist.
The force from behind stopped her from falling forward, but her body staggered backward several steps instead, sending her crashing straight into the man’s arms.
An arm naturally wrapped around her waist.
The moment she lifted her head, their eyes met directly.
Shi Ying froze.
Beneath her were the man’s firm, powerful thighs. At some point, her hand had clenched the expensive white dress shirt he was wearing, leaving a deep wrinkle in the fabric.
“S-Sorry!” Shi Ying panicked and immediately tried to stand.
But right then, the sharp sound of high heels clicking against tile echoed through the empty floor, painfully piercing to the ears.
An angry female voice rang out from outside the office.
“Brother Chenyan, do you really have to take things this far?!”
The voice sounded somewhat familiar.
Before Shi Ying could even turn around, she suddenly felt a hand clasp the back of her neck, pressing her head firmly into the man’s chest.
“Don’t move.”
The man’s thin lips were practically brushing against her ear as he spoke.
The moment his words fell, Meng Shuyan stormed into the office furiously.
But the instant she saw the scene inside, she froze in place. All the words she had been about to say became lodged in her throat.
“Y-You… what are you doing?”
Shi Ying recognized the voice immediately.
It was the woman who had tried to hit her with the car on Saturday.
Keeping one hand pressed against the back of Shi Ying’s head, Shang Chenyan lazily lifted his eyes toward the furious woman.
“Who allowed you to come in?”
“So this is the Meng family’s upbringing? Barging into someone else’s workplace without permission?”
Meng Shuyan staggered back two small steps.
The only reason she had been able to enter in the first place was because she used Cheng Suyun’s name.
“Brother Chenyan, who is she?”
“That doesn’t seem to concern you.”
Shang Chenyan pressed the office phone on the desk and spoke calmly.
“Come upstairs and escort her out.”
Meng Shuyan pointed at Shi Ying’s back as she demanded angrily, “You refused the marriage alliance because you already have another woman outside? You even brought her to the company?”
“Then what about that woman we saw the other day? What is she to you?”
“You terminated the cooperation with the Meng family because of that woman that day, didn’t you?”
Shang Chenyan was getting a headache from her shouting.
He spoke indifferently, “Saturday and today make twice already, Miss Meng. You came uninvited both times. Was I too polite before, which made you think you could behave this recklessly?”
Meeting his calm, emotionless gaze, Meng Shuyan suddenly felt a chill spread through her body.
In just one weekend, several major projects jointly operated between the Meng family and the Shang family had already been suspended.
Back then, those projects had only been possible because of the Shang family’s investment. Now that the funding chain had broken, if they couldn’t produce enough money to fill the gap later, all the effort they had poured into those projects beforehand would go completely to waste.
How much money would the Meng family lose because of this?
And those opportunistic people who followed the wind and shifted with circumstances—once they saw the Shang family withdrawing investment, who knew whether they would start suspecting that something had happened to the Meng family? Securing future investments would become far more difficult.
Shi Ying listened in utter confusion.
Had the two families basically fallen out completely?
Shang Chenyan’s slightly rough fingertips slowly traced along the back of her neck, making shivers run through Shi Ying’s body one after another. Yet she didn’t dare move at all.
Thankfully, she hadn’t tied her hair into a ponytail today. Her long black hair was loose around her shoulders, otherwise she definitely would’ve been recognized.
She had absolutely no desire to get dragged into Shang Chenyan’s love-hate drama.
Shang Chenyan’s gaze remained cold.
“No matter whose name you used to get in here today, if there’s a next time, I’ll make the Meng family disappear entirely.”
Before Meng Shuyan could say anything else, security guards had already arrived.
Shang Chenyan ordered coldly, “Take her away. And if unauthorized people are allowed upstairs again in the future, none of you need to keep your jobs either.”
“Sorry, President Shang.”
Several security guards grabbed Meng Shuyan and began dragging her outside. Struggling fiercely, Meng Shuyan shouted:
“Shang Chenyan, don’t go too far!”
“Aren’t you afraid your mother will find out what you’ve done?!”