The word “boss” rolled off his tongue with a certain playfulness—like iced eucalyptus, sharp yet carrying an intoxicatingly rich fragrance.
The hand he extended was clean and broad, with a silver pinky ring adorning one finger.
Ying Chan paused, choosing not to take his hand, and got out of the car on her own.
“Driver, come upstairs with me. I have something for you.”
Until she confirmed Jin Si’s identity, it was better not to be alone with him.
Jin Si looked at his empty hand, let out a scoffing laugh, and followed her.
Ying Chan lived on the 16th floor. After they arrived, Jin Si stepped out first and entered the code she’d just given him.
He checked the apartment thoroughly, inside and out, then said, “You can come in now.”
Ying Chan stepped back into her home after a week away, still feeling somewhat uneasy. She looked around again after entering, only relaxing once she confirmed there was truly no one else there.
At that moment, the phone in her hand vibrated.
Ye Han: “…”
Ying Chan: “?”
After a long stretch of “typing…” Ye Han ultimately said nothing and simply sent over an employment registration form.
Ying Chan tapped it open—it was indeed Jin Si’s information.
She read every word carefully. No issues whatsoever.
He really was just the bodyguard Ye Han had arranged for her.
Ying Chan finally let her guard down completely and casually replied, “I thought he was some young master from a wealthy family on a secret inspection.”
Little did she know, Ye Han was frantically nodding on the other end of the line—but she didn’t dare say it… that was the Jin family…
“It’s not quite that… he’s just a bodyguard from my company…”
She clung to a last thread of hope as she struggled, “But he hasn’t been on the job long and isn’t very professional. If you don’t like him, I can find you someone else later…”
That way, she wouldn’t be offending the Jin family either.
Unfortunately, Ying Chan didn’t catch her best friend’s hidden meaning. Her mind was entirely on “immediately”—otherwise, given Shang Lübai’s decisive style, he would have arranged things for her right away.
“No need, he’s fine. Draft a contract quickly and I’ll sign it right now—electronic signature.”
“…” Ye Han set down her phone, looked up at the ceiling, and let out a long sigh. Can’t help you there, girl.
Ying Chan signed the contract with fluid ease. Everything settled, she put down her phone and noticed the driver was still there. Only then did she remember she’d used an excuse to get him upstairs.
Thinking for a moment, she walked to the open kitchen and pulled out two cartons of milk: “Driver, take these home for your kids. It’s a brand I endorse—they sent way too much.”
The driver left happily with them.
Only then did Ying Chan turn to look at Jin Si.
Jin Si was leaning casually against the wall, his mask pulled down to his chin, the elastic band still hooked around his ear.
“I just signed the contract with your company.”
Jin Si smiled. “Thanks for picking me, boss.”
Ying Chan: “…”
Ying Chan: “By the way, where do you live?”
Jin Si: “I live at your place.”
Ying Chan: “? When did I agree to that?!”
Jin Si half-lidded his eyes and said nonchalantly, “I just checked on my phone—Heshan Bay is owner-occupied only, no rentals allowed. The nearest hotel is a twenty-minute drive away. You said ‘on call within five minutes’—did you want me to sleep at your doorstep every night?”
…Fair point.
Ying Chan scratched her cheek.
Of course, Jin Si didn’t actually want to live with her. He’d said it just to point out that she made rules without considering practical circumstances. But to his surprise, Ying Chan actually started seriously thinking it over.
He suddenly found this girl interesting.
One moment she was being cautious, the next she was actually considering his outrageous request?
And she was a celebrity too—wasn’t the entertainment industry supposed to be the most complicated place?
After considering it, Ying Chan still decided it wouldn’t work: “A man and a woman alone together—that’s not convenient. Too much could go wrong. You don’t know what I—”
The second half of her sentence was actually, “You don’t know I’m ‘hot-search bait’—paparazzi are always following me and snapping photos, and I’m constantly getting ‘exposed’ for fake relationships.”
But Jin Si looked like he understood something, and suddenly bent down.
The abruptly shortened distance made Ying Chan freeze, and the smile at the corner of his mouth carried a hint of something unreadable and teasing.
“Too much could… go wrong? From the very first meeting, I felt like the boss’s gaze at me wasn’t quite right. So the boss really does have designs on me, and now you’re afraid you can’t control yourself?”
Ying Chan: “?”
“Don’t worry, I’ll protect myself. I won’t let you succeed.”
Ying Chan: “?”
What the hell?
Ying Chan couldn’t believe what she was hearing, and the tips of her ears suddenly burned hot.
She only thought his voice sounded familiar! She only thought he didn’t look like someone who’d be a bodyguard! That’s why she’d given him a few extra looks!
She was assessing him—who was coveting him?!
He was so unremarkable, yet so confident.
Jin Si looked at that blush: “So easy to fluster.”
Ying Chan lightly bit the tip of her tongue and said, word by word, “MY! FRIEND! OWNS! AN APARTMENT! on the floor below my building. She’s not living there right now, so I’ll borrow it for you!”
Oh, she’s riled up.
Jin Si let out a muffled laugh. “Rent isn’t included in my 300k after-tax monthly salary.”
“I! KNOW!”
Clearly she was the employer, yet he was more of a “capitalist” than she was.
Ying Chan turned her head away in frustration, inexplicably feeling like she was keeping a kept man—giving him a place to stay and money to spend.
It was absurd.
If her parents found out, they’d break her legs.
But it was too last-minute today. Either she could send Jin Si back and wait to rent a place tomorrow, or let him stay at her place for one night.
Ying Chan agonized for a moment, but ultimately couldn’t bear the thought of being alone in this house.
—The psychological shadow from that day was too deep.
Last week, she’d returned to her home in Hucheng after finishing work.
She’d taken a shower and felt achy all over, assuming it was just exhaustion. But after sleeping and waking up, she discovered she had a fever.
Drowsy and lightheaded, she called Sister Wei to explain the situation, then remembered she had medicine at home and thought to look in the living room cabinet.
But the moment she stepped out of her room, she was shocked to see a completely strange man in the living room!
Caught completely off guard, she screamed in fright and ran back into the bedroom, locking the door behind her!
Sister Wei immediately notified the property management and rushed over with the police, managing to catch the man in time.
After questioning, it turned out he was a sasaeng fan—what people call an obsessive “fan.”
The man claimed he’d only come to take secret photos, but that she hadn’t fully closed the door when she entered the house, so he’d slipped in.
Though he kept insisting he hadn’t planned to do anything, the police found rope and a fruit knife in the bag he was carrying.
If Ying Chan hadn’t come out of her room—sick and half-asleep as she was—who knows what might have happened…
The more Ying Chan thought about it, the more terrified she became. In the end, she chose the latter option—letting Jin Si stay at her place for one night.
Actually, given that he was the bodyguard Ye Han had arranged for her, Ying Chan wouldn’t be too wary of him anyway.
She and Ye Han had grown up together since childhood—there was no way anyone she recommended could be a problem.
After showering, Ying Chan lay in bed and habitually logged into her burner account to browse online, checking what fans were talking about in the super topic.
Scrolling through, most of it was photos from today’s event.
But as she looked, she noticed a few that seemed off.
“Who’s the man in A-Chan’s car?”
The attached image was taken by a fan’s phone when she’d rolled down her window to wave goodbye—capturing Jin Si in the shot.
Jin Si had been wearing a mask, leaning against the seat back, and half of him was blocked by her, so only a blurry side profile was visible.
But his bone structure was striking, his nose bridge tall—even in such poor clarity, it was clear he was a young, handsome man.
The fans started discussing: “Could it be President Shang??”
“Definitely not. That style of dressing is very un-President Shang.”
“Couldn’t it be that President Shang dressed up in disguise so he could accompany A-Chan without being recognized?”
“If that’s the case, I’m totally shipping this! This is literally the Tomato Runaway CP coming to life!”
Seeing this, Ying Chan didn’t want to read any further. She turned off her phone and switched off the bedside lamp.
What she didn’t know was that while she slept, a new wave of public discourse sparked by that photo was already quietly unfolding…
·
Ying Chan had that dream again.