“Let’s break up. You’re too skilled—it’s exhausting being with you.”
Jiang Shining’s voice sounded calmly.
Behind her, the man who was helping her put on her dress paused as he zipped it up.
A brief silence fell over the hotel room.
Normally, he would have argued back by now, but this time, he remained silent.
Jiang Shining’s eyes instantly lit up.
She turned around with a look of pleasant surprise. “You agree?”
The man on the bed was shirtless, his chest broad and his muscles well-defined. His eyes carried a wild, sensual charm, and his gaze was both arrogant and lazy.
No matter how many times she looked at him, his face and physique—somewhere between mature and youthful—perfectly matched Jiang Shining’s taste.
The man scoffed. “What do you think?”
He zipped the dress all the way up in one swift motion and grabbed her wrist firmly with one hand.
“You’ve brought up breaking up twenty times this week.”
“Last time, you said my skills were too poor, so I improved. Now you’re saying they’re too good. You use me and then toss me aside. Jiang Shining, aren’t you going too far?”
Qin Wang’s eyes turned cold.
Jiang Shining felt that Qin Wang’s gaze made her look like a heartless woman who’d discard someone after getting what she wanted.
So, he still didn’t agree.
Disappointment flickered in Jiang Shining’s eyes. She glanced at her wrist and frowned delicately.
“If you don’t want to break up, then don’t. You’re hurting me!”
“It hurts.”
She pouted in complaint.
The next second, the grip on her wrist loosened.
But Qin Wang’s dark, brooding eyes remained fixed on her.
Jiang Shining rubbed her wrist and sighed. Ignoring his gaze, she slipped on the white sneakers placed on the floor and headed toward the door.
Watching her movements, Qin Wang frowned.
“Where are you going?”
Jiang Shining didn’t look back. “Home.”
She pulled open the hotel room door and looked out at the sunlight.
The weather was so nice—she even felt like going home to eat the jianbing guozi her mom made.
Behind her, Qin Wang, still on the bed, watched Jiang Shining’s departing figure with a dark expression, his fists clenching and unclenching. He took a deep breath before finally speaking.
“I’ll go back with you.”
Hearing this, Jiang Shining shifted her gaze from the sun back to him.
Qin Wang made no effort to hide himself from her as he picked up the black tank top that had fallen on the floor and pulled it on.
The motorcycle weaved through the old neighborhood before finally stopping in front of a rundown apartment building.
Only then did Jiang Shining release her arms from around his waist.
She got off the bike.
Their footsteps echoed one after the other as Qin Wang remained unusually silent the entire way.
He didn’t speak.
Jiang Shining didn’t say anything either.
Even divorce had a three-day cooling-off period—if they were going to break up, they should cool down too.
The two were next-door neighbors.
She lived in Unit 501, Qin Wang in Unit 502.
Jiang Shining stood in front of her apartment door and turned to look at Qin Wang.
“I’m home.”
Qin Wang still didn’t speak.
He had been like this since their first meeting—taciturn, with a faint sense of detachment.
It seemed only when she was in trouble—or, more accurately, when she brought up breaking up—that he showed strong emotional reactions.
Jiang Shining still remembered his reaction the first time she mentioned breaking up with Qin Wang.
It was as if he wanted to tear her apart and devour her.
But, thankfully.
She was fine.
Jiang Shining pulled open her apartment door and walked straight inside.
Click. The door closed, cutting off Qin Wang’s gaze from the other side.
…
“Mom, I’m back.”
The apartment was dark—the small unit didn’t get much natural light.
Click. Jiang Shining turned on the light.
The thirty-square-meter apartment could be taken in at a glance, and the room was empty—no one was there.
Jiang Shining walked toward the kitchen. On the kitchen table, three dishes were covered with plastic wrap to keep them warm. In one corner lay only a note.
【Xiao Ning, Mom will be setting up the stall a bit longer. You go ahead and eat.】
“Not home again.”
Jiang Shining was already used to her mother, who struggled to make money yet worked tirelessly at her street stall.
“Sigh—”
Jiang Shining sighed, her expression somewhat complicated.
“If you’re heading in the wrong direction, all your effort is wasted.”
Sitting at the dining table, Jiang Shining lifted the plastic wrap and picked up a piece of braised pork.
As it entered her mouth, it was tender and soft.
Jiang Shining was practically moved to tears.
“So delicious!”
“No wonder she’s the original mother who maxed out her housewife cooking skills.”
This was far more fragrant than anything she’d eaten at restaurants or hotels in her previous life.
She had transmigrated into a book.
In her previous life, she grew up relying on the kindness of others. After accidentally reading a middle-aged CEO’s melodramatic novel titled The Runaway Wife Returns with a Secret Child Twenty Years Later, she transmigrated into that very book.
And she became a pivotal character in the story.
She transmigrated into the ‘secret child.’
And a ‘secret child’ who had already grown up twenty years later.
As for the runaway wife heroine, that was her mother, Jiang Wan, also the male lead’s white moonlight.
In the original story, the original mother got drunk at a CEO’s gathering, spent a wild night with him at a hotel, and then immediately ran away. Later, she discovered she was pregnant. The CEO’s family received the news first at the hospital and strongly opposed the mother, who came from a poor background, hoping the CEO would comply with the family’s arranged marriage.
The original mother decided to hide her pregnancy and raise the child alone.
Thus began the “rental apartment” life, and thus came the original host.
Living long-term in a small apartment while raising a daughter took a toll on the original mother’s health.
Faced with her sick mother and impoverished home, the original host constantly complained under these circumstances. Finally, at the age of twenty, she defied her mother’s objections and chose to run away from home.
Only to be killed by a truck on the road.
After the original host’s death, the mother was heartbroken. At the funeral, she coughed up blood and fainted on the spot.
When she woke up, she encountered the CEO father of her child.
The CEO, holding the investigated truth, looked at the photo of his daughter and knelt before the white moonlight he had searched for twenty years. After that, he cleared all obstacles and brought his white moonlight wife home.
But the original mother grew depressed in the villa. Already ill and further devastated, her health deteriorated beyond recovery. She passed away the second year after returning to the family villa.
The CEO father’s hair turned white overnight, and he spent his days reminiscing over photos of his wife and child.
…
When she read that book, Jiang Shining wanted to gouge her eyes out.
The explosive plot, the old-fashioned melodramatic tragic romance.
And the ending was a BE—totally inhumane!!
If posted on a web novel platform, no one would read it.
If it weren’t for the fact that the ‘secret child’ shared her name, Jiang Shining wouldn’t have given it a second glance.
But now she had transmigrated into the book.
After the original host was beaten bloody by local thugs, she became the original host.
She had transmigrated three months ago.
In a chaotic neighborhood, with a gentle, sickly, beautiful single mother in her thirties, it was hard for Jiang Shining alone to ensure their survival. So, at that time, she made a decision: she would latch onto the local gang leader.
And coincidentally, her next-door neighbor was the gang leader of the area.
A middle school education, young and tough, and a man of few words—a cool guy.
With his eight-pack abs and handsome looks, Jiang Shining immediately set her sights on Qin Wang. Under her pursuit, the two began dating.
However… starting was easy.
Breaking up was not.
Jiang Shining originally thought that given her cool neighbor’s personality, if she proposed a breakup, he would turn and leave without a second thought. But unexpectedly, this guy stubbornly refused to agree.
She didn’t want to live a hard life; she wanted to return to her wealthy family and live as the young lady she once was.
Now, there was only one day left until the plot where her wealthy father would come knocking.
“Sigh—”
Another sigh echoed in the apartment as Jiang Shining ate her meal, feeling utterly helpless.
Just then, her phone rang.
The contact name read: 【Little White Flower Mom】
Jiang Shining answered, “Hello?”
On the other end of the line, faint sobbing could be heard. “Xiao Ning, wuwuwuwu, my stall was smashed…”
Jiang Shining’s face instantly darkened.