Hearing the sound of the call ending, Shen Jinyu was taken aback.
His wife, who had a thin skin but valued face above all else, seemed to be telling him through her actions that his words weren’t even worth a fart.
Leaning back slightly against the chair, Shen Jinyu’s gaze fell on the phone screen as it dimmed from bright to dark. After a moment, he raised his hand to pinch the bridge of his nose, letting out an inexplicable soft chuckle.
Hearing a knock at the door, he reined in the barely noticeable curve of his lips. “Come in!”
Shen Yu pushed the door open and walked in, looking to be in a good mood. “Brother, I came at just the right time. I heard from Assistant Song that you just finished a meeting.”
Shen Jinyu nodded and asked, “How did things go last night?”
“Not settled yet, but it went fairly smoothly.” Shen Yu let out a sigh. “Last night at Jinjing International, I got quite a bit of wine poured on me by the GC Esports Club’s out-of-town representative.”
Shen Jinyu looked up at him. “You were negotiating at Jinjing last night?”
Shen Yu seemed to think of something, raised his hand to rub the back of his neck, and the expression on his face could almost be described as bashful.
Shen Jinyu frowned and was about to ask when he heard Shen Yu say, “Brother, how did you pursue sister-in-law back then?”
As soon as the words left his mouth, he answered his own question: “Asking you is a waste of time. I forgot for a moment—you and sister-in-law had a quick marriage. It doesn’t seem like you ever pursued her before she went and got the marriage certificate with you. And…”
Seeing Shen Yu hesitate mid-sentence, Shen Jinyu tapped the desk with his slender, well-defined fingers and said impatiently, “And what?”
Shen Yu replied with an awkward smile, “And, brother, you don’t really seem like the type to chase after a girl.”
Shen Jinyu let out a cold scoff, clearly having no interest in chatting about something as meaningless as pursuing someone.
It wasn’t until after Shen Yu left that Shen Jinyu remembered that on their first wedding anniversary, he had been abroad and had only sent someone to deliver a necklace to Ji Qingtang.
He had always thought anniversaries were unnecessary, and with work keeping him busy, he hadn’t even sent Ji Qingtang a single message that day.
It was only after Shen Yu’s rambling just now that he realized that for Ji Qingtang—a young lady from a wealthy family who insisted on lighting scented candles even for a bath, all for the sake of ceremony—she probably cared quite a lot about anniversaries.
On a whim, he opened Ji Qingtang’s WeChat.
When she received the message from Shen Jinyu, Ji Qingtang’s first reaction was that his account had been hacked.
Cheap Shen Duck: [No business dinner tonight. I’ll be back at Changlan Residence for dinner.]
Cheap Shen Duck: [Anything you’d like to eat? I’ll have someone prepare it in advance.]
Ji Qingtang frowned. What’s gotten into Shen Jinyu? I don’t care where you eat.
Expressionless, she typed away furiously:
[Oh]
[Don’t worry about me]
[I’m eating out tonight.]
Shen Jinyu, who was in the middle of searching for how to celebrate a wedding anniversary, looked down at the messages popping up on his phone screen. He froze for a few seconds, then frowned and closed the search page.
Nightfall draped over the bustling city, with layers of light and shadow sketching the metropolis into something illusory and extravagant.
In a restaurant on the 56th floor, Ji Qingtang and Meng Xiao sat facing each other by the floor-to-ceiling window, able to take in the full night view of the city with just a turn of their heads.
Meng Xiao raised her phone to show Ji Qingtang. “Yan Xuejiao is really going all out this time—three million for a jade bangle. She’s really splashing the cash. With all this media coverage, she’s certainly heating things up for Old Mrs. Shen’s birthday celebration.”
Ji Qingtang picked up her napkin and dabbed lightly at the corner of her mouth. “This sister-in-law of mine is full of nothing but schemes for competing for favor and showing off. Our Old Mrs. Shen didn’t hold a birthday banquet last year, and this year happens to be her seventy-seventh birthday. Yan Xuejiao is definitely going to put on a good show in front of the whole family.”
Meng Xiao flipped through the photos in the media reports. “I have to say, the quality of that jade bracelet is really quite good. Setting aside whether your Old Mrs. Shen will like it or not, with that kind of thoughtfulness alone, she’s bound to earn herself some nice words.”
Ji Qingtang spoke indifferently. “That jade bracelet might look quite good to ordinary people like us, but in the eyes of our Old Mrs. Shen, it wouldn’t even catch her attention.”
Meng Xiao put down her phone and asked, “Have you prepared a birthday gift for your Old Mrs. Shen?”
“Of course I have.” Ji Qingtang said. “Among the entire Shen family, our Old Mrs. Shen is on a whole different level. I genuinely adore our Old Mrs. Shen from the bottom of my heart.”
Meng Xiao nodded, then suddenly caught sight of a mark on the side of Ji Qingtang’s neck. Her eyes turned teasing as she joked, “Absence makes the heart grow fonder—I think President Shen is also showing his fondness for you from the bottom of his heart, with actions to match.”
Looking at the woman sitting across from her, blinking her eyes like she had some kind of eye condition, Ji Qingtang said expressionlessly, “You don’t even have a driver’s license, but you sure know how to use your turn signals.”
“I do have a driver’s license,” Meng Xiao instinctively retorted. Realizing Ji Qingtang was telling her to stop blinking, she laughed. “Setting aside the fact that you’re not one to tolerate even the slightest grievance, just with that mouth of yours alone, you won’t suffer any losses in the Shen family.”
Ji Qingtang found it amusing. “Do you know what principle my mother spent most of her life teaching me?”
Meng Xiao looked at her. “What?”
Ji Qingtang sat up slightly straighter. “Better to be a spoiled young miss that everyone finds hard to stomach than to be a woman who bows her head and yields at every turn.”
At Changlan Residence, Shen Jinyu sat at the dining table. He had just picked up his chopsticks when he heard movement at the entrance.
Seeing Ji Qingtang walk in, he looked up and said, “You’re back pretty early.”
Ji Qingtang glanced at him as she walked toward the kitchen island. “Yes, well, I was afraid you might impose a curfew on me again, President Shen.”
Shen Jinyu had grown accustomed to her speaking to him with hidden barbs. Previously, he would simply ignore it, but today he was in a rare mood to tease her. “That’s not a bad suggestion. I can consider it.”
Ji Qingtang shot him a look, set down the glass of water she’d been drinking from, walked over to the dining table, casually pulled out a chair and sat down. She smiled sweetly at him. “President Shen, I have another good suggestion. Would you like to hear it?”
Shen Jinyu raised an eyebrow and looked at her. “Even if I said no, would that stop you from saying it?”
Ji Qingtang gave him a look that said “absolutely not” and said, “When you’re not so busy with work, could you—”
Remembering what Shen Yu had said in his office today—”No matter how busy you are with work, you should still make time to accompany your sister-in-law”—Shen Jinyu instinctively finished her sentence, “Spend more time with you?”
Ji Qingtang’s voice rang out at the same time. “Not act like you’ve lost your mind?”
Time seemed to freeze for a few seconds.
From the expression on Ji Qingtang’s face that clearly said “look at you, being ridiculous again,” Shen Jinyu began to wonder why on earth he had listened to Shen Yu ramble on for over an hour.
Ji Qingtang cleared her throat lightly and quickly changed the subject to cover her embarrassment. “So many dishes—are you sure you can finish all of that?”
Shen Jinyu asked in a calm tone, “Want to eat a bit more?”
The dishes at the restaurant she’d gone to with Meng Xiao hadn’t suited her palate at all. Ji Qingtang had only eaten about thirty percent full, and she’d originally planned to have the household auntie make a late-night snack anyway.
Hearing this, she immediately picked up the bowl and chopsticks beside her. “Since you’re begging me, I can’t very well refuse you.”
A faint trace of amusement surfaced in Shen Jinyu’s eyes as he reached out and placed a piece of fish in her bowl.
Mealtimes had always been when the two of them were most harmonious.
Watching Ji Qingtang eat with such relish, Shen Jinyu raised a question: “Did you eat dinner out and then come back?”
Ji Qingtang wrapped shredded meat in a sheet of tofu skin and gave a matter-of-fact “mm.”
Shen Jinyu noticed a bit of sauce at the corner of her mouth and pulled out two tissues to wipe it away.
Falling into a pair of deep, dark eyes, Ji Qingtang watched him patiently wipe the corner of her mouth and felt herself momentarily stunned.
Shen Jinyu tossed the tissue away, puzzled. “What are you looking at me for?”
Ji Qingtang blinked. “Before we got married, how many relationships did you have?”
Shen Jinyu had no idea her thoughts could jump around like that, but he answered truthfully: “None.”
“No way? Adding food to my bowl, wiping my mouth, saying things like ‘spend more time with me’—that’s way too out of character for you.” Ji Qingtang said, “I thought I was your white moonlight stand-in, suddenly triggering some romantic memories of yours.”
The term “white moonlight stand-in” was outside Shen Jinyu’s vocabulary, but that didn’t affect his understanding of the sentence.
He truly wasn’t skilled at these things, nor did he know when he’d developed this unconscious habit.
Seeing that he didn’t respond, Ji Qingtang chalked it up to his strong learning ability—able to effortlessly pick up all those public displays of affection he saw from others.
Once in bed, the harmonious, affectionate atmosphere from dinner vanished completely.
Ji Qingtang kept inching her body toward the edge of the bed.
Last night, Shen Jinyu had been so vulgar she couldn’t handle it. She was waving the white flag now, not daring to provoke him in the slightest.
Shen Jinyu lay flat on his back and noticed her subtle movements. He spoke slowly: “Keep moving and you’ll fall off.”
Ji Qingtang turned her back to him, clutching a corner of the blanket as she accused: “It’s all because of you! So many tricks, playing deaf and dumb—when I said stop, you just kept proving how capable you are. Anyway, I haven’t recovered yet, so don’t even think about it for the next few days.”
He really hadn’t held back last night, but at this moment, Shen Jinyu genuinely wasn’t thinking about that sort of thing.
Hearing Ji Qingtang’s string of accusations, he raised a hand to rub his brow, saying with some helplessness: “I’m not thinking about it. I won’t touch you. Stop moving and get some proper sleep.”
Ji Qingtang yanked hard at the blanket. “Only a ghost would believe you. Did you listen yesterday when I said not to touch me?”
Most of the blanket was pulled away from him. Shen Jinyu let out a soft sigh, reached out with his long arm, and pulled Ji Qingtang back into his embrace.
“Have you forgotten how you seduced me last night? I originally wasn’t going to touch you since you were angry. But if you didn’t want me to touch you, why did you respond so enthusiastically?”
Ji Qingtang’s face flushed with embarrassment, and she quickly cut him off: “Shut up. Don’t say any more. I’m going to sleep.”
Shen Jinyu didn’t press further. He pulled the blanket back over them and closed his eyes.
The room fell quiet.
Before long, Ji Qingtang heard Shen Jinyu’s steady breathing, and after silently cursing him as “cheap Shen duck” hundreds of times in her mind, she too drifted off to sleep.
Outside the window, the moonlight was hazy, and the emerald waters of the lake rippled with gentle waves.
After Ji Qingtang fell into a deep sleep, she somehow rolled into the man’s arms at some point.
Shen Jinyu slowly opened his eyes. He caught that faint, elegant rose fragrance with a hint of woody undertones once again. His arm naturally draped over her waist, and he closed his eyes once more.