After his subordinates left the conference room, Liang Zongxu took the cell phone handed to him by his secretary.
A message had come from Xiyuan, saying that the old man had invited the couple over for dinner tomorrow night.
Liang Zongxu didn’t reply right away.
As he stepped into the elevator, he opened his phone’s contact list and found Meng Ying’s name.
The elevator was incredibly fast on its way from the large conference room on the thirteenth floor to the directors’ office on the fifteenth floor. As soon as the doors opened, he put his phone away and nodded to the two directors waiting there.
This meeting was unusually long. Since they were all family, they didn’t get down to business right away, as was customary—
They began by discussing his father’s accident early last year, their tone somber. When they moved on to his wedding last month, however, the mood lightened; their expressions softened, and smiles appeared on their faces.
Liang Zongxu sat at the head of the table, remaining silent as usual.
By the time they gradually got down to business, it had already grown dark outside.
“…The Meng family came by this morning to ask about the contract… Didn’t Xiao Meng mention it to you?”
After seeing everyone off one by one, General Manager Li from the Group’s Design Institute suddenly turned to ask Liang Zongxu.
He was a close friend of Liang’s father and, having been the last to leave, whispered to Liang Zongxu: “Now that we’re family, we must handle matters with care—we can’t let the outside world make fun of us.”
The Liang-Meng marriage alliance had been arranged during the lifetime of the late Chairman Liang of Jiusheng Group.
Following Chairman Liang’s unexpected passing, his only son hurriedly returned to the country to take over, and the outside world was speculating whether this marriage—touted as a “powerhouse merger”—would be affected.
The newly appointed Chairman Liang was a low-key and diligent man who managed to weather the turbulence in Jiusheng’s stock prices. Later, by proceeding methodically with the Meng family, the outside rumors gradually subsided.
Li Hongyun believed that Liang Zongxu kept his professional and personal lives strictly separate and treated his wife’s family with equal respect. So, adopting the tone of a mediator, he advised, “The Meng family has been in the real estate business for many years, and their subsidiary, Huiying Design, was built from the ground up by their eldest daughter. You have no reason to worry.”
“Even when your father was alive, the Meng family was always reliable.”
Liang Zongxu smiled. “Uncle Li, rest assured—that’s not the case.”
Hearing this, Li Hongyun nodded and said no more.
The Chairman Liang standing before him actually had a more steady and measured approach than his two predecessors.
Despite the turmoil and upheaval of the past year or so, not a trace of it showed on his face.
Even when facing the most scathing and intractable media, he didn’t display his father’s hot temper, nor did he exhibit his grandfather’s arrogance.
He remained impassive yet firm, prioritizing matters by their importance—calling things as they were, standing by what he said, and declining to comment on anything he chose not to address.
Last month, the wedding concluded successfully, and Jiusheng’s stock—along with that of the Meng family—rose significantly.
After wrapping up the minor details, he arrived home quite late.
The butler asked if he’d like a late-night snack, but Liang Zongxu declined.
He loosened his tie and headed toward the guest bedroom on the first floor. Halfway there, he hesitated, then asked, “Where’s my wife?”
Although they’d agreed from the start to keep to themselves and focus on their respective families’ interests, now that the situation was right in front of him, he had to ask.
The butler replied, “She hasn’t come back yet. She called this afternoon and said she’d be working late at the office.”
Liang Zongxu asked no further and turned to enter the guest bedroom on the first floor.
He opened his WeChat chat with Meng Ying; their relationship status still showed they’d just added each other as friends.
One side’s self-introduction: Liang Zongxu.
The other side: “Hello, I’m Meng Ying.”
After that, there had been no further communication.
At 10:00 p.m., Meng Hui’s elevator descended directly to the underground parking garage of Huiying Tower.
Seeing the sky-blue car parked securely next to her own, she couldn’t help but chuckle. she got into her car, took out her phone, and dialed Meng Ying’s number.
Meng Ying had received this car as a special gift from Meng Tongfeng last year after she graduated from college.
It was quite expensive—customized inside and out, finished with a paint that couldn’t be bought domestically, and shipped back to China after assembly.
Back then, Meng Ying had called Qian Liyun, who was taking care of her grandmother abroad, and asked, “Mom, can I keep it?”
Qian Liyun replied, “Why wouldn’t you? What’s his is yours. When he dies, everything goes to you and your sister—take it! If you don’t like it, just sell it when you come back.”
The back-and-forth conversation took place right at the breakfast table in front of Meng Hui, who laughed so hard she started coughing.
Meng Tongfeng’s move was far too biased, so that afternoon Qian Liyun called Meng Hui and berated her over the phone, saying, “That old bastard of a father of yours—all he knows how to do is pull these petty tricks—”
Meng Hui, of course, understood her mother’s concern.
Back when the Qian and Meng families parted ways, the couple was also going through a divorce.
Meng Tongfeng had a nice little plan: Meng Hui had grown up and become sensible, so she would go to the Qian family; their younger daughter, Meng Ying, still looked up to him, so she would stay with the Meng family. It was supposed to be a win-win situation. At first, Qian Liyun had agreed to let each child go with one parent.
But back then, fifteen-year-old Meng Hui was already quite headstrong and refused under any circumstances to let her sister leave.
At the time, Meng Ying was only five years old. Clutching her doll, she stood in the middle of the staircase, sobbing softly. Her delicate, porcelain-like face was streaked with tears. On one side stood her father, pleading earnestly; on the other, her older sister, looking fierce and menacing. She glanced from one to the other, unable to bear the thought of parting with either of them. Not far away, her mother sat on the sofa on the first floor, smiling warmly.
Seeing her indecision, Meng Hui snapped, “Which one are you going with?”
“Mom or Dad?”
“Meng Ying, let me tell you this: if you go with him, you’ll never see your big sister again for the rest of your life! Your big sister won’t want you anymore!”
She was just a middle schooler, after all, and didn’t have the composure of an adult; her harsh words left no room for compromise, and as soon as she finished speaking, her eyes turned red.
Frightened, Meng Ying burst into tears, crying until she was hoarse, as if a knife were already pressed against her throat.
She closed her eyes and shouted, “I’ll go with my older sister—”
“I’ll go with my older sister!”
Meng Hui was taken aback for a moment, then broke into a smile.
“That’s more like it.”
Satisfied, she went downstairs, picked up little Meng Ying, and headed back upstairs without looking back.
Downstairs, Qian Liyun burst out laughing, while Meng Tongfeng’s face turned ashen.
From that moment on, a grudge was born between Meng Tongfeng and his eldest daughter.
She had snatched this little sister away from him single-handedly.
During those years when Qian Liyun was embroiled in a legal battle with Meng Tongfeng—fighting to transfer 30 percent of the Meng family’s real estate shares into the names of the three of them—she was the one who took care of her little sister, all while constantly watching out for Meng Tongfeng’s return to try to take the child away.
—She, of course, knew exactly what Meng Tongfeng was capable of.
But Meng Ying turned out to be even more cunning than she’d imagined.
The very next day after getting the car, she put it up for sale, then claimed she didn’t like the color and asked Meng Tongfeng for another one.
She split the proceeds from the sale into three parts: one for her mother, one for her older sister, and one she stashed away in her own secret stash.
Later, when Meng Hui married into the Song family, this entire secret stash was transferred into Meng Hui’s name.
Only then did Meng Hui realize that the seemingly sweet and smiling little sister, who always had a smile for everyone, had been slyly siphoning off so much money from Meng Tongfeng’s pocket all these years with her sweet talk. It was truly astonishing.
No one answered the phone.
Meng Hui wasn’t in a hurry, so she asked Qu Huan from the Planning and Design Department.
“…She’s really focused. I’ve never seen her so focused.”
The voice on the other end sounded amused: “Back when you’d drag her over to do her homework, she’d be all over the place—eating this, looking at that. It’s just different once she’s settled down—”
Meng Hui asked, “Has she been working overtime the whole time?”
Director Qu replied, “I’m not sure… I was supposed to ask Jiusheng for the contract today, but they haven’t issued it yet, so I came over to check on things and do a spot check while I’m here.”
“Not ready yet?” Meng Hui frowned.
On the surface, this partnership was between Mengjia Real Estate and Jiusheng, but the day-to-day operations were in Meng Ying’s hands. As for the other side’s end—let’s be honest, this was their boss’s wife—how could she be dragging her feet like this?
Director Qu’s voice came through the phone: “They said the manager in charge at Jiusheng is out of town on a business trip. He’s not here, so we’ll have to wait until next Monday.”
“Got it.”
After hanging up, Meng Hui dialed Liang Zongxu.
Liang Zongxu answered right away.
He addressed her as “Big Sister.”
Meng Hui smiled. “Please don’t. You’re actually two years older than me. Let’s keep this strictly business, Chairman Liang.”
She was holding back some of her frustration. After all, when they first discussed the arranged marriage as part of the business partnership, she’d been secretly dissatisfied with the age gap between Meng Ying and Liang Zongxu.
At that moment, she felt the Liang family was truly ungrateful.
—How outrageous.
She cut straight to the chase: “Why hasn’t the contract been drafted yet?”
“I just found out myself,” Liang Zongxu said.
His tone was calm and his words concise; Meng Hui was at a loss for words.
She was a bit confused: “Didn’t Xiao Ying tell you?”
Liang Zongxu: “I haven’t seen her in a long time.”
From the few times they’d met, Liang Zongxu clearly looked like a returnee elite with a strong family background.
He always exuded an exceptionally composed and steady demeanor, which made his words and actions particularly convincing—which was also why, in the year since taking office, he had been able to stabilize the teetering Jiusheng and turn the tide.
Hearing him say “a long time” now, as if it were the most ordinary thing in the world,
Meng Hui was at a loss for words once again.
On the surface, the arranged marriage was presented as a business matter, but when you got right down to it, it was still wrapped in the guise of marriage—the couple would have to live under the same roof, no matter how long or short the arrangement lasted.
Back then, the agreement she’d made with the Song family was for five years. After five years, they’d divorce by mutual consent—each getting what they needed, with everything clear, straightforward, and clean-cut.
But now, when it came to her younger sister, she didn’t even know where to begin asking.
After a long silence, she could only ask, “How long is ‘a long time’?”
Liang Zongxu: “Just the wedding—when we met.”
Meng Hui: “…..”
Author’s Note:
Thank you, everyone~
Meng Ying: 22 years old
Meng Hui: 32 years old
Liang Zongxu: 34 years old