Yasen International, in the office.
Lu Qi placed the potted plant he had taken on the balcony and sat down in his chair. His phone screen lit up, and when he opened it, he saw a message from Ji Qingyan.
Ji Qingyan: It’s all your fault—my lip is split.
It was a selfie, showing only the lower half of Ji Qingyan’s face. He tapped on the image and saw a small wound on the other’s lower lip, bleeding slightly. Frowning, he stared at the spot.
[LQ]: You’re the one who provoked me.
Another message came through: It hurts every time I talk now.
[LQ]: Then don’t talk.
The two chatted intermittently for a while. Ji Qingyan had to carefully avoid the wound on his lip even while drinking coffee. Just then, the office door was pushed open from outside. Looking up, he saw Lu Qi walking in.
“What are you doing here?”
“Came to bring you medicine.” Lu Qi glared at him with annoyance and placed the ointment he had just bought from the pharmacy on the desk.
Ji Qingyan picked up the ointment, surprised that Lu Qi had actually bought medicine for him.
“Thank you.”
Seeing him look so pitiful, Lu Qi decided to be a good person and see this through to the end.
He walked around the desk, stood in front of Ji Qingyan, and snatched the ointment from his hand. Opening the cap, he squeezed a bit onto his finger, his tone softening slightly. “Look up.”
Ji Qingyan complied. A cool sensation spread over his lips, accompanied by the tingling friction of Lu Qi’s finger.
Lu Qi focused intently on applying the ointment when he suddenly felt his finger being lightly pressed. He shot Ji Qingyan a glare. Here we go again.
“Let go. Don’t tease me.”
“Sorry, I thought you were done.” Ji Qingyan chuckled, then winced as the movement tugged at his lip wound. “Ouch…”
“Still laughing? Serves you right if it hurts.” Lu Qi grabbed a tissue and wiped off the remaining ointment from his hand.
“If there’s nothing else, I’ll head out. Remember to apply the medicine.”
“Yeah, got it.”
That night, after showering, Lu Qi sat on the bed, drying his hair with a towel. He lowered his head, and suddenly, the memory of kissing Ji Qingyan flashed through his mind.
Holding the back of Ji Qingyan’s neck with one hand had greatly satisfied his intense possessiveness. When the kiss grew fierce, Ji Qingyan would tremble slightly in his arms.
Just as he was lost in these thoughts, his phone rang with an incoming call. He reached over, picked it up, and answered.
“Qi-ge, good afternoon—oh wait, it must be evening where you are. I heard your uncle dragged you back to manage Yasen International. How’s your first day? Getting used to it?” The voice on the other end belonged to his mother, Shi Qingyin.
Lu Qi replied, “It’s fine. Nothing too troublesome happened. Did you call for something, or was it just to ask about this?”
“Of course not! Do I seem that boring?”
Hah. As if it wasn’t her who called him in the middle of the night, waking him up. He’d thought it was something important, only to find out Shi Qingyin just wanted to confirm whether he was actually asleep…
Shi Qingyin paused for dramatic effect. “Yesterday, when your dad and I visited a partner company, guess what I saw? A super cool helicopter. The moment I laid eyes on it, I knew Qi-ge would love it.”
He trusted Shi Qingyin’s taste because she only liked beautiful things. Anything even slightly ugly couldn’t catch her eye.
Lu Qi became a bit more interested. He went to the living room, poured a glass of water, and leisurely sat on the sofa. “You bought it?”
“Yeah, I bought it. It wasn’t expensive anyway, and I’ve already arranged to have it shipped back to the country.” A six-million-dollar helicopter still cost less than one of Shi Qingyin’s necklaces.
“Wow, our Sister Shi is so generous! Even while abroad, you still remember to buy me something. I’m truly touched,” Lu Qi joked with a smile.
He had long grown accustomed to his mother’s lavish spending habits. Aside from co-managing the overseas Lu Corporation with Lu Wensui, Shi Qingyin owned dozens of companies and over twenty buildings under her name, amassing considerable wealth. When shopping, she only cared about whether something looked good and never bothered checking the price.
Shi Qingyin chuckled a few times. “Hmph, your dad wanted it too, but I didn’t give it to him.”
“By the way, did you upset your brother again?”
Lu Qi raised an eyebrow, stretched his legs onto the coffee table in front of him, and lazily asked, “What’s up? Did that little crybaby go tattling to you again?”
Shi Qingyin replied unhurriedly, “He told me you snatched his sports car and didn’t give him any leeway. He complained to me for hours, and I had to buy him two cars just to calm him down.”
Shi Qingyin looked helpless. Both brothers shared a common hobby—collecting sports cars—and often argued over the same model. Lu Mian, the soft-tempered younger brother, was no match for his older brother in these disputes.
Lu Qi thought to himself, just as expected. “Tsk, what’s the point of letting him have it? He couldn’t come up with that much money on such short notice anyway. A while back, he got caught by Second Uncle at a bar, and his cards were frozen. I picked up the car right in front of him, and he was absolutely furious.”
“Bullying your brother again—be careful, or Grandpa will scold you.”
“Who’s scared of that?”
“Our Mianmian can be a bit mischievous, but you can’t just ignore him. What if someone takes advantage of him?”
“That’s easy. Just have him find a boyfriend.”
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
Suddenly, Lu Qi thought of a question and tentatively asked his mother, “Sister Shi, I want to ask you something.”
“What is it?”
He hesitated for a while before saying, “I have a friend who was kissed by another person, and both of them are men. Due to certain circumstances, they’ll still have to interact in the future, but my friend doesn’t know how to face him…”
Shi Qingyin gasped on the other end of the line. “What? Qi, you were kissed by a man!”
Lu Qi tried to cover it up. “No, it’s not me—it’s my friend.”
“Oh dear, what can you do? You’d better… well, tell your friend to lock the door when sleeping and not sleep too soundly.”
“Huh? That’s it?”
“How did your friend react when that person kissed him?”
Lu Qi recalled the moment he kissed Ji Qingyan. “Not only did he not dislike it, but he actually enjoyed it a bit.”
“Is it possible that your friend has feelings for him?”
Hearing this, Lu Qi was momentarily stunned. What did that mean? Did he like Ji Qingyan? But the other person was a man.
So, am I gay?
After hanging up the phone, Lu Qi was still pondering this question.
If it were any other man who kissed him—no, the mere thought made him feel sick.
He paced back and forth in the living room, Ji Qingyan’s strikingly beautiful face surfacing in his mind. Probably no one could dislike him, right?
The next morning, Lu Qi woke up feeling something was off. He sat up in bed, pulled back the covers, and looked down. Embarrassed, he covered his face with his hands.
Last night, he had an embarrassing dream. In it, Ji Qingyan was straddling him, wrapping her arms around his neck in an intimate embrace as they kissed. Not only did he not resist, but his hands also slipped under her clothes to caress her waist, and he whispered many shameful words.
It was now six in the morning. Lu Qi had just taken a cold shower in the bathroom. Standing in the washroom, he looked down at the black fabric in his hand and sighed. What on earth was going on?