Compared with Gu Tingshen’s fury, Shen Suiwan was perfectly calm.
“President Gu, if I remember correctly, you were the one who said not to drag private matters into the company.”
Gu Tingshen’s pupils contracted.
“What, when it’s Gu Xirou’s turn, you forget?”
“That’s true enough, but you still can’t throw juice at her.” Gu Tingshen tugged irritably at his tie.
Shen Suiwan immediately caught a certain piece of information in his words.
“So you actually know perfectly well that I didn’t throw coffee at her in the break room, don’t you?”
So he knew everything.
And he had still chosen to stand on Gu Xirou’s side.
Gu Tingshen’s eyes shifted away slightly. “Rourou, she…”
In fact, the moment he saw Shen Suiwan’s attitude just now, he had understood roughly what had happened.
The coffee had not been thrown by Shen Suiwan.
Gu Xirou had staged the whole thing herself.
But he could not bring himself to blame Gu Xirou.
She had suffered so much… She clearly loved him deeply, yet because of her status as an adopted sister she could not be with him openly. After going abroad and getting married, she had been beaten by that damned ex-husband of hers. She wanted a child so badly, and yet she could not bear one.
How could he bear to blame Gu Xirou?
So the only person he could blame was Shen Suiwan!
But at this moment, looking into Shen Suiwan’s eyes, he suddenly did not know what else he should say.
Actually, Shen Suiwan was not particularly surprised either.
After all, he had been able to cover up something as serious as the car accident for Gu Xirou.
What was strange about him taking Gu Xirou’s side over a small thing like this?
After quite a while, Gu Tingshen spoke again, his voice much gentler. “All right, Wanwan, Rourou doesn’t know any better. Don’t hold it against her.”
He got up and walked over to Shen Suiwan, taking her hand. “I hear a new bag has come out. Let me buy it for you, all right?”
Shen Suiwan pulled her hand back. “I don’t need it.”
Heard it from whom? Gu Xirou?
He wanted to pull that one-gift-each routine again.
“For my sake, stop being upset, all right? When you’re unhappy, I feel awful too.”
In the past, when she threw a little tantrum, he would coax her like this.
Back then she had thought he was sincere, but now it was clear that it was hypocrisy so blatant it was nauseating.
Coaxing her like this now, surely it was for Gu Xirou’s sake?
Sure enough, Gu Tingshen’s very next sentence was, “Besides, Rourou really is in a bad mood today. That project… she’s only just taken it over, and there’s a lot she doesn’t understand. Today she upset the client. Give her a hand, won’t you? Otherwise won’t the better part of a year of work by all of you go down the drain?”
“Of course I wouldn’t play games with the work my team and I have put in,” Shen Suiwan said.
Gu Tingshen thought she had agreed and was about to breathe a sigh of relief when he suddenly heard her say, “But I won’t help Gu Xirou either.”
“You…” Gu Tingshen’s face darkened abruptly. “Wanwan, if you keep making a scene like this, I really am going to get angry.”
Shen Suiwan loved him so much. She was certain to be afraid of him truly being angry with her.
She would panic.
But Shen Suiwan went on looking at him with no expression at all.
This time it was Gu Tingshen’s turn to panic.
How could this be… How could Shen Suiwan have no reaction at all? Could it be that she no longer loved him the way she used to?
Impossible!
Gu Tingshen himself did not realize it, but at this moment his heart was in an unprecedented state of panic. He stared fixedly at Shen Suiwan’s face, trying to find in her eyes and her expression some trace of tension or distress…
A phone rang abruptly.
Gu Tingshen came back to himself with a start.
He gave Shen Suiwan a long look before walking over to the desk and picking up the phone.
It was a call from the client.
Normally a client would not call Gu Tingshen directly without any warning. He was, after all, the man in power at the Gu Group now, and his position spoke for itself.
This time they had probably been genuinely infuriated.
Gu Tingshen took the call. The client’s tone toward him was quite polite, but he also stated his position firmly: this project had to be handled by Shen Suiwan. If Gu Tingshen insisted on changing the person in charge and the project was left half-done as a result, then they would cut off all future cooperation with the Gu Group.
Gu Tingshen was extremely displeased, but losing a reliable partner over this would hardly be worth it.
So all he could do was agree to the client’s demand.
Putting down the phone, Gu Tingshen looked at Shen Suiwan again.
“Wanwan, let this project be your responsibility after all. As for Rourou… let her be your deputy.”
Even at this point Gu Tingshen still would not give up. He still wanted to carve out a share for Gu Xirou.
“Deputy?” Shen Suiwan let out a mocking laugh. “President Gu, if I’m not mistaken, right now the upper hand seems to be in my hands.”
Gu Tingshen’s brows knit slightly. “What… do you mean by that?”
“I mean that if you want me to go on being in charge of this project, then Gu Xirou withdraws from it completely, and from now on she has nothing whatsoever to do with it.”
At that moment Gu Xirou, who had just come out of the lounge, heard Shen Suiwan’s words, and she immediately shrieked, “Brother Tingshen, you can’t!”