First Marriage Then Love Chapter 97

While waiting for Qin Yun to make her way to their new place, when the doorbell rang again, An Ran and Su Yi Cheng were already all washed up and changed.

Su Yi Cheng was in the bedroom, so An Ran went ahead and opened the door.

Upon seeing her, Qin Yun was br.i.m.m.i.n.g with smiles. She looks at An Ran, “Come, let mother see, it’s been so long since I’ve last seen you, your father, grandfather and I all talk about you often.”

An Ran just smiles, “Yi Cheng and I have been pretty busy these last few days. We were waiting until the busy period was over, and find a time to come home and visit everybody.”

“Good, good good.” Qin Yun repeatedly nods her head, “When you guys come home mom will make you something good. You ah, are too thin.”

An Ran quickly smiles, “Mother, come in and talk.” The both of them enter, and at that moment Su Yi Cheng had come out of the bedroom. He still had a half-arranged necktie around his neck.

“Mom, why didn’t call us before you came to our place.” Su Yi Cheng says as he continues to tie it.

“You guys don’t come and visit me, I can’t even come over to see my daughter-in-law ah.” Qin Yun jokingly glares at her son. She turns and looks at An Ran, promptly putting on a kind smile, “Isn’t that right, An Ran.”

An Ran awkwardly smiles, and just turns to look at Su Yi Cheng. She doesn’t say anything.

“I didn’t mean that, you see I just moved, didn’t even have the time to tell you, like this morning, made you take the long way around.” Su Yi Cheng smiles.

Qin Yun smirks, “This child can really talk, if you knew it would be a detour you should’ve notified me earlier ah, from what I see it’s most likely that you don’t welcome me.” She surveys the interior of the room, nods, and says, “Speaking of which, I feel like the decoration of this place has more character than the last, in the old place, if it wasn’t black then it was white, very cold, just like your personality. If it were me, I wouldn’t be able to live there.” As she says that, she turns to look at An Ran and says, “Isn’t that right, An Ran.”

An Ran smiles but doesn’t reply. She looks at Su Yi Cheng, only to see him shrug helplessly.

She was joking around, when Qin Yun suddenly remembers the purpose of her visit today. Two days earlier somebody gave Qin Yun a wild pheasant, and yesterday she specially made it into hot stew. She knows that the both of them had busy jobs, and so she wouldn’t know when would be the next time they'd come home to visit, so she came early morning to deliver the chicken stew that she had spent a whole evening to make, afraid that if she came too late, they’ll both already be at work, then she really wouldn’t be able to meet them. But she didn’t expect that, when she came and rang the doorbell for a long time, she didn’t see anyone answer it. She called the landline, and only heard the phone ring, no one was picking it up. Thus she called Su Yi Cheng’s cell phone, but to her misfortune, they had moved!

“An Ran, you’re too skinny, I heard that this chicken stew is wonderful for supplementing your body, An Ran you should drink it all up, mom spent the whole night making the stew, it came straight out of the pot this morning.” Qin Yun says as she excitedly pours the contents from the Thermos. She hands it over to An Ran, and says, “Here, eat it while it’s hot.”

An Ran couldn’t refuse it, and can only accept the soup. Although she hadn’t eaten this morning and was a bit hungry, but drinking this kind of greasy stuff, she wasn’t used to it. “Thank you, mom.”

On the side, Su Yi Cheng awkwardly rubs his nose, and says sourly, “Mom, did you really forget your son over your daughter-in-law?”

Qin Yun turns her head, and with a deadpan expression she says, “Of course one should dote on their daughter-in-law, sons have thick son, lack self-discipline.”

“Mom, you’re too biased with women.” After getting married, Su Yi Cheng had always felt that his position in the family was coming to a straight decline. In the past when his mother called, she would always be concerned over this and that with him, but now it seems like every time she calls she always asks about An Ran, if she was gaining weight or not, if she was tired or not, if work was exhausting or not. She very rarely asks about him, and for a time he started to doubt, is this still his mother?

Qin Yun glares at her son, and says, “What do you know, before I always wanted you to get married, now you’re married, so now I’m wanting An Ran to give me a grandchild ne, so naturally I will treat An Ran better.” As she says that, she doesn’t forget to turn to look at An Ran and say, “Isn’t that right, An Ran.”

“He he, yes, yes.” An Ran just laughs awkwardly, not really knowing what to say. Having children, she really hasn’t given it a thought. However she is aware, she and Su Yi Cheng are not young, so it is a given that the elders are worried.

Hearing that, Su Yi Cheng rubs his nose and mutters, “Well if I’m not trying, An Ran also wouldn’t get pregnant ah. Anyways, the key lies in me.”

“You, you dare not try!” Qin Yun glares at her own son with wide eyes. So he is the one who is blocking her from carrying her grandchild, what an absolute disgrace!

“Cough, cough cough…” An Ran chokes on the soup. “Cough cough cough, cough cough cough…..” Her face turned a deep red from coughing.

“Ai yah, why aren’t you being careful.” Qin Yun says as she lightly pats her back, “Here, take a deep breath.”

An Ran shakes her head, “Cough, I-I’m okay.” She doesn’t know if her face is red because she had choked on the soup or if it was red because of what they were just discussing. Her small face was as red as an apple.

“Ai, your face is all red, still say you’re okay.” Qin Yun says lovingly, her hands incessantly patting her back.

Su Yi Cheng chuckles, and says, “Mom, An Ran didn’t choke on the soup, she’s embarra.s.sed~”

An Ran glares at him, and says, “N-no I’m not.”

Qin Yun was taken aback, and takes a while to react to the meaning behind Su Yi Cheng’s words. She turns and looks ambiguously at An Ran, “Aiyah, what is there to be embarra.s.sed about, we’re all family here.”

“Mom.” An Ran felt embarra.s.sed, “I’m not.”

Qin Yun chuckles, but doesn’t push her. She looks at her stomach, pulls on her hand, and smiles and asks, “An Ran ah, you and Ah Cheng have been married for a while now, say, your stomach, there isn’t, is there…?”

“Mom!” An Ran’s embarra.s.sed face turns even redder. Where is this going, she and Su Yi Cheng hadn’t been married for more than 2 months, how did it become ‘married for a while’! An Ran couldn’t counter, so she turns to look at Su Yi Cheng for help.

Su Yi Cheng naturally understood the expression in her eyes. He smiles and steps forward, pulls her into a hug, looks at his mother and says, “Mom, you’re worrying too much. An Ran and I haven’t been married for more than two months yet, I’m afraid that we won’t be able to bear you a grandchild to hold yet quite yet. Even if she did get pregnant, you’ll have to wait for 10 months for the pregnancy.”

“10 months pregnant!” Qin Yun only grabbed onto that point. She quickly looks at An Ran, and asks, “An Ran, you really are?”

“I….” An Ran couldn’t force a smile. Just what is this, she was having difficulties in arguing, it seems like whatever explanation she gives will be misconstrued.

“Mom, An Ran’s not pregnant. I was just giving an instance.” Su Yi Cheng to the rescue.

Qin Yun frowns, and bluntly asks, “You guys normally use contraception?”

An Ran was already ashamed and was unable to say anything. She turns and buries herself in Su Yi Cheng’s chest. She was so embarra.s.sed that she doesn’t want to face anyone now.

Su Yi Cheng thinks for a bit, then says in seriousness, “No.”

“Then have you guys gone to the hospital for a checkup?” Qin Yun continues to press on.

Su Yi Cheng once again shakes his head, “No.”

“Well that’s not acceptable, you guys have been married for almost two months, you guys are healthy, if you are with child that wouldn’t be odd.” Qin Yun says. “When I had you, I didn’t know for the first two months, then one day while I was at the hospital I fainted for no reason, gave your father a fright. Upon inspection, we found out that I was pregnant, so, we aren’t certain if An Ran is pregnant. How about this, An Ran, I will come with you to the hospital for a checkup today?”

Qin Yun was impatient, but she doesn’t blame her. Back then she had longed for her son to get married, but because of that incident he shut off his emotions, making her say every nice and bad thing available. He pa.s.sed by every girl available, and in a blink of an eye he became 30 years old. She even thought that he’d be a bachelor for life, but he went beyond everybody’s expectations, and brought home a daughter-in-law. Although they said they won’t do a wedding, but in any case they already got a marriage card, by law they are husband and wife. Furthermore seeing their post-marriage life, their feelings towards each other seem to be very sweet. He really did put that big issue to rest, and then really no other issues came up. Other families of Old Su’s comrades already have plenty of offsprings, and they all prepared for a lonely life. And finally, after so long, her son finally tied the knot, so naturally the next thing she’s expecting is that they will give her a fat grandchild soon, otherwise would she just let the other grandmothers in the courtyard sway about with their grandchildren in their arms? How uncomfortable is that.

“Mom, I-I’m not.” An Ran nearly had a nosebleed.

“That’s enough mom, I really think An Ran is about to cry.” Saying that, Su Yi cheng laughs and pats An Ran, “Anyways, it’s still a working day today, recently both An Ran and I have been pretty busy, we really don’t have time to go to the hospital.”

“Then what if you were pregnant?” Qin Yun was unwilling to give up. Even though she knew that she was being impatient, but it’s not like this was an impossible matter.

“I-I just had my period a few days ago.” An Ran buries her face into Su Yi Cheng’s chest, and utters quietly.

Hearing that, Qin Yun seemed to have given up. She was silent for a while, and laughs, “Hehe, if not this month, then next month!”

An Ran blushes with shame. How could she reply to that. She doesn’t know if it will come next month or not, these things, they are not the ones who have the final say in it.

Qin Yun looks at An Ran like that. Smiling, she reaches out to pull on An Ran’s hand, and lightly pats her, “An Ran ah, don’t look at mom like I’m saying something bad, mom is just really worried. Ai, you see Ah Cheng isn’t even young, it’s reasonable that at this age I would want to be carrying my grandchild. Anyways, take advantage of the fact that mom is still young, I can still help you guys take care of the child, if you guys feel like having a child would be inconvenient, feel like it would get in the way of work, then you can just leave the child at the courtyard and I will raise him, when the weekend comes you guys can come over and spend the weekend with the child, isn’t that right?”

An Ran looks at Qin Yun awkwardly. The heat in her face did not die down, her face was still quite flushed. She can only force a smile and reply, “Mom, I didn’t say that I didn’t want to give birth. But the thing is all of this is up to fate, we aren’t the ones who can make it happen at will.”

Hearing her put it that way, Qin Yun was relieved. She was worried, apart from wanting to hold her grandchild, she was worried that she doesn’t want children. Couples these days are different now, she heard from the news, that there were plenty of dual income no kids households, just like that chit Yi Jiao, all day long she would shout out that she won’t have children, saying that she was scared she’d age quickly after having a child, and if she was tied down to a child, then she can forget about living like she does now, free and unfettered. She almost died from these words. But this is good, at least An Ran didn’t say that she didn’t want children.

“Haha, mother was just anxious. Look at me, just speaking without thinking. That’s right, that’s right, it is up to fate, it’ll happen when it happens, must not be anxious, must not be anxious.” Qin Yun laughs.

Su Yi Cheng, at the side, glances at his watch. “Alright, mom, look at the time, An Ran and I have to rush to work now, we’ll have to get going first.”

Qin Yun looks at her watch, it really was time. She quickly says, “Ai yah, it’s already that late, then you guys quickly go, go, don’t be late for work. I should also head back, I still have to go over to that brat Yi Jiao’s place. You two siblings are such troublesome kids. Don’t know what happened to Yi Jiao last time, she came home crying, even when I asked she wouldn’t say a word, and when the next day came she was already gone!”

“Yi Jiao?” Su Yi Cheng frowns.

“Alright alright, you two get to work, don’t be late. I’ll put the chicken soup in the fridge, remember to warm it up tonight alright.” Qin Yun says as she picks up the soup from the table and heads over to the kitchen. Suddenly she recalled something, she turns around and looks at them, “Oh right, An Ran, when are your parents free, it’s a must that us parents have to meet, last time because of Ah Cheng we had to put it aside, and following that your dad has been busy with practice, but now the practice season is over, Ah Cheng’s better now, so when will you arrange for us elders to meet. Grandfather is also aware, saying that not having a wedding is already impolite to your parents, so meeting is a must.”

An Ran nods, “Okay, I will talk to my parents.” Actually her parents have brought it up a few times before, only they’ve been busy recently, so she’s been putting it aside. But they’re almost settled with the manor’s blueprint, the model is also being constructed without a glitch, so everything is pretty much on the right track. If it does get busy it won’t be like the past few days.

Su Yi Cheng goes to the studio and gets his briefcase. An Ran was still a little red, but compared to before it was a lot better. He goes to the kitchen and addresses his mom, “Mom, we’ll get going first then.”

“Okay, be careful on the road.”

In the car, An Ran was still quite red. Su Yi Cheng laughs and glances at her, poking fun at her, “Still embarra.s.sed huh.”

An Ran pouts and glares at him, and turns around, looking out the window. She is originally sensitive, and couldn’t retort.

Su Yi Cheng laughs and starts the car, making his way on the road smoothly. A while later he faintly says, muttering, “How come I don’t remember that you just had your period ah.”

Hearing that, An Ran suddenly turns her head and looks at him. Her red face was starting to fade but now it was reddening up again, “You….” Looking at him, she couldn’t even utter a word.

Su Yi Cheng laughs, still with evil intentions he continues, “Don’t tell me mom hit the mark.” As he says that, he ambiguously looks at her stomach, “Could it be you really are?”

An Ran was peeved and turns her head around indignantly. She mutters, “That thing is normally irregular.”

“Haha.” Su Yi Cheng laughs heartily, the mood was pretty good.

An Ran gloomily looks out the window, still blus.h.i.+ng ferociously, even her body was a little bit warm. Even the wind blowing in from the window couldn’t cool down the temperature in her face.

Not too long after, they arrived at the entrance of An Ran’s company. An Ran, still pouting, reaches out and was about to get off, but was pulled back by Su Yi Cheng. He faintly smiles and pulls on her hand, looks at her earnestly and asks, “An Ran, are you feeling pressured?”

An Ran looks at him blankly. It took a while for her to realize that the ‘pressure’ that he was referring to was the thing with Qin Yun wanting a grandchild. She was silent, looks at him, and asks, “If I said no, would you believe me?”

Su Yi Cheng faintly smiles, and he gently strokes her small hands. Looking at her, with a serious face he asks, “If you don’t want, then we can take it slow, don’t worry about what mom said this morning. I won’t force you, I just want you to be happy.”

An Ran felt her heart warm up. In fact, just those words from him were enough. She holds his hand, shakes her head, and faintly smiles, “How could I not care about mom, she is your mother, and my mother in law. She is our elder, of course we should consider her opinion. In any case, her opinion isn’t wrong, and all are within reason. Anyone else would think the same way if they were in that position, but also….” As she was speaking, An Ran lowers her head, and the corner of her mouth rises to a faint smile, however this smile seemed a bit bashful.

“Also what?” Su Yi Cheng asks.

An Ran raises her head, fixes her gaze at him, and says, “It’s not I, it’s not like I don’t want to give birth. I want to give you a child.”

Su Yi Cheng stares at her. A while later, he smiles, and holds her close to his bosom. He strokes her head, softly speaks into her ears, “Thank you.” A woman saying that she is willing to give you a child, he doesn’t know how others would react to it, but he was moved, extremely grateful.

An Ran let him embrace her. Her hand slowly rises to wrap around him, a soft smile hanging at the corner of her mouth, with a small voice she says, “But this isn’t something I can control, we should still let nature take its course.”

Su Yi Cheng nods, and smiles, “Then I will work really hard every night.”

Hearing that, An Ran’s face turns red again. Peeved, she pushes him away. It would’ve been better if he didn’t speak, just that one sentence, she just felt her entire body go sour. “You still have the nerve, I think I can only calm down if I don’t see your face.” For a time, she doubted whether or not their marriage activities was happening too frequently. At first she even looked it up on the forums. Quite a lot of people, in the midst of their honeymoon phase, would do it 3 or 4 times a week, but with Su Yi Cheng they’ve been doing it nearly every night, this is just too much isn’t it.

Su Yi Cheng laughs out loud. He looks at her stomach, and brazenly says, “The revolution is not yet a success, comrades still need to work hard.”

An Ran flushes even more, opening her eyes wide at him. She grabs her bag and opens the door to get out. Facing the car, she scolds him, “Hoodlum!”

The mischievous Su Yi Cheng laughs heartily, the mood was especially good. An Ran quickens her steps to go into the building, doesn’t turn around to look at him. Her face was still very red. Recalling his words, she couldn’t help but smile. It really was funny and something to be happy about. That kind of serious man, was unexpectedly quite naughty.

The elevator stops at her floor. An Ran takes a deep breath, adjusts her frame of mood, pats her slightly burning face, and then enters her office.

“Good morning Gu jie.” A younger colleague at the front desk sweetly greets her.

“Morning.” An Ran smiles. She was about to go into her office, when she sees Chen Cheng quietly sitting at the corner seat, earnestly looking over the files that she had given her yesterday. Recalling that she had seen her last night at the restaurant, An Ran walks over to her. She lightly knocks on her table. Waiting until she lifts her head up, she faintly says, “Come see me at my office.”

Chen Cheng nods her head blankly, and scribbles a few notes on the file, then closes the doc.u.ment, and follows An Ran into her office.

An Ran puts her briefcase aside, and notions her to take a seat, reaching out to open her computer.

Chen Cheng sits down in front of her. She doesn’t want for An Ran to say something, and directly says, “I know I’m going against company policies, but the restaurant was a job that I had before this. When I got an offer for this job I already told my manager that I will be resigning, but the manager said that they can’t find another person in such short notice, so she asked me to stay until they can find another person to replace me.”

An Ran looks her in the eyes, and nods. She starts to say, “That is reasonable. But I hope that this won’t get in the way of this work.”

“I understand.” Chen Cheng replies in determination.

An Ran nods. She takes out a folder and hands it over to her, “These are the blueprints to old cases of mine, take a good look at them, and this afternoon I will take you to the construction sites to take a look, help me overlook the progress of the project. Any problem?”

Chen Cheng accepts it, and confidently answers, “No problem.”

An Ran nods, “Then you can leave.”

Chen Cheng nods and retreats from the room.

An Ran watches her disappear behind the door, then she takes back her gaze. Actually, she had changed a few things in the blueprint. She purposefully changed the scales to be wrong. She wanted to test her, because of what she said yesterday, it seemed like she was confident, so she wanted to see her abilities. If she really is like what Huang De Xing had described, then she will be a good mentor to her. But if she’s like another Ling Lin, then there’s nothing more that she can do.

When the afternoon rolled in An Ran had just finished her lunch. The finished model was just delivered, and that happened quicker than she had expected, furthermore it was really pretty.

As An Ran was carefully scrutinizing and comparing the model to the blueprint, her phone started to ring at this time. It was an unknown number. An Ran frowns. Her intuition tells her that it must be a marketing call, maybe real estate, shop promotion, golden stock opportunity. Seeing that housing prices are high right now, expensive houses can’t be sold, those that don’t have money don’t have a place to live, it is these types of things that drive them. She rejects the call, not wanting to waste her energy dealing with these people.

But it seems like the other person was very persistent. As soon as she rejected the call the phone started to ring again, as if insisting that they will continue to call until she answers.

An Ran pinches the area between her brows, and without a choice, answers the call. Not waiting for the other person on the line to speak, she starts to say, “If you want to sell investments iof some house or store, then I’m sorry, I’ll pa.s.s. If you want to talk about stocks, then I apologize, I’m not into that stuff.”

The other person on the line was speechless, only a while later does she hear a roar of laughter, jingling pleasantly.

Hearing that, An Ran was shocked. She looks at her phone. It was still the same unknown number, but this voice, she wouldn’t mistake it!

Carrying some suspicions, she carefully probes, “Lin Li? Is it Lin Li?”

“Hehe, An Zi, I didn’t know that you answered the phone in so particularly.” On the other line, Lin Li laughed tenderly.

Hearing that, An Ran’s nose started to sting, and her eyes started to water up. She quickly tilts her head up to look at the ceiling, forcing her tears to go back into her eyes. A while later, does she resolutely say, “Lin Li, you b* so you do know how to call me!” When she left she left, but she even turned off her phone. When she called her, she reached a vacant number, and she doesn’t know the number to Lin Li’s family line, so she didn’t have any news about Lin Li. Furthermore she doesn’t know who she could ask, where she could ask. When she returned to her home town, it was as if she had disappeared.

“Didn’t I just call you, don’t make a big deal out of it.” Lin Li said. From her tone, it seemed she was doing well. “Oh yeah, this is my new number, remember to save it. Don’t give me that long lecture like I was a telemarketer next time I call.”

“En.” An Ran nods in reply. She asks worriedly, “Have you been well these days?”

“You tell me, do I seem well?” Lin Li laughs, “For the first few days my parents took me on a trip. Actually during this period of time I really thought over it a lot. There are some things that you can’t force, I wasted ten years doing something that was impossible, it’d be foolish to waste even more time. Being with my parents for this period of time, I realized that they really are old. Even if they dye their white hair black, the white hair would still grow back again. But for me, to make them worry over me with their old age, really is something I shouldn’t do. If not for others, I should get better for my parents. Before I always went on a wild goose chase, and now I’ve reached a dead end and have turned around. It feels good. Before, my life had revolved around Cheng Xiang. Now I can focus on myself, and my parents.”

An Ran sighs. She doesn’t know if Lin Li is truly well, or if she is just saying that. But from her tone, it was a lot better than when she left. Perhaps Su Yi Cheng was right, people need to experience things in order to genuinely grow. Lin Li was too easy-going before, so she was able to maintain a child-like innocence, always seeing things in black and white.

This time it can be considered that it was a cost for the sake of maturing, although the cost was very painful, but it was profound.

“An Zi, I wanna show you my new hairstyle, I really like this short hair.” Lin Li said excitedly, she could hear the joy in her voice.

“Alright.” An Ran nods, and replies warmly.

The two ended the call, not a minute later, An Ran got a message. In the picture, Lin Li’s cla.s.sic elegant long hair was cut short, up to her ear, and her jet-black hair was dyed a light blonde. The new hairstyle made Lin Li a completely different person, nothing like the cla.s.sic beauty of before, much more fas.h.i.+onable, chic. Her smile looked genuine, as if she truly was happy. She added a message below the picture, ‘pretty right, pretty right, you have to tell me it’s pretty, I won’t accept anything otherwise.’

An Ran chuckles, grabs her cellphone, and honestly gives her a reply. She appeased her, and replied, “Very beautiful.”

It was good cutting her hair, cutting off past worries, cutting of the shadows of other people, and once again being your genuine self, living your own life.

The two exchanged a few more texts, and ended the exchange because Lin Li’s mother had called her to eat.

An Ran looks at the picture, and a while later, she puts her phone back into her pocket. She goes back to scrutinizing the model and the blueprint.

While An Ran was scrutinizing, Xiao Xiao and Ling Lin came back from their lunch. Xiao Xiao looks at An Ran, and disdainfully turns around to go into her office. While Ling Lin doesn’t return to her seat, but rather advances, determinedly standing before An Ran, staring at her.

An Ran raises her head, looks at her in the eye, and faintly responds, “Need something?”

“My sister attempted suicide, did you know?” Ling Lin looks at her determinedly, the expression in her eyes seemed as if she wanted to rip her apart.

An Ran faintly nods, “I know.”

“Don’t tell me you don’t feel an ounce of guilt? She attempted to commit suicide because of Ah Cheng ge, and it was in your home.” Ling Lin criticizes.

“Guilty?” An Ran didn’t understand, and just says, “Why do I need to feel guilty over someone else’s foolish actions?” She even felt that Ling Ran’s so-called excuse as an attempted suicide was ridiculous, not worthy of pity. She doesn’t care for her own life, talking about love or not love, it’s all because of her unwillingness that she found that far-fetched excuse.

“That’s because you stole big brother Yi Cheng.” Ling lin says hatefully, “You don’t even match with big brother Yi Cheng. You’re not pretty enough, you don’t even have a good background. You and big brother Yi Cheng being together, is simply just climbing up the social ladder.”

An Ran finally checks the final details of the model, and then puts down the blueprint in her hands. She glances at Ling Lin, “Not going to deny that what you said is true, so what about it?”

“You…..” Ling Lin was speechless. She hatefully stares at her with wide eyes.

“Even if it weren’t me, and someone else, between them, for 7 years they couldn’t make it work, don’t tell me that it’d be possible 7 years later?”

Ling Lin doesn’t say anything. She knew that there were no more chances between her sister and Su Yi Cheng, but she wasn’t resigned. She waited for 7 years, only to be shorted by her.

Seeing her not speak, An Ran doesn’t look at her anymore. She takes her blueprint and heads over to her office.

Ling Lin just stood there, hatefully watching her silhouette disappear around the corner of the hallway. Because she was not resigned, she clenches her fist, turns around and looks at the sample house displayed on the table, with a trace of calculation in her eyes.

---END OF CHAPTER---

WOOOOh just when I thought the workplace drama was over lol. And hurrah! Lin Li's back, kinda. ^^