Jiang Zao’s laugh was little more than a faint snort escaping her nostrils, but in the deathly hush of the meeting room, it rang out with crystal clarity.
Xie Lisheng sprawled indolently in his office chair, the open collar of his shirt revealing sharply defined collarbones. His shoulders were broad and squared, as if padded with hangers.
He fixed his gaze on her face, a flicker of tension twitching at the corner of his brow for an instant.
Two seconds passed, and then Xie Lisheng let out a chuckle of his own.
“Having fun?”
“Got any additions to your little evaluation of me?”
A chill ran through the room.
Look at him—furious enough to kill. The meeting was nearly over; someone was about to drop dead.
It was like an enraged hunter drawing his bow taut against his prey, arrow nocked and ready—only for some interloper to snip the bowstring out of nowhere. Boom. The fury shifted targets in an instant.
Every eye in the room turned on her, burning with complicated undercurrents.
Jiang Zao squirmed under the onslaught of stares, clutching her coffee carrier to her chest as she bowed her head. Then, with brazen audacity, she replied, “Nope. Very thorough.”
Everyone else: “…”
The meeting had only reached its halfway point, but the outcome was inevitable: all three proposals rejected, back to the drawing board.
As Xie Lisheng departed, he dragged the General Manager of the Planning Department along with him, as if intent on burying the poor soul somewhere private.
Back at her workstation, Tang Peng patted Jiang Zao’s shoulder and flashed her a thumbs-up in admiration. “That trash talk at lunch in the cafeteria was just casual banter, but I didn’t think you’d actually pull a stunt like that to catch the CEO’s eye. Way too bold—I didn’t even dare breathe.”
Jiang Zao flushed with embarrassment, her cheeks turning pink. “It wasn’t on purpose. I just… couldn’t hold back.”
Tang Peng couldn’t fathom it, her curiosity piqued. “What exactly did he say that cracked you up?”
“Not funny?” Jiang Zao sat down and unlocked her computer, fighting to suppress a grin. “Only a dog would eat shit.”
Tang Peng fell silent.
The point was, was he the dog?
“You seriously aren’t letting it get to you at all that he called our work shit?”
Jiang Zao pulled up the PDF of her rejected proposal, her expression serene as she countered, “Why should I let it get to me?”
“He was talking about those three teams. Our plan didn’t even make it to the meeting, so it doesn’t mean ours is shit too.”
Tang Peng leaned over the partition, probing gently. “You still not giving up?”
Jiang Zao looked up, her face deadly serious. “Whether it’s shit or vomit or whatever, you have to test it yourself to know for sure.”
“Until the decision-maker weighs in, I don’t trust anyone else’s opinion.”
Tang Peng sighed. “I get the logic… but couldn’t you pick nicer words?”
She waved it off. “You’re new here—you don’t know Grand Eunuch Zhou yet. He won’t look at any proposal that’s already been shot down in a meeting. Hand it in again, and he’ll just hate you for it.”
Jiang Zao blinked at her, then turned back to her screen, lost in thought.
“I see.”
~~~
At seven-thirty that evening, Jiang Zao rode the subway back to the most exclusive residential complex in Qinnan City Center: Willow Shore No. 1 Courtyard.
She swiped her card and ascended to the eighteenth floor, still uncomfortable with the one-elevator-per-unit setup where the doors opened straight into private living space.
Pushing open the entry door, she changed into house slippers and headed to the water bar for a drink. She surveyed the lavish living room ahead, its floor-to-ceiling windows making the space feel extravagantly empty.
This was her new marital home, and tonight marked only her second visit.
Her assistants had already moved in all her luggage, but Jiang Zao felt no sense of belonging whatsoever—just an odd discomfort.
Why did rich people always insist on living in such vast, echoing houses? Did they enjoy chatting with the reverb?
She rubbed her arms and glanced at the air conditioner.
Even with no one home, it never shut off for a second. What a waste.
She was still dithering over whether to take the guest bedroom or the master tonight when a noise sounded from the entry door.
Jiang Zao’s breath hitched. Her hand jerked, and the cap from her mineral water bottle clattered to the floor.
Xie Lisheng stepped inside, bent down to open the shoe cabinet, and shot a glance toward the water bar. “You’re home.”
“Uh… just got in.” She crouched to retrieve the cap, putting heavy emphasis on that first word in a strange tone. “How come you’re back?”
“What, do I need a visa to return to my own house?” Xie Lisheng slipped into house shoes and lifted his gaze, spotting the paper proposal carelessly tossed atop the shoe cabinet.
Jiang Zao heard the rustle of pages turning from the shoe cabinet and guiltily squeezed her water bottle until it creaked.
She glanced sideways as the man emerged from the entrance hall, clutching the stack of papers.
Seeing the stiffness in her expression confirmed Xie Lisheng’s suspicions. He brandished the file with a playful lilt in his voice. “Left it out on purpose for me to find?”
Jiang Zao knew full well she was no good at lying or dissembling. She straightened her neck defiantly and shot back with disarming honesty, “So, what do you think?”
Xie Lisheng didn’t answer right away. He flipped open the file and read off the title. “Practical Living…”
He sauntered slowly toward the water bar, his tone leisurely—yet piercing straight to the heart of it. “You’re trying to hint that there’s infighting in your planning department? That there’s a better proposal, but the CEO just can’t see it, right?”
No matter how casual Xie Lisheng’s words and actions might seem, his presence always carried a razor-sharp edge.
He had no qualms about stripping away someone’s dignity in conversation—she even suspected he had a wicked penchant for exposing people’s pretenses.
Add to that his unfairly striking looks and his broad-shouldered, narrow-waisted athletic build, and he exuded a singular, hard-to-pin-down allure.
A guy this infuriating had no business being so damn handsome.
As he drew closer, Jiang Zao blinked and pulled herself free from the spell of his attractiveness. “So my proposal really is better?” she pressed for confirmation.
Xie Lisheng twisted the faucet at the bar counter and washed his hands, shooting her a sidelong glance. “When are you going to break that habit of answering a question with another question?”
Jiang Zao flushed with embarrassment but held her ground stubbornly. “…The prenup doesn’t say anything about that.”
Xie Lisheng: “…”
She found herself staring at his long, elegant fingers under the stream of water, lost in a daze for no reason she could name.
Droplets traced the raised veins on the back of his hand, a silently flowing sensuality.
Her throat suddenly went dry. It took effort to tear her eyes away as she picked up where he’d left off. “If that’s what I think, would you even care?”
Choked by her retort, Xie Lisheng grew even more irritated. He shut off the faucet with a bit more force than necessary and let out a derisive snort.
He grabbed a paper towel to dry his hands, his gaze turning somewhat disdainful as it landed on her. “Do you have any idea of Yunsheng’s scale of operations?”
“I’m the CEO. I’ve got a ton of major issues to handle every day.”
“Those proposals I ripped apart weren’t below the passing line, and yours aren’t scoring over ninety, either.”
The implication was clear: even if they went with the one from the meeting, it wouldn’t cause any real damage. He just held himself—and everyone else—to higher standards.
“I’ve got no reason to stick my neck out over a junior staffer’s hurt feelings and dig into departmental drama.”
Jiang Zao stared at the water bottle clutched in her hand, a sullen frustration bubbling up inside her.
But I’m still your wife.
Would it kill him to offer a single word of praise or comfort?
Whether in the past or now, whether as mere acquaintances or as husband and wife, Xie Lisheng’s temperament hadn’t budged in seven years.
He always dodged anything resembling hassle, refused to empathize, solved problems and nothing more, and had zero patience for feeding anyone’s emotional needs.
Arrogant to a fault, he looked down on everyone equally.
Jiang Zao let out a soft, derisive huff and muttered under her breath, “You can play king of the castle out there all you want, but tonight you’re still crawling into this junior staffer’s bed.”
The words were out before she realized how they sounded. Regret flashed across her face as she looked up—right into Xie Lisheng’s gaze, now darkened with a new intensity.
It was as if thick orchid essence had been poured over a honed blade; the taut atmosphere suddenly thickened with an unspoken undercurrent.
He leaned sideways against the edge of the counter and snatched the mineral water from her hand.
Xie Lisheng turned his head with a mocking chuckle, then tilted it back to take a swig.
Jiang Zao spun away, eager to put some distance between them, but the man beside her suddenly stepped forward, blocking her path.
Xie Lisheng tossed the half-empty bottle into the sink with a sharp clink that echoed through the quiet water bar.
Jiang Zao tilted her head up, her nose tip brushing dangerously close to his chin.
The space between them hovered tantalizingly on the edge of safety and peril.
Jiang Zao’s off-color remark had been purely literal in intent, but even knowing that, Xie Lisheng felt provoked every single time.
Because with words like those, the first one to read too much into them was the loser.
He caught the faint quiver of her eyelashes, and his irritation evaporated in an instant. “You can say that again after I’ve crawled all over you.”
With that, he leaned down toward her flushed lips—
Jiang Zao’s hand shot up on instinct, pressing against his chest.
They held there in a standoff, their eyes locked in a silent battle across the scant distance to a kiss.
Rather than pressing forward aggressively, Xie Lisheng flicked his gaze to her bare ring finger and delivered his taunt with deliberate difficulty. “If you’re willing to start wearing that ring out in public from tomorrow on, I’ll make an exception and step in to clean up the Planning Department’s mess myself.”
The moment the words left his mouth, Jiang Zao caught on, her anger flaring as she called him out. “I knew it! You flipped through our marriage certificate on purpose in the employee elevator.”
God only knew how sky-high her blood pressure had spiked amid the office gossip.
Xie Lisheng’s single-lidded fox eyes looked perpetually sharp and cutting, the upturned corners giving the impression he was always plotting mischief.
Just like the man himself.
“It’s spreading faster than I expected.”
Jiang Zao glared at his increasingly wicked expression, a nameless fire raging in her gut.
This had nothing to do with punishing some slacking employee. No, that stunt was pure retaliation against his new wife for keeping their marriage under wraps!
“Enough, Miss Jiang. We’re finally off the clock—let me catch a break.” Xie Lisheng lowered his gaze with a soft sigh. “Work can wait.”
“Back to the main event.”
“Hm?”
Xie Lisheng tugged open the collar of his shirt. “On our wedding night… I want to crawl into bed early.”
Before Jiang Zao could react, he dipped his head and claimed her breath—
Their kiss ignited in a wet, entwining clash.
Jiang Zao was pressed thin against his embrace, her palm searing with the rapid thrum of his heartbeat.
As her lips went numb under his sucking pull and her mind began to fog, a growing disorientation took hold, leaving her to question if any of this was even real.
It had been less than two months ago.
The two of them had still been locked in a relationship of mutual disdain.
How had things developed into this?