Chapter 7

Chapter 7

After half a month away on business, I returned to a mountain of work. I was so busy my feet barely touched the ground.

Naturally, someone with no sense chose that moment to provoke me.

My father appeared with his illegitimate son.

This time, he did not ask me to apologize to Lin Qing. He demanded that I hand the company to his son.

“You’re a woman. Once you marry, can the company still bear the Xu name? Shuyin, step aside and support your younger brother. We’ll tell the public he’s the youngest son of our family.”

When he finished, I wondered whether I had misheard.

The script was far too familiar. It was hard not to suspect that Lin Tianhai was directing things behind the scenes.

But none of that mattered.

One after another, people who had enjoyed too many good days insisted on tasting a mountain of blades and a sea of fire.

I looked up at father and son.

“I told you, I’m an only child. I have no younger brother. Do you understand what I mean?”

My father stared. “You want your brother dead?”

My lips curved. “I wouldn’t object.”

I was not as ruthless as Lin Jingyi. I could not stab him three times.

But I had more power than Lin Jingyi had possessed back then.

There were many ways to make a person’s life impossible. I would use scientific methods to ensure neither of them ever appeared before me again.

People chased hardest after whatever they lacked.

That described me perfectly.

My parents’ love had been my obsession since childhood.

Now that obsession had finally dissolved.

I could accept that my family and romantic lives were disasters. My career and my future, however, would be nothing but bright.

Lin Tianhai sent people to ask about my father, but their interest quickly disappeared.

He had problems of his own.

Lin Jingyi and her mother had joined forces with old allies and shareholders from the Shen family to seize power. Only then did Lin Tianhai discover that mother and daughter had not been idle all these years.

I held grudges and always repaid them. How could I miss an opportunity like this?

Every Xu Group project connected to Lin Group was suspended regardless of cost, and would remain suspended until Lin Jingyi took control.

Xu Group’s position was a signal. Resentment against Lin Tianhai rose throughout his own company.

No one liked the story of a poor man who married an heiress, climbed to the top, then betrayed her.

Women despised his treachery. Men hated that they had never been given the same chance.

When a man stood at the peak, everyone fawned over him. Once his footing slipped, people did far more than throw stones into the well after him.

Lin Tianhai had made plenty of enemies during his arrogant reign. To be destroyed by his own daughter after all those years—it was almost poetic.

During this time, the Hecheng project was finalized. Lin Jingyi and I signed the contract with the client.

Afterward, she held a victory banquet for me.

It was the same hotel, the same private room, and the same guests.

He Zheng and Liu Yaochen hovered at my side with ingratiating smiles.

“Yin, that was incredible. You really took the project just like that?”

“Took it? What do you mean, took it? The project was hers to begin with. When I went home the other day, even my old man told me to spend more time with her.”

I sipped my mango juice and ignored their flattery.

Only a month had passed, yet Lin Qing no longer had the standing to sit at this table.

Everything I had predicted had come true. His fate was even worse than I had promised.

Halfway through the banquet, Lin Jingyi arrived at last.

He Zheng and Liu Yaochen scattered like mice at the sight of a cat.

Lin Jingyi sat beside me and suddenly laughed.

“When Lin Tianhai gave me the name Jingyi, he must have hoped I’d grow up quiet and pleasant.”

I turned to her, smiling too.

“And the shu in Shuyin probably came from shuxin—peace of mind.”

We looked at each other and laughed.

When we were born, no one had imagined that the girls they named for gentleness and comfort would one day fight for power and win both wealth and glory.

She raised her glass. “Congratulations, Ms. Xu.”

I lifted mine and drank to my victory.

“A fair wind carries us both. Congratulations to you too.”