The Whole Company Thinks I'm the Boss's Mistress, But Only the Boss's Wife Pays Me - Chapter 5
Chapter 5
I stood at the hotel entrance, staring at those two text messages, my palms slick with sweat.
They knew about my mom.
That was far more effective than threatening me directly.
My first instinct was to call the hospital.
The caregiver picked up quickly and said my mom had just fallen asleep. Her dialysis had gone fairly steadily today.
I let out a breath.
After I hung up, the room was unbearably quiet.
I wedged a chair under the door handle, then drew the curtains tight.
Then I sat on the edge of the bed and stared at that earring.
It looked far too ordinary.
So ordinary no one would believe anything could be hidden inside it.
I picked at it with the hotel sewing kit for ages, splitting a small piece of my fingernail before I finally pried open the seam along the edge.
There was no chip inside.
Only a tiny slip of paper, folded extremely thin.
The paper had been wrapped in waterproof film. When I unfolded it, there was only a string of numbers and four characters written on it.
“0709, Blue Whale.”
I didn’t understand what it meant.
But Lin Yuan wouldn’t have left this behind for no reason.
I took a photo and sent it to Song Wantang.
She didn’t reply until ten minutes later.
“Don’t send electronic copies again.”
“Keep the original safe.”
“Tomorrow at ten, go to the archives and look for the Blue Whale Project from July 9, 2021.”
I asked, “Can I even get into the archives?”
Her reply came almost instantly.
“Your salary has tripled now.”
I stared at that sentence and suddenly laughed.
After I laughed, I felt a little like crying.
The next day, I went to the office with a face that looked like I hadn’t slept all night.
The moment I walked in, the receptionist looked at me differently.
Not with yesterday’s eagerness to watch a spectacle.
This scrutiny was more subtle.
As if I weren’t a person, but an object that had just had a price tag slapped on it.
Xu Jia was in the elevator too.
She stood in the corner, faint shadows under her eyes.
I glanced at her, and she immediately lowered her head to scroll through her phone.
When the elevator reached the sixteenth floor, she suddenly spoke.
“Xu Mian, what happened in the group chat yesterday wasn’t posted by me.”
I said nothing.
Her voice dropped even lower.
“I only forwarded it once.”
I asked, “To who?”
She bit her lip.
“Everyone was forwarding it.”
The elevator doors opened.
I walked out.
Xu Jia suddenly caught up and grabbed my wrist.
“I’m warning you, don’t get on President Zhao’s bad side.”
Her eyes were a little red.
“You think just because CEO Song is protecting you, everything will be fine?”
“Lin Yuan thought the same thing back then.”
I stopped.
Xu Jia seemed to regret saying it and immediately let go.
“I didn’t say anything.”
She hurried away.
When she reached the corner, her phone lit up.
She looked down at it, and her face turned even paler than before. Even her shoulders seemed to hunch inward.
I watched her retreating figure and, for the first time, felt she might not be just a gossip after all.
At ten that morning, I took the authorization form Song Wantang had approved and went to the archives.
The archivist was a woman in her fifties, surnamed Peng.
After reading the authorization form, she glanced at me.
“You’re the one whose salary tripled?”
I said, “If the company doesn’t have a second one for now, then that should be me.”
Aunt Peng laughed.
“Sharp tongue for such a young girl.”
She opened a cabinet for me.
“The Blue Whale Project is in Area B, third row, but part of the 2021 files are missing.”
My heart sank.
“What’s missing?”
“The acceptance form and the supplier price comparison sheet.”
Aunt Peng lowered her head to make a registration entry, her voice dropping.
“Lin Yuan came looking for them back then too.”
My head snapped up to look at her.
She didn’t look up.
“She said that if a girl named Xu Mian ever came here in the future, I should tell her something.”
“Don’t just search the project cabinets.”
Aunt Peng closed the registry.
“She said you’d understand.”
