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Shen Tang’s memory of Jiang Chengyu’s body was still stuck a year and a half ago, in the Shanghai apartment. That was the last time they were together before they broke up.
All sensations related to him had long since blurred.
But now, with his forceful presence, every cell in her body’s memory was reawakened.
Each thrust, shattering her past grievances against him.
Those three boxes brought from Haitang Village were put to use tonight.
One.
Then another.
Jiang Chengyu supported himself on both sides of her body, his arm muscles taut.
The tingling sensation in her heart had nowhere to release. Shen Tang gripped his wrists tightly, staring at his sharply defined facial contours. She slightly lifted her head.
This gesture was a demand for a kiss. Jiang Chengyu lowered his head, enveloping her lips.
Bodies and minds intertwined, tongues entwined. Shen Tang had already hugged him tightly, yet felt the strength in her arms wasn’t enough. All her sounds were muffled by him.
Jiang Chengyu’s kiss reached her ear, kissing her beside it.
He kept wanting her.
Shen Tang’s voice was hoarse: “Jiang Chengyu...”
She only called his name. Before she could say anything else, Jiang Chengyu leaned into her ear. “I love you.” Immediately after, Shen Tang was sent to cloud nine by him.
Shen Tang buried her head in Jiang Chengyu’s neck. Just now, when he gave her all his strength, her mind went blank for a moment. She had no idea where her fingernails had scratched him.
Jiang Chengyu propped himself up on his elbows, lying on his side and holding her in his arms.
She remained silent, so he never let go of her.
A few minutes passed.
Jiang Chengyu brushed her long hair back from her face; her hair near her forehead was damp. He slowly rubbed his thumb across it, wiping away her sweat.
Other than her calling his name and his “I love you,” they hadn’t spoken a word throughout the entire process.
Shen Tang leaned against his chest. They used to be like this in Haitang Village, going for walks on the beach at dawn, and when they returned home, they didn’t need many words, just holding each other and communicating physically again and again.
Jiang Chengyu asked her, “Do you want some water?”
Shen Tang was too weak to speak, her throat so dry it felt like smoke was coming out. She nodded.
Only then did Jiang Chengyu leave her body, getting up to go to the bathroom.
Shen Tang lay in bed for a while longer. Perhaps it was because she had woken up naturally this morning, but even after two rounds of lovemaking, she still wasn’t sleepy.
Jiang Chengyu showered and went downstairs to pour her water.
Shen Tang got out of bed and grabbed a bathrobe to shower.
She reached back and touched the injured spot on her back. When her body was overcome with pleasure, she completely overlooked the faint pain there.
Jiang Chengyu came up from downstairs. No one was on the bed, and there was no sound of water in the bathroom.
“Shen Tang?”
“Going to shower now.” Shen Tang was checking the hickeys Jiang Chengyu had left on her body in the mirror. After a few hours, some spots were already slightly red and bruised.
She couldn’t wear low-cut clothes tomorrow.
Having nothing to do, Jiang Chengyu sat in front of the vanity mirror and unpacked all the unopened cosmetics on the table, arranging them neatly.
When Shen Tang emerged from the bathroom, Jiang Chengyu was standing by the bedside table, setting tomorrow’s alarm. He turned to look at her; her hair was already dry. “Go to sleep quickly.”
Shen Tang hugged him from behind. “Goodnight.”
A faint, pleasant scent wafted from her.
Jiang Chengyu reached back, wanting to pull her closer and hold her in front of him, but Shen Tang was a step quicker; she had already let go of him and rolled onto the bed.
Jiang Chengyu picked up the box on the bedside table, wanting to take out a third condom for tonight, but then remembered her back injury and ultimately gave up.
He turned off the wall lamp.
“I’m meeting Xiao Dongkai for dinner tomorrow night,” Shen Tang said in the darkness.
After two seconds, she added, “Goodnight.”
Seeing that she didn’t want to say more, Jiang Chengyu didn’t ask further.
“Hmm, goodnight.”
Shen Tang shared a third of the duvet with him, and her left foot rested across his leg.
________________________________________
The next day, Shen Tang went to the company wearing a long-sleeved shirt.
Her sleeves were rolled up to her forearms, making her look capable and sharp.
The variety show that Chu Ran was going to participate in would start filming in mid-July. Each episode of this show required completing corresponding tasks and earning points based on the ranking of the current episode.
The points accumulated each episode, and an elimination system based on the lowest accumulated points would begin from the seventh episode.
The six popular young female stars participating in this show did not have a significant difference in strength, making the points competition fierce.
Chu Ran, unexpectedly, attended this afternoon’s meeting.
During the meeting, Sister Li specifically mentioned Chen Yinuo.
She looked at Chu Ran, “Chen Yinuo is your biggest competitor in this show. If you don’t crush her, you won’t be able to get first place.”
Qin Xing was attending a company meeting for the first time. He opened his notepad and wrote furiously.
Hearing Sister Li’s hope for Chu Ran to crush Chen Yinuo, his pen paused. “For her to get first place, isn’t that a bit too high an expectation?”
Chu Ran: “...”
She glared at Qin Xing, finding his frivolous demeanor increasingly irritating.
“Not high,” Shen Tang interjected. “Isn’t the original intention of joining this show to get first place?” On her way to the company this morning, she had already packed Chu Ran’s schedule full for the period leading up to the show’s recording.
“Take a look at this.”
She pushed the schedule from her desk toward Chu Ran.
“Starting tomorrow, you will strictly follow my requirements. I’m currently contacting relevant teachers for you.”
Chu Ran felt her scalp tingle after reading it. This was treating her like a trainee, putting her through three weeks of devilish training. “Why do I also need physical training?”
Shen Tang didn’t answer directly, instead asking, “Did you not look closely at the relevant competition segments in this show?”
Chu Ran looked, then suddenly fell silent.
But the schedule also included things like running, which felt a bit like it was giving her a hard time.
She had long relied on dieting to lose weight, and because she was lazy, she didn’t exercise. She would get out of breath after just a few steps. This 3000-meter long-distance run, wouldn’t it be the death of her?
Shen Tang closed her tablet. “No matter what, if you push yourself to the extreme, at least you’ve beaten yourself.”
The small meeting with four people dispersed in less than half an hour.
Qin Xing still hadn’t gotten used to the days of serious work. This morning, he gritted his teeth to get up, and the moment he struggled to sit up, he truly wanted to give up this job.
“That physical training,” he told Shen Tang, “I’ll participate too, to change my own bad habits, and also to supervise Chu Ran.”
Coming out of the conference room, Chu Ran walked behind him, rolling her eyes several times.
“Tangtang,” Sister Li stood at the conference room door, calling her back.
Shen Tang agreed to Qin Xing’s request to participate in physical training. She turned back to the conference room.
“What’s wrong?” she asked Sister Li.
Sister Li held Chu Ran’s training schedule in her hand and pointed to a few items. “Chu Ran will surely be a mess of snot and tears then. She probably won’t be able to stick with it.”
“Then she’ll cry and train,” Shen Tang said, referring to the drama “How Should I Love You?” “Her acting skills alone won’t be enough. If she can’t endure hardship, this drama won’t achieve the effect Zhou Mingqian wants.”
This training was for both the variety show and preparation for Zhou Mingqian’s drama.
Sister Li opened her phone and showed Shen Tang an email. “Fan Yu’s backing capital is working to make Chen Yinuo the pre-determined winner of this variety show.”
Fan Yu’s quick recovery after the exposure incident wasn’t due to her own great ability; several shareholders in her company had unusual backgrounds.
Having invested so much money previously, how could they just watch Fan Yu’s brand collapse?
“My biggest concern is that Fan Yu will expose Chu Ran’s current boyfriend then.”
Shen Tang: “It’s a normal relationship. What’s there to expose?”
“You don’t know,” Sister Li sighed. “Chu Ran’s boyfriend started pursuing Chu Ran before he broke up with his ex-girlfriend. Chu Ran was kept in the dark too. It wasn’t until the ex-girlfriend heard from others that she realized she had been cheated on. Fan Yu will twist the story then, saying Chu Ran interfered in their relationship, and Chu Ran will be unable to defend herself.”
Shen Tang was concerned: “So, how are Chu Ran and her boyfriend now?”
“After Chu Ran found out, she immediately blocked him. He was also past the honeymoon phase and was flirting with another girl, so he readily broke up with Chu Ran.”
The reason Sister Li was worried that Chu Ran wouldn’t stick with the physical training was because she had broken up with her boyfriend and was quite hurt.
Shen Tang: “Continue the physical training; other practices cannot be neglected either.”
As for Fan Yu, she needed to carefully consider how to deal with her.
“Hey, Tangtang, news about President Jiang’s company acquisition.” Sister Li’s phone received a push notification. She had bought shares in Jiang Chengyu’s company, so any relevant news would be pushed to her immediately.
So fast?
Shen Tang opened her phone. This morning, Jingxu signed the acquisition agreement with the target company.
She meticulously read every word in the news, and suddenly, she felt the same unsettling feeling as Jiang Chengyu. She was inexplicably uneasy.
[Don’t forget our meeting tonight.] Xiao Dongkai sent Shen Tang a reminder message.
“I want to see what ability Jiang Chengyu has to get out of this unscathed.” Xiao Donghan closed his computer page, determined to get Jingxu’s shares.
Xiao Dongkai put away his phone. “What kind of trap did you set for Jiang Chengyu?”
“Many.”
Xiao Donghan stood up, went to the wine cabinet, opened a bottle of red wine, and poured two glasses. He wasn’t pouring one for Xiao Dongkai; he clinked the glasses together himself and drank both.
“It’s full of traps, traps that Jiang Chengyu won’t discover all at once.”
Xiao Dongkai poured himself a glass of warm water. “Don’t get too smug too early. This is Jiang Chengyu’s home ground. Once Jiang Chengyu discovers the traps, he is fully capable of preventing this acquisition from proceeding in the later stages.”
What Xiao Dongkai could think of, Xiao Donghan naturally also thought of. “If the acquisition isn’t completed as scheduled in the later stages, Jingxu will have to pay the target company a penalty of 400 million US dollars.”
This was no small sum, and it was a cash payment. At that point, Jingxu’s shareholders would surely be in an uproar, and the stock price would plummet.
He would take advantage of the opportunity.
If Jiang Chengyu discovered the acquisition trap and stubbornly continued with the acquisition, the numerous large and small pitfalls afterward would be enough to deeply entangle Jingxu.
He would then have the opportunity to negotiate with Jiang Chengyu.
No matter how this acquisition case progressed, no matter what the outcome, he would be the one to benefit.
“I never make a losing deal.”
For this scheme, he had also been busy for half a year, investing effort and an astonishing amount of capital.
Xiao Dongkai put down his water glass. “You’re playing a bit big.”
“If I play small, how can I force Jiang Chengyu to compromise?”
Xiao Dongkai said no more. He had an appointment with Shen Tang for dinner. As it was almost time, he excused himself to go to the meeting.
Upon arriving at the reserved restaurant, Shen Tang was already waiting for him.
“I’m sorry, I’m late,” Xiao Dongkai apologized.
The traffic in Beijing was more congested than he had imagined. “It’s fine, my company is nearby, so I walked. It’s definitely faster than driving,” Shen Tang handed him the menu.
Xiao Dongkai wasn’t in the mood to eat. He put the menu aside and conveyed his grandfather’s wishes.
After he finished, he earnestly said, “Tangtang, trust me this once and accept Grandpa’s shares.”
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