SFBF CH27

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Shen Qing felt that the finer details of who was accompanying whom didn’t really need to be picked apart — all his efforts to get Duoduo and Aozai out of the house were ultimately for their physical and emotional wellbeing!

But wait — how did the big boss know about that detail??

So the security cameras in the house had already been installed.

Where were they?!

He’d have to go downstairs and look around later…

But since the topic had already come up, Shen Qing felt he should probably report a few things to the big boss.

“Since we’re on the subject — you should know that Duoduo and Aozai are both very dedicated students, right?”

“Mm.” Gu Huaiyù responded, then asked: “What about it?”

Shen Qing: “Nothing major — it’s just that once those two get into studying mode, they forget to eat and sleep. They didn’t even nap this afternoon after getting back from registering for class. I’m worried that if this keeps up, it might not be good for them? Like, what if it stunts their growth?”

Shen Qing had already thought this through. He didn’t support the hyper-competitive tiger-parenting style of education, but given the original host’s track record, he also couldn’t conveniently keep stepping in to urge Duoduo and the others to rest more and act like normal children.

So what to do? Obviously — discuss it with the children’s little uncle, and let the little uncle be the one to actually talk to them.

Besides, Director Gu was home these days.

And he’d seemed to be in good form recently — knowing everything, weighing in on everything.

So he could just weigh in on this too.

But the problem Shen Qing had assumed was a problem turned out to not register as one at all for Gu Huaiyù: “Setting Aozai aside — Duoduo is nearly seven. What’s wrong with learning an additional language?”

Shen Qing: “?…”

Gu Huaiyù wasn’t asking for his opinion; he was simply stating a position, as if he genuinely saw no issue.

He said: “By his age, I had already mastered four languages.”

Shen Qing: “???”

Wait — so the implication was that Duoduo had actually fallen behind?…

No — big boss, what exactly did your childhood look like?!

…No wonder both children in this household studied without anyone telling them to. It seemed the Gu family’s work ethic was bred right into the bone — which, on reflection, suggested that life as a child of the elite was no easy thing either.

But still — Duoduo and Aozai didn’t need to earn money or compete for an inheritance. He had no idea what kind of environment Gu Huaiyù had grown up in, but these two kids absolutely did not need to grind themselves that hard.

Shen Qing held his ground: “I’m not saying they can’t learn — just that their health comes first. What if they end up short because of it?”

He thought that was a fairly compelling argument.

But then Gu Huaiyù said: “That shouldn’t happen. It didn’t affect my height.”

…Coolly and matter-of-factly dismissing his hypothetical.

Shen Qing: “…”

He glanced down at the big boss’s long legs stretched out in the wheelchair… all right, they were indeed longer than his own.

He estimated that if the man could stand, he’d clear at least a hundred and eighty-five centimetres.

But — big boss, you can’t stand up, and you don’t know that?!

Getting run into the ground from childhood, still working every day while bedridden — proof enough that intensive cramming from a young age wasn’t all it was cracked up to be.

But saying any of that out loud would be far too cruel.

Even in an argument, Shen Qing generally didn’t twist the knife in people’s wounds. This wasn’t even an argument — just a rational discussion.

So Shen Qing said nothing.

All right. He officially declared this first household meeting regarding the children, held between himself and the big boss, to have concluded without resolution.

Gu Huaiyù observed the young man’s expression go quietly deflated, and imperceptibly raised an eyebrow. Without showing it, he mentally replayed their conversation, trying to figure out which thing he’d said had annoyed the young man.

Shen Qing’s irritation was not hard to read.

He was usually smiling — so the sudden absence of expression was fairly obvious.

Gu Huaiyù thought about it, and returned directly to the practical matter: “Since you want to go, I’ll have someone clear the venue for you. What day were you thinking?”

Shen Qing: “No, no, that won’t be necessary. No need to arrange anything like that.”

He declined quickly: “It’s more fun when there are crowds — that’s what gives it atmosphere! Clearing the venue would take all the fun out of it. Having them around more people, getting them to interact with other children their age — that’s actually a good thing.”

Gu Huaiyù looked at him: “That’s a sensible perspective.”

Receiving the compliment, Shen Qing immediately broke into a thoroughly ingratiating smile: “Of course, that said — if it gets so busy that the wait times are completely impossible… is there, hypothetically… some kind of high-level VIP benefit available?”

Gu Huaiyù: “…”

After leaving Director Gu’s room, Shen Qing belatedly remembered something — hadn’t he just been in Director Gu’s bedroom?

Because that room looked every bit like a study…

Did the actual sleeping area lie further inside somewhere?

…As expected of Director Gu, a model scholar from birth. Grown up, fallen ill, and still choosing to sleep in the middle of his bookshelves.

But Shen Qing’s curiosity had its limits, and he preferred to let sleeping dogs lie. He didn’t dwell on the question, and certainly wasn’t going to go back and check.

That evening, sitting down with Duoduo and Aozai for dinner, Shen Qing announced the upcoming trip to The Great World.

Upon hearing it was an indoor amusement park and a same-day round trip, Gu Duo visibly exhaled.

It wasn’t that he didn’t want to go out and play, or that he didn’t want to take his brother somewhere farther. It was that he genuinely had a significant amount of missed schoolwork to catch up on, and the new term was starting soon. Time was tight.

Gu Duo had already planned it out: if he worked diligently, and as long as no one interfered with his studying again, he could fill in all the gaps within two months of the new semester starting. By the time Labour Day holiday came around, if Aozai still wanted to go somewhere, and if Auntie agreed, they could all go together.

…Or maybe just let Aozai go with Auntie, the two of them?…

The moment that thought floated through his mind, Gu Duo’s characteristically serious little face took on a slightly stunned and peculiar expression.

He found himself looking across at Shen Qing — who was using a fork to pick out fish bones with practiced elegance — and hadn’t realized until just now how much trust he’d already placed in this person. Enough to even consider letting Aozai go out alone with him.

Of course, the thought was extinguished the instant it surfaced.

He turned to look at his brother in the children’s chair — Aozai, absorbed in scooping food into his mouth with his little spoon — and decided that he still felt more at ease keeping watch himself.

Last semester, he and Aozai had been handed off from their eldest uncle to the second uncle, and then brought home by their little uncle.

Three different places in less than half a year.

Every single day, when Gu Duo left for school, he’d worried about Aozai.

Worried that Aozai would wander off and cause trouble. Worried that Gu Ming and the others would pick on him. Worried that Aozai would get bored sitting alone in his room.

Thankfully, Aozai had been very well-behaved and very resilient, waiting quietly in his room every day for Gu Duo to come home…

Thinking about this, Gu Duo felt a twinge of guilt. He lifted his hand and brushed the stray grains of rice from his brother’s face, then used his chopsticks to transfer one of his own small ribs onto Aozai’s plate.

Aozai, whose cheek had been patted and who had now received a bonus rib, let out little bursts of happy laughter while eating.

The sound startled Shen Qing out of his thoughts.

Shen Qing glanced at Gu Duo, then at Gu Ao, and set down his fork: “Eat your own food.”

He was talking to Gu Duo.

As he said it, he picked up the communal chopsticks and transferred the fish he’d already deboned from his own plate over to Gu Duo’s.

Gu Duo: “…”

It was a deep-sea fish with only a few large bones. Shen Qing had picked them all out, then checked again and again to make sure, before handing it over.

As for Gu Ao:

Shen Qing: “Little Aozai — eat all the carrots in your bowl.”

Aozai had a deep and abiding hatred of carrots. And regardless of who had taught him this habit, at every single meal he meticulously picked out every single piece of carrot from his little plate, lined them all up neatly to one side, and refused to touch a single shred.

Hearing Shen Qing tell him to eat the carrots, Gu Ao twisted his small body to one side and shook his head: “Don’t want to.”

Shen Qing: “Picky eaters don’t grow tall, you know.”

Gu Ao didn’t yet understand the appeal of being tall, and continued shaking his big round head with utter conviction: “Aozai doesn’t want to!”

He simply refused to eat carrots. Full stop.

Shen Qing: “…”

Privately he thought — you say you don’t like carrots, but Auntie Zhang told me you ate more of the afternoon cake than your brother!

He’d heard that almost every parent eventually encountered a picky-eating phase.

But he’d only ever heard about it. He hadn’t imagined it would find him this quickly.

This is what you get for marrying young.

He hadn’t actually planned to make it a battle — nutritionally speaking, with a household like this, Aozai would grow up perfectly healthy even if he never touched a carrot in his life.

Besides, he could just ask Auntie Zhang to disguise carrots as other things and sneak them into the little one’s meals.

But the problem was that watching food go to waste genuinely bothered him.

…Maybe going forward he’d just ask Auntie Zhang not to put carrots in the main dishes, and instead quietly fold small amounts into Aozai’s snacks. That way the little lord would be happy, and Shen Qing would be happy.

…Come to think of it — the piece of cake he’d brought up for the big boss earlier, he’d left it on the desk when he walked out. He’d never taken it back.

He had no idea whether the big boss had eaten it afterward. Whether he’d actually liked it or not…

Lost in this idle musing, Shen Qing sent another piece of fish toward his mouth.

Then: “Mmph!” — he’d barely started chewing when his whole jaw clenched to a hard stop.

Across the table, both small people simultaneously noticed the commotion and tilted their heads to look at him.

“Cough, cough… it’s fine. Something poked me.”

As he spoke, Shen Qing removed a fish bone from his mouth.

His preferred method of eating fish — regardless of species — was to pick out every single bone first, then eat the whole piece in one go, so he could properly enjoy the juicy, tender flesh uninterrupted.

But just now, he’d watched Duoduo transfer his rib to Aozai’s plate, and his mind had run away with him. He’d thought about how this child had once regularly gone hungry, and had still always taken care of his little brother — had gotten so used to putting Aozai first that even now, with plenty of ribs on the table, he’d given his own portion away.

In that moment, Shen Qing’s heart had given a small, involuntary lurch, and he’d instinctively transferred his own carefully deboned piece of fish to Gu Duo’s plate.

There was still plenty in the serving dish, after all.

After giving that piece to Gu Duo, he’d reached over and put another piece from the main dish onto his own plate.

But then Aozai had started his carrot-sorting operation, and Shen Qing’s attention had been hijacked by the impending food waste, and somehow — in a fit of complete mental absence — he’d entirely forgotten that he’d given his deboned piece to Gu Duo. The piece now on his plate was a fresh, unvetted one…

In short: while eating with great gusto, Shen Qing had been ambushed by a large, firm fish bone.

Having forgotten so thoroughly, he’d bitten down with some force, and the tip of the bone had caught him at a precise and unfortunate angle, jabbing straight into the roof of his mouth.

The yelp that escaped him was entirely involuntary — pure shock, and genuine pain.

Auntie Zhang, tidying up in the kitchen, was startled enough to come rushing out: “Madam, what happened?”

Across the table, Gu Duo had set down his utensils. Aozai still hadn’t quite worked out what was going on, but his big round eyes were fixed unblinking on Shen Qing, and even the chubby little legs that normally kicked nonstop had gone still, hanging quiet.

Shen Qing saw how alarmed they looked and immediately said: “I’m fine.”

One hand over his mouth, the other waving: Shen Qing was genuinely trying his best to communicate that everything was alright.

Neither child had yet worked out exactly what had happened to Shen Qing, but Auntie Zhang was already exclaiming: “Did Madam get poked by a fish bone?”

Gu Duo: Hm?

Gu Ao: Wha?

Both small heads tilted simultaneously.

Shen Qing: “…”

Auntie, please — at least leave me a shred of dignity!

Who apart from Aozai gets got by a fish bone?! He’d just been distracted while eating!

But sharp-eared Aozai had already caught Auntie Zhang’s meaning. He lifted his little chopsticks, looked at the fish in his bowl, then looked at the piece Shen Qing had just removed from his mouth, and tilted his head in genuine puzzlement: “But Aozai doesn’t get poked! Aozai can sift for bones!”

Shen Qing: “…”

Right. Little Long Aotian and his devastating commentary — always delayed, never absent.

Aozai’s expression was one of pure, honest confusion, with no intent to attack — simply unable to understand why Auntie could possibly have been caught by a bone.

But sometimes the most hurtful things are the ones said without any malice, Aozai. You know that?

What made it even more mortifying was that, in order to demonstrate his own superior bone-sifting skills, Aozai promptly picked up a piece of fish with his chopsticks and stuffed it into his mouth.

His round little cheeks worked side to side as he chewed.

Eventually, once all the fish had been thoroughly demolished, he concluded with a slight air of disappointment that his piece had, in fact, contained no bones.

What a shame.

Aozai had been fully prepared to put on a performance.

Shen Qing: “…”

Auntie Zhang was still mid-self-recrimination: “Next time I’ll remove all the bones before serving, every single one. Really — how does someone manage to hurt themselves eating dinner… Madam, shall I find some medicine for you?”

“No, no, it’s fine.” Shen Qing ran his tongue over the spot, decided it was just a tiny surface nick with no real damage, and waved everyone down — please, stop worrying, let’s just eat.

“I’m really fine,” Shen Qing said.

His words just came out slightly thick-tongued as he said it.

Across the table, Gu Duo stared at Shen Qing’s pained expression, then looked down at his own plate.

The next second, he picked up his children’s chopsticks and poked at his fish. Not a single bone.

…This person. Gave him a perfectly deboned piece, and then for himself…

Gu Duo couldn’t find the right words.

Something felt a little strange in his chest. He looked at that piece of fish someone had carefully prepared with a fork, and felt simultaneously a small warmth and a small ache.

Gu Duo wanted to give the piece back to Shen Qing. He wanted to say he could pick out his own bones.

But by then, Shen Qing had already reached for another piece of fish, meticulously removed the bones from this one, and started eating it.

Gu Duo: “…”

He poked at the fish on his plate once more.

Actually, having eaten cake during the afternoon, he wasn’t very hungry now. Compared to children his age, Gu Duo’s appetite had always been on the smaller side.

But after several moments of hesitation, Gu Duo was the first one to finish every bit of fish on his plate.

Meanwhile, Aozai — who had been depositing no small amount of food into his own mouth — set down his little chopsticks. He sat watching Shen Qing for a moment, arms folded across his chest, then suddenly leveraged his small body and launched himself down from the chair.

He’d been sitting in the safety children’s chair with the harness and buckle, but at this dinner Aozai had declared himself a big boy who would sit in a real chair like his brother and auntie.

He’d lobbied Shen Qing for a long time, and Shen Qing had confirmed multiple times that he could sit properly without fidgeting before finally making the swap to a regular chair with a back.

Now, mobile and unrestrained, Aozai bounced straight to the floor — startling Gu Duo and the adults nearby.

Gu Duo’s first instinct was to reach out and steady his brother, but Aozai, for all his short legs and low center of gravity, landed surprisingly stably.

The moment his feet hit the ground, he marched his little legs over to Shen Qing’s side, tilted his big head back, and looked up: “Auntie, are you really okay?”

Having just been startled by the mid-dinner floor jump, Shen Qing found all his irritation immediately dissolved by the sight of this soft, round, bun-shaped little person looking up at him with actual concern.

He hadn’t expected Aozai to specifically come over to check on him, and felt a small, genuine warmth.

He reached out and ruffled the child’s fluffy head, then took the opportunity to wipe away the food remnants stuck to his face.

“Auntie is fine,” Shen Qing said. “Thank you for your concern.”

“Good.”

Aozai was already in his small pajamas. One hand tucked into his little pocket, his overall bearing impressively swaggering: “Auntie should try not to be so silly next time, or Aozai” — he paused significantly — “will be very troubled by it!”

Shen Qing: …?

Excuse me—

Who’s silly?

And who is troubled by whom??

…This was the little dragon king, was it? Starting his tyranny this young — someone gets a fish bone stuck in their mouth and he can’t even permit that?!

“Wait, I’m troubling you now??”

The warmth and tenderness of two seconds ago evaporated entirely. Shen Qing lunged toward Aozai in mock indignation — but the small person in the pale yellow pajamas took it as the opening move of a game, dissolved into giggles, and bolted.

Still very much like an energetic, round little duckling.

Even Gu Duo couldn’t hold back a smile.

Beyond the factory-installed dragon-king settings, Gu Ao was, at the end of the day, just a small child.

And children’s worlds were simple, and full of joy. One small thing could fill an entire villa with laughter.

Before, when Aozai had been reluctant to engage with him, and Gu Duo had been so deep and reserved, Shen Qing hadn’t gotten a proper sense of this.

Now he was getting a real taste of what childhood delight actually looked like.

Though he still had to yell about it: “Aozai! No running! Come back here and finish your dinner!”

Upstairs, Li Hong was once again nearly doubled over laughing at the scene playing out below.

He couldn’t help murmuring: “How is it that Madam seems to need more looking after than the young masters?”

Gu Huaiyù: “…”

His gaze fell to the floor below. He could see Shen Qing still holding a hand over his mouth.

Gu Huaiyù said nothing — but privately, he found Li Hong’s assessment not entirely wrong.

He did look like he needed looking after.

He thought of the young man from that afternoon, standing in front of him pledging that he would definitely take good care of Duoduo and Aozai.

Well. He was, genuinely, taking good care of Duoduo and Aozai.

Just not being particularly careful with himself.

Gu Huaiyù found that he genuinely could not figure this person out. Sometimes he seemed careless and haphazard, and yet at other times — unexpectedly precise. Sometimes he seemed not to pay much attention to Duoduo and the others; from what Gu Huaiyù had observed, Shen Qing spent most of his days doing his own things, only really spending time with the children at mealtimes and afternoon snacks.

And yet somehow, nothing important was ever neglected. Every meaningful thing had been thought of and attended to, one by one, with the children in mind throughout.

At least far more than Gu Huaiyù himself had been able to manage as their uncle.

…

What the young man had done had already far surpassed what Gu Huaiyù had originally expected.

He hadn’t, to be honest, expected much from the person the Shen family had sent over. He hadn’t expected them to treat Duoduo and Aozai well.

He’d long seen clearly the coldness that ran beneath the surface of family ties.

If blood relatives could be so indifferent, what could a stranger be expected to do?

All he had ever asked of this young man called Shen Qing was to stay within his proper place and not cause trouble.

…

But this young man had kept managing to be surprising. To be entirely other than expected.

Pressing one hand firmly over his chest, suppressing the urge to cough, Gu Huaiyù didn’t leave.

Instead he stayed and kept watching the scene below —

The “furious” young man had scooped Aozai up like a wayward chick and deposited him firmly back in his chair. Shen Qing’s frame was slight, and the exertion had him breathing a little harder — from Gu Huaiyù’s angle, he could see the young man’s narrow chest rising and falling with each breath.

Below, Shen Qing was delivering a lecture to Gu Ao, and announcing the establishment of a house rule: if there was any more running during meals, every single carrot that had been picked out would have to be eaten.

Addendum: this particular consequence applied to Aozai specifically.

Despite the slight breathlessness, the young man was standing very straight.

Both hands at his slender waist, facing Gu Ao, that imperious expression…

Gu Huaiyù almost let the corner of his mouth lift.

But alongside the cheerfulness below, there was also Li Hong’s poorly suppressed laughter at his side.

Gu Huaiyù glanced over: “You pay a great deal of attention to Madam.”

Li Hong: ???

His hair stood on end. He stopped laughing immediately.

“Director Gu… what do you mean by that?”

Gu Huaiyù didn’t respond.

Long fingers tapped a quiet rhythm against the armrest of the wheelchair.

Gu Huaiyù: “The blue diamond ring I had you order — when does it arrive?”

Li Hong: “I confirmed with the house — it’s still available. They’re sending it out tonight. With a private flight, direct… it should arrive by noon tomorrow at the latest.”

“Good.”

After that, Li Hong had no choice but to keep his eyes firmly to himself and stare at nothing in particular, because looking down at the warm scene between Madam and the young masters made him want to laugh, and laughing irritated Director Gu.

Though Li Hong still wasn’t entirely sure what it was he’d done to irritate Director Gu in the first place…

“Speaking of which,” Li Hong said carefully, feeling out the director’s mood: “Director Gu, you do seem much better than you did a few days ago. Is it the new medication working?”

Without waiting for a reply — it wasn’t really the kind of question he should be asking anyway.

Li Hong had brought it up mainly as a lead-in to a suggestion: “Why don’t you come downstairs to eat with Madam and the young masters sometime?”

He genuinely felt that Director Gu spending every day tucked away on the third floor, quietly watching Madam and the children be lively downstairs… the whole picture had a certain lonely, wistful quality. Sad, even.

At first, Director Gu had been observing the situation below in order to watch how Madam interacted with the young masters. For the sake of the children and for Madam’s sake — that was understandable.

But these past few days it had started to look like something else entirely. Director Gu, are you conducting surveillance? Because this is edging toward spying…

He knew Director Gu didn’t generally enjoy noise and bustle.

But Madam made things lively, and Li Hong hadn’t seen Director Gu seem bothered by it… in fact, just this afternoon, Director Gu had called Madam up and the two of them had talked in the bedroom for a very long time.

If he enjoyed it that much — just join in!

As expected, though, the proposal was immediately shot down.

Gu Huaiyù: “No.”

Li Hong: “…I know you feel that your health isn’t good, and you worry that when the day comes, Madam and the young masters will grieve. But Director Gu — have you considered that you could also choose to get better…”

Having said it, Li Hong immediately looked up at the ceiling.

Because Director Gu was already looking at him.

With an especially sharp look.

Gu Huaiyù said: “Come. Let’s go back.”

The following afternoon, Shen Qing was called upstairs again to see Gu Huaiyù.

This time he was shown to the director’s office rather than the bedroom. Gu Huaiyù today was not in a robe, but in a dark high-necked sweater with a cashmere coat over the top.

Elegant winter business-formal. Cold, refined, and effortlessly authoritative.

This was Shen Qing’s first time seeing the big boss in anything other than indoor robes, and he found himself thinking: if Gu Huaiyù were a normal person, or rather, if this were the past — this man would have broken hearts left and right. How many colleagues would have been helplessly charmed?

But the most eye-catching development was that Director Gu had opened the curtains today!

…Just a small gap, granted. But the weather outside was good, the light was bright, and now a thin thread of natural sunlight reached into the room.

Though Shen Qing couldn’t be entirely sure this wasn’t a coincidence… but however he looked at it, that small gap seemed almost exactly the same width as the one he had drawn open for the big boss yesterday.

He was still turning this over in his head when Gu Huaiyù slid another paper gift bag across to him, identical in appearance to yesterday’s.

Shen Qing: “???”

Gu Huaiyù: “For you.”

Shen Qing: “What is it this time?”

After yesterday’s experience, Gu Huaiyù had decided explanations were no longer worth the effort.

He said, concisely: “A gift. Take it.”

Shen Qing: “Why another gift? What happened? What’s in it this time?”

But no matter how many questions he asked, Gu Huaiyù showed no interest in answering any of them.

The big boss returned his full attention to the documents in front of him. Still. Unmoved.

Shen Qing: “…”

He had no choice but to pick up the bag, standing there unsure whether to stay or go.

Until Gu Huaiyù suddenly asked: “Is your mouth healed?”

The big boss didn’t look up as he said it.

Shen Qing: ?

“…How do you know my mouth was hurt?”

He’d thought about it for a while before connecting it back to yesterday’s fish bone incident — and to be honest, given that it had only been a small jab, even though it had ached through the evening, a night’s sleep had sorted it out entirely. He himself had almost forgotten about it.

But the important thing right now was: exactly four people had known about the fish bone incident — Auntie Zhang, Gu Duo, Gu Ao, and himself.

Having been more or less laughed at by Aozai, Shen Qing had his own embarrassed dignity to protect, and had specifically asked Auntie Zhang not to mention it further.

Auntie Zhang was not a gossip. And when Shen Qing had come back downstairs from the big boss’s room yesterday, he’d had a discreet look around. Apart from the cameras at the main entrance and outward-facing windows — purely for security purposes — he hadn’t found any internal surveillance within the house.

As for the children: a trivial thing about him was unlikely to come up in conversation unless someone had specifically asked.

Unless someone had deliberately inquired.

Or unless…

“Were you spying on me?“

The more he thought about it, the more plausible it seemed.

The property was enormous. Just the ground floor had three sitting rooms of different sizes, all of them with a great deal of open space.

In that kind of layout, if someone were watching from the third floor, the people downstairs would have no way of sensing them unless the noise reached a certain level.

And connecting it to the time he’d borrowed — well, taken — the shower gel, and Gu Huaiyù had spotted him from the third floor that time too, Shen Qing reasonably suspected he’d been watched again yesterday.

…Which aligned rather well with his existing theory: Gu Huaiyù had already begun to suspect something was off about “him” and was quietly keeping watch.

Even without cameras, the big boss had simply been watching him personally.

Realizing this, Shen Qing felt a little dazed. Primarily because the novel hadn’t included a scene like this, and he had no way of knowing whether the current situation was a normal development within the story’s friction, or whether something had gone wrong somewhere…

Since he couldn’t tell if it was abnormal, Shen Qing’s only option was to pretend he hadn’t noticed any abnormality.

He put on his best expression of disbelief: “How could you spy on me!”

He also wanted to ask: don’t you trust me?

But that question had a slightly too-obvious guilty-conscience energy. After considering it carefully, he chose not to raise it.

He’d see what the big boss said first.

But something Shen Qing considered vitally important was met with complete composure from Gu Huaiyù.

The big boss set aside one of the documents on the desk, then finally looked up, and said unhurriedly: “It was watching. Not spying.”

Shen Qing: “…”

Your wife is being watched and you’re going to sit there and split hairs over the word choice?

Even if you’re the one doing the watching…

Shen Qing flared up anyway: “You watched me! How could you just watch me like that?”

Gu Huaiyù raised an eyebrow slightly, genuinely puzzled by the strength of the reaction: “Isn’t it perfectly natural for me to look at you?”

Shen Qing: “…”

Gu Huaiyù: “Or am I not allowed to?”

“…I suppose it’s not that you’re not allowed.”

He did recall having shoved his entire arm into the big boss’s face yesterday. Shen Qing: “It’s not like you haven’t seen me before.”

Gu Huaiyù: “…”

He glanced away briefly.

Shen Qing had this one particular habit: the moment he saw the other party back down during a standoff, he’d immediately perk right back up.

The more he fought, the more energized he got. He simply walked around the desk and positioned himself directly in front of the big boss.

Shen Qing half-leaned, half-sat against the edge of the desk, and draped one hand over Director Gu’s shoulder: “Want me to take everything off so you can get a proper look?”

“…Cough, cough, cough!”

The words had barely left his mouth when someone coughed.

Just — not the Director Gu who was now within arm’s reach.

The half-open office door was pushed open. An elderly man entered — a man of considerable bearing, leaning on a jade-handled walking cane, the other hand shaking as he pointed into the room: “Gu Huaiyù! You ungrateful wretch! This is your idea of ‘too ill to come home’?!”

The elderly man was impeccably dressed in a suit, temples gone grey — yet he carried no frailty in his bearing.

Look closely and his features bore a distinct resemblance to Gu Huaiyù’s.

Behind him, Gu Huaixiang — exquisitely made up, in an equally immaculate skirt suit — arrived and froze at the sight of what was unfolding inside.

Froze with such force that she nearly forgot to protect her makeup as she clapped a hand over her mouth.

She had known the sixth one and this Shen branch-family person had a rather unusual dynamic.

But this branch-family Shen was actually this brazen…

In the same moment, Tian Yi came rushing over from the side.

…Director Gu’s father — the elder Director Gu — and the third young miss had suddenly entered the estate, and Tian Yi had tried to send word ahead. He’d been blocked by the elder Director Gu’s people.

Tian Yi had then tried to slow them down on the stairs, and been scolded for his trouble: “What is there to stop? Do you think at my age, Gu Yu’an, I no longer have the right to see my own son?!”

“That’s not what I mean,” Tian Yi said. “It’s just that our Director Gu is currently occupied, this isn’t a convenient—”

The elder Director Gu apparently assumed he was being brushed off, and cut him off mid-sentence with a surge of fury: “Occupied with what?! What’s inconvenient about it?! Isn’t he at death’s door already?!”

Now, Tian Yi — having finally shaken loose from the elder Director Gu’s people and caught up — arrived at the office doorway, took in the scene inside: Madam, one arm draped over Director Gu’s shoulder, the two of them in a very cozy tableau —

And could not help himself. He touched two fingers to his nose. Rolled his eyes skyward.

See?

He’d said Director Gu was occupied right now.

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