Chapter 9

Qin Yao came looking for Chu Yan.
Under Assistant Li’s secretly astonished eyes, Chu Yan coldly refused Qin Yao’s dinner invitation.
Assistant Li: “......”
No wonder he can’t be a CEO, his mind is unpredictable.
Clearly he’s attached, yet refuses to admit it.
Qin Yao angrily slammed the door of Chu Yan’s office.
The heavy wooden door slammed loudly, startling Wen Jiu, who couldn’t hear anything while eavesdropping.
“Wen Jiu, come with me.” Qin Yao’s delicate face was full of anger. She pointed, and her little assistant Wen Jiu immediately followed.
Wen Jiu was the assistant, but the young lady had always driven.
Driving, even a luxury car, was annoying in traffic.
They waited on the road for ten minutes, moving barely twenty meters. The young lady pressed her lips together, furious enough that the little tuft of hair on her head even stuck up.
“No, I need to come up with a plan and give him a push.”
“Chu Yan still won’t get engaged to me. Don’t tell me he’s got some kind of… hidden health problem?”
“I even invited him to dinner. What right does he have to refuse?”
Wen Jiu turned her head and met the Young Lady’s gaze.
Before Wen Jiu could say a word, Qin Yao looked at her face and had an idea. “Wen Jiu, you’re Chu Yan’s secretary now. You’re around him all the time. Help me spike his drink.”
“I want to see whether he’s… functional or not.”
“No need to pick a special time, this Saturday’s banquet.”
Wen Jiu: ???
Wen Jiu: !!!
She swallowed in horror. “M-Miss Qin, that’s illegal.”
No, no, no, don’t follow the original plot line, Miss! Don’t go down the villainess route!
The Young Lady’s pretty cherry mouth drooped. Her frustration washed over the anger from moments ago, and she wilted. “But I really can’t think of anything else.”
“He clearly agreed to get engaged yesterday, and today he turns cold and refuses to even have dinner with me.”
In Wen Jiu’s mind, numbers floated past: today’s 2,000, yesterday’s 10,000, and last week’s 45,270.65.
“Right now I’m President Chu’s secretary; I can get closer to him. Don’t worry, Young Lady, I’ll sound him out and see what he’s thinking lately.”
Just please, please don’t drug him. Anything but stepping onto the original villain plotline.
Her gentle voice was like a spring breeze, smoothing out the Young Lady’s furrowed brows.
Qin Yao’s pouting lips slowly curved upward again, hovering somewhere between sulky and delighted.
“Then you have to find out by Friday. I want him to tell me the engagement date on Saturday.”
No one understands weekdays like a wage slave. Wen Jiu suddenly remembered it was already Tuesday.
She braced herself and nodded. “Mm-hmm.”
So in the original, was the drugging plot because the cannon-fodder lackey had no better idea, so she just… delivered the male lead straight to the Young Lady’s bed…?
In her heart, Wen Jiu gnawed on an invisible handkerchief, brain going blank.
The Young Lady didn’t care what her lackey was thinking. With someone handling the problem, her mood brightened at once.
Thinking that around Saturday’s banquet she might hear Chu Yan personally tell her the engagement date, she sprang back to life like a drooping houseplant fed a pot of water, leaves perked up and swaying happily.
When she was in a good mood, she was never stingy with her lackey. She transferred another 10,000 to Wen Jiu.
“Miss Qin?” Wen Jiu’s eyes went round at the sight of the transfer.
Another tip?
“Nothing. I’m just in a good mood.”
“If Chu Yan comes over to my house this Saturday to talk engagement, once the date’s set, I’ll triple your salary this month.”
Qin Yao’s brows danced; her sweet little face held no trace of condescension, only a soaring tsundere sort of cuteness.
At least, that’s how Wen Jiu saw it.
Her monthly salary was 35,270.65. Triple that…
That was 105,811.95.
A hundred thousand. A full hundred thousand.
Faced with the Young Lady’s desire to nail down an engagement with the male lead as soon as possible, Wen Jiu’s previously empty brain suddenly filled with strategies.
So this was what “inspiration” felt like, ideas gushing like a spring.
The Young Lady was just lovestruck. How was that her fault?
The next day at work, Lan Mingyan noticed Wen Jiu kept sneaking glances at the president’s office door.
The soundproofing in the president’s office was excellent, nothing leaked out.
“Wen Jiu, Lan Mingyan, come here, I’ll teach you how to make coffee.”
“President Chu’s coffee is always the same, same taste, same temperature…”
In the pantry, Wen Jiu stood under the air vent, listening as a senior secretary passed on their wisdom.
To sum it up in one sentence: the male lead was ridiculously picky about his coffee.
“You two try.”
Lan Mingyan went first; Wen Jiu followed right after.
Two cups of coffee came out, rich and fragrant.
A spark flashed in Wen Jiu’s mind. “I’ll take it in to President Chu and get his opinion.”
She hadn’t come here to work anyway. Hierarchy meant nothing to her; she couldn’t care less what people thought.
She was firmly here as the Young Lady’s employee.
The senior secretary reached out to stop her, but before he could, Lan Mingyan stuck a foot out and held him back. “Ge, come see if my coffee passes.”
“Knock, knock, ”
Wen Jiu rapped on the door, pushed it open, and walked in holding the cup, only to lock eyes with the male lead.
His features were refined and handsome, his bearing like a snow pine, distant and untouchable.
With just one glance, Wen Jiu’s heart almost stopped.
Not from his beauty, but from fright.
Such a beautiful face, how could his gaze be so sharp? The coldness in his eyes was like snow that had lain on a mountaintop for ten thousand years; inside that snow, a blade glinted.
Every time she met his eyes, Wen Jiu couldn’t help but admire the Young Lady.
Those eyes were practically knives, sharp enough to stab someone to death, and yet Miss Qin could look at him, lovestruck, and say he was her favorite.
“President Chu, your coffee.” Wen Jiu set the cup before him.
After a while, she was still standing there, the AC-chilled air combing over her back until it broke out in a cold sweat, but she held her ground.
“Anything else?” Chu Yan’s voice carried an innate nobility, falling on the ears like a piano piece, so pleasant it was almost offensive.
He hadn’t spared her a glance. The invisible pressure was immense.
She could sense the weight inside that offhand question.
Wen Jiu decided to go all in, thickened her skin, and cleared her throat. “President Chu, Miss Qin Yao would like to invite you to dinner.
I wonder what you think of that?”
In truth, she was still scared stiff, she’d wanted to ask directly about the engagement.
She’d leave that part to the Young Lady. As long as she managed to get him there, Miss Qin would definitely ask.
“What time?”
“…Six?” It had never occurred to Wen Jiu that the male lead would agree so quickly. She hadn’t even thought of a time and just blurted one out.
“Secretary Wen, the group’s off-work time is six,” Chu Yan said, finally lifting his gaze to glance at her.
“…Miss Qin will come look for you at six, President Chu.” She barely managed to patch it.
“Mm.”
The male lead was stingy with his syllables; Wen Jiu didn’t mind.
She turned to hurry out and share the good news with the Young Lady,
Only to be stopped by Chu Yan.
“Why aren’t you calling me ‘brother-in-law’ anymore?”
Alarm bells exploded in her head; her scalp tingled.
She turned back. Chu Yan’s hawk-like eyes were deep, fixed on her.
“Hehe…” She laughed weakly, forcing it through. “Bye, brother-in-law.”
It wasn’t her idea, President Chu had asked her to call him that!
Assistant Li walked in just in time to catch the scene and froze.
So the president really was set on marrying into the Qin family?
He’d even started accepting the “brother-in-law” title from her people.
It was… unsettling.
As Assistant Li stepped inside, Wen Jiu quickly nudged him forward, using him as a human shield once again, and slipped out in a flash.
When Qin Yao heard the good news, she booked a French restaurant for dinner. Full private-room romance: roses, candles, the works.
Wen Jiu pinched the tiny mic in her earpiece, then adjusted the minuscule walkie-talkie hidden in her collar and blended into the waitstaff.
As the Young Lady’s most devoted and considerate lackey, she had to be ready to serve at any time.
She’d be providing remote support tonight.
Both of them thought they were hidden perfectly, but Qin Yao’s clear, bright eyes kept drifting backward from time to time. She’d long since spotted Wen Jiu and her round bun peeking out behind the servers.
Assistant Li stood at a distance, holding in his laughter without saying a word.
Graceful as ever, Chu Yan poured champagne into Qin Yao’s glass.
Qin Yao promptly pushed it back toward him. “Chu Yan, drink a little more.”
Her enthusiasm was naked and unrestrained; every bit of her little scheme sat right there on the table.
Wen Jiu turned slightly and saw Chu Yan take a light sip. She murmured in the mic, “Miss Qin, see? Even without spiking his drink, there are ways. We have to be law-abiding citizens.”
But after that one sip, Chu Yan didn’t drink any more, which sent Qin Yao’s excitement plummeting. She even grew anxious, forgetting all about table manners and filling his glass to the brim again.
“Drink a bit more,” she insisted, eyes wide and shining.
Chu Yan studied her for a moment. To Wen Jiu, his gaze was frosty. To the Young Lady, it was a distant flower finally bowing its head, she was thrilled.
“Mm.” He drained it in one go.
Wen Jiu thought that would be it for this part, but to her horror, Qin Yao topped off his glass again.
In the corner, Wen Jiu pressed a hand to her forehead. “That’s enough, Miss. There’s no rush, take it slow.”
This was not how she’d coached her.
Qin Yao’s mind had gone straight to the real thing. Before the first course even arrived, she blurted, “Chu Yan, when are we going to get our marriage license?”
All she could see was the face she’d pined after for years, one so handsome she sometimes woke up laughing from dreams of him.
Truly bewitched by beauty, Qin Yao forgot every step of the script Wen Jiu had given her, and even the earpiece.
What was she supposed to ask again? Engagement? Forget that, go straight to the marriage license!
“Are you in that much of a rush?” Chu Yan asked.
“Of course. I want to pounce on you. But you never respond, so I don’t even know if you’re… functional or not,” Qin Yao said, utterly without filter, letting all her true thoughts tumble out.
Wen Jiu: !!!
“Miss Qin, you need to be hot-and-cold, a straight ball like that and he’ll just…” stop caring.
Before she could finish, a different voice cut into the earpiece.
“Next Monday,” Chu Yan said.
Wen Jiu snapped open her phone.
Next Monday was Qixi, Chinese Valentine’s Day.
Wait…the male lead was going to get their license with the Young Lady?!
The surprise came out of nowhere and smacked Wen Jiu right on the head. She could hardly believe it.