The door in front of him opened and shut. Shao Yuanjia drew his gaze back as if from a distance.
Of course. After so many years, Wen Yin would have forgotten him completely. The memories of the orphanage—if any remained at all—were probably faded, reduced to nothing more than vague impressions.
Air seemed to thin around him. It felt as though a great weight had been pressed onto his chest; he didn’t even notice the other door opening behind him.
A lighter clicked. In the dim light of the balcony the flare of the cigarette was sharp and red. A man had lit up beside him and began to smoke. His eyes flicked to Shao Yuanjia now and then, but he kept his face smooth—no hint of whatever he felt.
He gave a small, amused laugh. “What’s the matter, Director Shao? Not having a good time?”
Because of the poor light earlier, Shao hadn’t gotten a good look at him. While the man spoke, Shao Yuanjia took him in quickly.
The face was familiar. The eldest son of the Xiao family—Xiao Mo—who had already taken over the family company. Shao’s eyes narrowed. Others might not know this, but Shao Yuanjia did: this man had once been Wen Yin’s boyfriend.
He hadn’t looked deeply into Wen Yin’s past relationships—those were messy—but he remembered, fragmentarily, that she’d had a boyfriend in college and two more later on, none of whom had stayed. A smart assistant had even handed him a dossier on why she’d been dumped. When he saw the report, he’d raised an eyebrow—there was a distinct look of distaste in his eyes. He hadn’t expected three different men to share the same white moonlight.
Shao Yuanjia couldn’t figure out what Wen Zhi—what sort of person she was—to have drawn their affections. More ridiculous still, he’d learned they’d all appeared on the same dating reality show with her. After that show aired, the three men’s attitudes had changed drastically.
A phrase popped into his head: the classic “men groveling after the fact” routine.
“No,” he said, his tone a little stiff. They weren’t close—at best acquaintances from a few meetings. He felt no real threat from Xiao Mo. Wen Yin had rejected them all once; Shao knew better than to believe in belated confessions. Late repentance was worth less than grass.
Xiao Mo didn’t seem offended by the refusal. He drew in a long drag of smoke and exhaled slowly. “Really? You weren’t interested in the woman who just left?”
At the mention of Wen Yin, Shao Yuanjia’s eyes went colder for a beat. He tilted his mouth; the smile that spread was thin and controlled. “What are you suggesting, Mr. Xiao?”
Xiao Mo’s explanation was casual, almost bored. “Exactly what it sounds like.” He had tried to dig into Shao’s background, but the Shao family’s secrecy made it impossible. He hadn’t expected the private son to be so valued by the Shaos.
“Oh?” Shao said lightly. He clapped a hand on Xiao Mo’s shoulder with mock solemnity. “A friendly word of advice: a good horse doesn’t go back to its old pasture. That applies to relationships too.”
He left the balcony with that and sat back in the hall to watch the press conference’s aftermath. Xiao Mo’s hidden meaning was clear: he’d seen other men approaching Wen Yin and felt jealous. The thought made a cold corner of a smile cross Shao Yuanjia’s face. Just because Xiao Mo couldn’t have something didn’t mean he had the right to stop others from having it.
Down below, the press event continued on schedule. Models in clashing styles walked one after another. The tableau was not pretty; a messy mishmash.
Wen Yin felt a little dizzy. She turned toward Shao Yinan and murmured, “Why did I even come to this show tonight?”
Such designs, such a novel runway—fashion was its own language, and sometimes it felt like a different planet. “Let’s just wish them luck,” she added with a faint, ironic smile.
Shao Yinan’s mouth twitched—something indulgent and almost fond in it. When the show finally ended, Wen Yin felt her long-standing low blood pressure spike back to normal from the shock. Jiujiu’s expression said everything; she leaned close and whispered a running critique into Wen Yin’s ear.
“I admit, at first I thought the concept was interesting,” Jiujiu confessed, “but looking at it now—there isn’t even a word for this disaster.”
Everyone else at the event looked disappointed. The styles collided without harmony; the designs had no standout points. Shao Yuanjia rubbed the bridge of his nose, tired. He could already hear his father’s inevitable lecturing when he returned home.
Earlier, while Shao had been dazed, Shao Yinan had reached out and ruffled Wen Yin’s hair. “Tired?”
Wen Yin rarely stared blankly. She only just registered that Shao Yinan had come back and smoothed her expression. She still hadn’t figured out how to tell him about the orphanage—about her and Shao Yuanjia having been in the same place as children. Outwardly, they were competitors; he saw her as a thorn in his side. How could she drop something like that into the open now?
But she didn’t want to hide everything. Carefully, she tried a softer approach. “I heard one of the wealthy guests say Director Shao used to be in an orphanage,” she ventured.
At the mention, Shao Yinan’s eyes cooled for a second. He answered with a low, “Hmm.” Then he asked, “And?”
Wen Yin shook her head and chose a gentler phrasing. “Nothing. It just sounded like the orphanage he stayed at might have been the same one I was in as a child.”
That got a real reaction. Shao Yinan hadn’t known she’d grown up in an orphanage; she’d once told him she’d been raised by her grandmother. But it made sense—after she’d gone missing from the Wen household and had no place to go, a kind stranger could easily have sent her to an orphanage. He didn’t press the subject, though; after a brief exchange he changed the topic. Wen Yin let out a quiet, inward sigh of relief—at least he knew something now, even if only vaguely.
Unseen by her, Shao Yinan’s gaze grew unexpectedly deeper. He had noticed that Wen Yin had disappeared during a meeting and then returned with Shao Yuanjia. Could they have only discussed the orphanage? He smoothed his thoughts and decided this was worth investigating properly.
Back in the venue, the guests filed out. The designers would have to face the music. Wen Yin felt the night drain of its small entertainments. “Wish them luck,” she repeated under her breath—an almost perfunctory blessing.
Shao Yuanjia sat quietly, thinking of the old man at home who would scold him for coming back with nothing to show. The evening had yielded awkward discoveries and worse fashion. He stood and straightened his jacket, ready to leave the chaos behind.