Chapter 147 — The Long-Awaited...

"Fine." Yang Yu nodded. "But I'm warning you—if you talk a lot of nonsense, if it's all useless, then however much I spend on you, I'll tell Hou Lin to dock it from your salary."

"Don't worry." Jing Yu smiled with complete confidence. "I guarantee you'll walk away with the beauty in your arms."

Yang Yu nodded without thinking much of it. He had no idea that his threat was no threat at all to Jing Yu. She had come out shopping anyway, and she would have been spending her own money; even if Yang Ce had it docked from her wages, all he would be docking was what she was going to spend today regardless.

So by that reckoning, Jing Yu stood to lose nothing at all.

Jing Yu bought a small plush toy. Yang Puqi paid for it, though with some resignation—what was this, acting like a child, buying such a thing?

Jing Yu seemed to read Yang Juehuan's thoughts and laughed. "It's a colleague's birthday—a birthday present for her."

"Oh." Yang Yu nodded. "Things going all right at work?"

"Of course they are, heh heh." Jing Yu gave a sly grin. "Right now they all know I'm a big boss's mistress."

"You're a big boss's mistress?" Yang Puqi was stunned. "What do you mean?"

"The big boss is you, of course," Jing Yu said, glancing at Yang Puqi.

"Me? What have I got to do with it?" Yang Ce was baffled, unable to work out how he could possibly be involved.

Jing Yu blinked like a cunning little fox. "You're the one who arranged for me to join the company, and President Hou gives me special treatment. At first everyone thought I was President Hou's mistress. I was a bit annoyed, so I explained offhandedly that my man was a friend of President Hou. Who'd have thought it would spread?"

"But that still isn't me," Yang Xu tang said with a bitter smile. Still, he had to admit that Jing Yu was very good at using the connections around her to protect herself—that way, whether it was rumor or truth, no one dared to bully her.

But such harmless jokes, Yang Shuoxuan let slide. He would not dig into it. "Just don't go around saying my name."

"Ah—so you mean you admit you're my lover?" Jing Yu asked, delighted.

Yang Ce rubbed his chin, not knowing whether to laugh or cry. "When did I ever admit to being your lover?"

"You said it yourself. You said not to say your name—doesn't that amount to admitting you're my lover? Otherwise, why would I be saying your name at all?" Jing Yu had caught Yang Juehuan in a slip of the tongue and said so with great smugness.

Only then did Yang Ce realize that this girl was not as empty-headed as he had imagined. Perhaps what he had seen that first time he met her in the cafeteria was only a surface, a disguise.

After learning her background from Ge Xinyao, Yang Moyi had often thought that perhaps this girl was merely rebellious against the world, that dressing up as a delinquent or a bad girl was only a disguise for the fragility beneath.

It was her way of venting the family affection she had been denied.

But the Jing Yu of now was quite pleasing to the eye. Gone was that rough edge of the streets; she was entirely the fresh image of a young white-collar girl. Perhaps this was her true face.

"Forget it, let's not talk about this." Yang Ce shook his head and let the matter drop. He was afraid that if he kept going, Jing Yu would only keep harping on it and making a scene.

Hmph. Sooner or later I'll make you call me your lover of your own free will. Jing Yu clenched her little fist, though on the surface she showed nothing at all. "All right, let's go. Come shopping with me, Big Wallet."

Big Wallet. Yang Ce cursed inwardly. What an ugly name. He followed Jing Yu toward the clothing stores.

"Now talk. How am I supposed to give this gift?" Yang Ce had no time to shoot the breeze with Jing Yu—better to get straight to the point.

"Then you'll have to tell me who you're giving it to first," Jing Yu said. "If you don't tell me who it's for, how am I supposed to advise you?"

"You don't know her. Even if I told you, you wouldn't know," Yang Ce answered.

"Then what am I supposed to say?" Jing Yu rolled his eyes. "Still, you're a real flirt. You've already got Chen Shutang and Lin Yanhe—why go chasing after some other girl?"

Yang Ce glared at him in a fury. Why did this Jing Yu have so much useless chatter? "Are you going to tell me or not? If not, I'm leaving. What do I care about all this?"

"Just asking. What's there to get angry about?" Jing Yu pursed his lips. "A flirt who can't stand being called one. You're the type who covers his own ears while stealing a bell."

Covering my ears while stealing a bell—what the hell does that have to do with me? Yang Ce was beside himself with anger at Jing Yu. He had never lost an argument with anyone before, yet today Jing Yu had needled him again and again. The frustration in his heart was beyond words.

"So much nonsense." Yang Ce gave a cold snort. "Are you going to tell me or not?"

"All right, all right, I'll tell you." Jing Yu muttered, "So petty. Bold enough to do it, but not to own up to it."

Yang Ce simply pretended not to hear. If he took the bait, heaven knew how many more lines she had waiting for him. So he said flatly, "Go on, then. I'm all ears."

"Heh heh. After hearing what that waiter said, were you planning to write every last detail of how you and that girl met onto this Memory Tree, not a single thing left out?" Jing Yu asked with a smile.

"That's right. Is there a problem with that?" Yang Ce frowned and looked at Jing Yu. If she had not said it with such a straight face, he would have wanted to curse her for stating the obvious.

"Of course there's a problem." Jing Yu shook her head and said smugly, "You don't understand how a girl's mind works. If you write it all down, that's actually not a good approach."

"Then what should I do?" Yang Ce asked, puzzled but still genuinely seeking her advice.

"There's a kind of love called 'refusing while welcoming, speaking while holding back,'" Jing Yu explained. "What does that mean? It means that even if you write something, don't write so much, don't write it so meticulously."

"Don't write it so meticulously—write it in jumps and starts?" Yang Ce asked in surprise.

"Mm, that's it," Jing Yu said. "Just as you said—pick and choose what to write. Don't put down every important thing. But leave a few blank tiles, with nothing written on them at all."

"Why?" Yang Ce finally could not hold back and asked.

"Dummy." Jing Yu scolded him with a coy pout. "Think about it. If she doesn't feel that way about you, then no matter how much you write, it's all for nothing—she won't notice anything is missing. But if she does feel that way about you, she's bound to notice what you left out. If it were me, I'd definitely fill in the missing pieces, then find some way to send it back to you. That way, you'd each know how the other feels."

Yang Ce was stunned. He could not help saying, "Is that really how it works?"

"Of course." Jing Yu nodded. "I'm not making this up. Anyway, that's how I see it. Since you won't tell me who she is, I can only infer based on an imagined mindset like mine."

Yang Ce nodded. There was indeed something to what Jing Yu said—it really did seem to work that way. "But what if she doesn't give it back to me?"

"Then that means you've got no chance," Jing Yu said. "Or there's another possibility: she never found the mechanism on this Memory Tree and just set it on a shelf as an ordinary handicraft. That scenario is rather tragic, but it does happen."

True. Still, Zhao Ying probably would not be that dense. Anyway, no matter what, Jing Yu's approach seemed workable, so Yang Ce did not make things hard for her. "Fine, I'll grant that you make some sense. Let's go. Buy whatever you want today—I'll pay."

"Really? Anything I want?" Jing Yu had not expected Yang Ce to agree so readily. She had thought he would keep picking at her.