Chyou stared at the delicate flower she planted in the soil. A lot of complicated emotions toiled her heart back and forth.
An Guoting patted her head. "It's alright, dear. Things are hard for you. But this shall all pass too. Have faith."
"...I…feel so ashamed, Grandpa…" she choked as her misty tears dropped tears on the ground.
He frowned. "Why would you feel ashamed?"
She lightly gasped and rubbed her palms together. "I wanted to show Mom, Dad, Xiang that I…chose a good man. But I let them down. Not just let them down but Yin humiliated them…all because of me. I wanted to have a perfect relationship like theirs. I thought I found it in Yin.
I was so happy…What must they be thinking about me?"
An Guoting's eyes widened. "My dear pumpkin you are thinking on an entirely wrong tangent. Xiaosi and Chyou would never be disappointed in you. They are disappointed in Cheng Yin for breaking your heart. It has nothing to do with you choosing him. You are the apple of their eyes.
They are your parents. Even if Cheng Yin turned out to be the wrong guy for you, what is there in it for you to be embarrassed about? You should be proud of yourself. You did everything a good partner should. It's him who didn't honor the same."
She pressed her lips inward, her cheeks aching to cry.
He patted her head again. "You might feel that everything is over but that is far from the truth, okay? Just give yourself some time. Take a break from your work if you want. Things will get back on track for sure. And always remember to be grateful to fate that you learned of this ugly truth before it got too late."
She trembled. She couldn't imagine herself marrying Yin while she was being kept in the dark of his affair. Getting married to a cheater would have been the worst possible punishment for her.
"You don't have to invest your feelings in a cheater anymore. I know it's painful for you but I don't mind celebrating with a glass of wine that my granddaughter is free from such a man's life," he harrumphed. "Th-though Yueqin won't let me have any wine…"
Chyou slightly burst into a chuckle seeing his shoulders droop. She softly wrapped her arm around his and said, "I will sneakily help you with it."
His eyes shone. "Really?"
"But only one glass. No overdoing it with your health."
He nodded hard. "My granddaughter is the best."
She lifted her lips in a tired smile. An Guoting released a silent sigh.
It won't be easy to forget that bastard…
He gently smiled at her. "Promise me, pumpkin."
"That you won't deal with this all alone. You have so many friends who care for you. Don't distance yourself from them because of one wrong man."
She didn't know why but Yating's face popped into her mind first.
'I will be a call away whenever you need me no matter the time or place. I want you to remember that. That's all.'
Then something else automatically and almost instantly followed the previous train of thought.
'What if I want that woman to be you?'
She inwardly slapped herself for thinking about out of context things.
What am I doing? Is this the time to be thinking of all this!
An Guoting tilted his head and curiously asked, "What are you thinking?"
From a distance, Xiang and An Yueqin were peeking at the duo.
"Hoho sis seems to be in a better mood now," Xiang eagerly whispered.
An Yueqin sighed in relief. "Indeed she looks a lot better now. As long as she isn't alone, she won't suffer ."
"Chyouuuuu!" This content belongs to novel·fıre·net
Suddenly a voice came echoing in and Chyou's editor, Sun Jiang, rushed in the garden.
Chyou stared at her, taken aback. "JiangJiang."
She burst into tears as she saw her. "Thank God you are here! I thought you already packed your bags and left on some journey to rediscover yourself."
"But then Mrs. Zhu said that you are here so I came here at lightning speed!" She jumped to hug her.
"Chyou, I am so glad to see you," her eyes ached. "I was so worried about you! Imagine my shock after seeing today's news! I thought you had already disappeared."
An Guoting smiled. "Chyou would have never disappeared. After all, she loves her cute grandfather a lot. What will I do without her?"
"But just look at her Mr. An. She has clearly not slept enough! Why sacrifice your sleep for a bastard man?" Her gaze went cold. "And for a man who spoke nonsense about Chyou! He shamelessly blamed everything on Chyou for his actions.
I want to beat him into a pulp! She wasn't wrong at all. First of all, the whole thing about Chyou telling me about his addiction is wrong. It was Liu Jun who had told me."
Chyou's eyes widened. "What? Jun?"
"Damn this is gonna be a problem!" Sun Jiang was pacing back and forth in her office seeing all the supposed 'date' pictures making rounds on the net.
"I won't ever let Chyou apologize for this nonsense!" She frowned. "But will Cheng Yin do anything about it? If he declares his trust in Chyou, then his stupid fans will calm down and everything will be sorted."
That is provided only if he trusts Chyou too.
Her phone then buzzed with a number she never saw before and she furrowed her brows. "Who is this?"
Her eyes rapidly blinked.
"You are Sun Jiang, right? Chyou's manager. I want to talk to you. Can you come to Sky for some time?"
He is from the Liu family Chyou keeps talking about…
"Okay. I will be there."
When she was at Jun's office seated opposite him, she could feel her knees becoming jelly with the sheer iciness that had completely covered his dark brown irises.
"Cheng Yin won't be giving a statement."
Her daze broke and her attention snapped towards him. "You mean about the scandal right? He has to. He is her boyfriend. If he doesn't trust her then it will only make the mess bigger."
Jun smiled alarmingly. "Not this time."
Jun slid his phone and showed her some pictures. "What do you make of them?"
Sun Jiang squinted her eyes and gasped. "Is that…what I am thinking it is? The hell he is an addict!?"
"This is…" Sun Jiang felt her mind blown.
"I want you to use these pictures to threaten him and his manager to put out a statement. Gu Yating already did half of the job with his own statement," he chuckled with an evil glint in his eyes. "Cheng Yin will give the finishing touches."
Sun Jiang shuddered with the hair on her skin snapping straight. Jun was younger than her but right now more villainous than anybody in this world.