She sat down across from him and suddenly asked, "Mr. Wan, is the offer to open a boutique still on the table?"
He was taken aback, his hand still toying with a fluffy tiger-head shoe. "Xixi, you want to open a boutique now? That’s not advisable. You don’t have the energy for it at the moment; focus on recuperating first. After the baby is born, if you’re still interested, I’ll arrange everything. But now is absolutely not the time, and there’s no need. If you wear yourself out, the loss would far outweigh the gain."
He wouldn’t even let her step out of the house, so how could he possibly allow her to start a boutique?
She said quietly, "I want to open a store and have Xu Xiaoya manage it."
"She and Zhong Minghui bought a house together. She put in two to three hundred thousand, but her name wasn’t on the deed, and they never officially married. Now, Zhong Minghui has found another woman and kicked her out of the house. He also refuses to return her money. She’s at her wit’s end; she even attempted suicide... I also want to help her find a way forward. Otherwise, she’ll keep dwelling on it and might do something reckless..."
"Zhong Minghui was never a good person to begin with. Xu Xiaoya has only herself to blame for her stupidity."
"Xiaoya is too kind-hearted..."
"Kind-hearted? Yan Xixi, do you really think she’s kind-hearted? In the past, for Zhong Minghui’s sake, she disregarded everyone else, even you..."
Realizing his slip of the tongue, he didn’t continue.
Yan Xixi, however, was surprisingly calm. "Are you saying that she deliberately told me about Huang Xiaojue’s blind date to help Zhong Minghui get promoted?"
He gave an awkward chuckle.
A man like Zhong Minghui was so easy to buy. Just a hint, and he eagerly dragged Xu Xiaoya to that restaurant for a deliberate "chance encounter" with Huang Xiaojue—otherwise, how could there be so many coincidences in this world?
"Xu Xiaoya has been helping me for years," she said, without anger and very patiently. "Ever since my father’s car accident, she has often helped me. Sometimes, when I couldn’t even afford a meal, she would always give me a few hundred yuan just when I needed it most..."
The money wasn’t much, but it always arrived when she was most in need, and she gave it often. Even the few pathetic imitation bags Yan Xixi owned were gifts Xu Xiaoya had bought online for her.
Wan Donglin said dismissively, "Haven’t you already given her a sum of money? Even if it was to repay a favor, it’s been repaid!"
"..." Fresh chapters posted on novèlfire.net
She couldn’t bring herself to tell him that with her mother deceased, Xu Xiaoya was, in fact, the only family she, Yan Xixi, had left in the world.
"Yan Xixi, let me tell you, there’s no such thing as genuine friendship between women. Women are different from men. It’s tough for them to maintain long-lasting friendships. Women are particularly prone to jealousy. They can only befriend those of roughly their own standing. Even then, they’ll still be jealous of each other. Xu Xiaoya isn’t in the same world as you anymore. Do you think helping her will make her grateful? I bet even if you help her, she’ll only be jealous of you. Deep down, she definitely won’t be grateful."
"I don’t need her to be grateful!"
"Alright, stop worrying about other people’s affairs. Go and rest. The baby is the priority."
The argument ended there.
Yan Xixi was tactful enough not to press the issue. This outcome was within her expectations. She knew very well that Wan Donglin could give her a substantial amount of money, but fundamentally, he did not want her to be financially independent—otherwise, how could he maintain such firm control over her?
Opening a boutique or anything else—he was merely paying lip service.
For the rest of her life, Yan Xixi would have to rely on him for money by asking.
This was his ultimate plan.