Chapter Sixty-Three Happy Valentine's Day

After dinner, Jiang Chuan naturally stayed.

He could finally legitimately conduct a critical inspection of the rental apartment, and everything from the unbearable floor to the mold in the bathroom tile grout became his primary targets for rectification.

The painkillers had reduced Lin Yu's wounds to a dull, throbbing pain. She curled up on the sofa, watching the usually aloof man kneeling on the bathroom floor, wiping away the grime that had accumulated on the tiles.

The rolled-up shirt cuffs were still damp with water, and the light cast a soft shadow on his well-defined profile. Two stray hairs fell across his forehead with each movement, giving Lin Yu a sudden, almost illusory feeling of happiness.

She scrolled through her phone, then abruptly asked, "Is there anything you'd like as a gift?" She then tilted her head and thought seriously for a moment. "How about a belt?"

Before Jiang Chuan could answer, she hurriedly added, "Let me make this clear first, I can't afford anything too expensive!"

Even though they were currently in a relationship, Lin Yu didn't like taking advantage of others for no reason. But similarly, she disliked doing things beyond her capabilities.

A short, muffled chuckle came from the restroom. Jiang Chuan, holding a brush, leaned halfway out and gave Lin Yu a half-smile. "No need!"

It wasn't until late at night, when the two of them tumbled together onto her creaky single bed in her bedroom, that Lin Yu finally understood the true meaning of his words.

Jiang Chuan was tall and big, taking up almost half of her bed. Lin Yu was forced to curl up facing the wall, her back pressed tightly against his burning chest.

His wrists, as hard as branding irons, gripped her waist. His nose gently rubbed against her sensitive neck like a puppy's, inhaling the scent of shampoo and shower gel in her hair.

His breath hit the fine hair on the back of her neck, sending tiny electric shocks through her. Lin Yu shrank her neck to avoid him, her face swollen as she tried to push him away with her hand. Her palm brushed against his bare waist and abdomen, the distinct texture of his muscles startling her so much that she immediately withdrew her hand.

"That's indecent," Lin Yu said irritably.

She knew she was picking a fight because there weren't any suitable men's pajamas for Jiang Chuan in her rented room. She couldn't very well make him wear her own clothes; the image seemed even more terrifying than him being completely naked.

Jiang Chuan chuckled softly behind her, then suddenly pulled her into a tight embrace. "Banban, are you hot?" His hands, which had been resting on her waist, began to wander, his burning palms sliding upwards along the hem of her pajamas.

"It's not hot at all," Lin Yu said, then moved closer to the wall, almost embedding himself in it. "It's only February!"

"Oh? But you're so hot." Jiang Chuan's fiery chest pressed even closer, his canines gently nibbling at her earlobe, his soft lips touching Lin Yu's sensitive skin behind her ear.

Lin Yu felt as if he were being strangled by a giant python, forced to turn his head and dodge by this entanglement, only to be met with an even tighter embrace. "Stop fooling around, go to sleep."

She pushed Jiang Chuan's shoulder, her breath unsteady. "Are you a perpetual motion machine? You've been working all night and you still have so much energy!"

“I thought you knew quite a bit about this,” Jiang Chuan continued, gently breathing on her.

"I'm drunk. I know nothing, I know nothing at all." Lin Yu closed his eyes and refused to admit it.

"Turn around, don't press on the wound!" Jiang Chuan grabbed her wrist and turned her over. They were face to face, noses touching. "Do you need me to help you review?"

His hands encircled Lin Yu's back, slipping through any opening. Lin Yu, tickled to the point of tickling, burst into laughter unexpectedly, instinctively bending his knee and pushing Jiang Chuan off the bed, blanket and all, crashing heavily to the floor.

Lin Yu hurriedly propped himself up, looking awkwardly at Jiang Chuan, who was sitting on the ground with a cartoon blanket wrapped around his waist. The scene was indescribably comical.

"That's good too." Jiang Chuan smoothed his messy hair with his hand and smiled helplessly, "At least from now on, when you go out at night, you'll have to avoid those bad people."

......

The next day, Jiang Chuan sat at his desk, tidying up case files, while massaging his aching shoulders and neck. He pondered what size bed he should get for Lin Yu, or perhaps install a railing around the perimeter.

A knock sounded at the door. Senior Brother Zhang Hengyuan leaned against the door frame with a smile, his eyes revealing a cunning that didn't match his serious appearance.

Seeing that Jiang Chuan ignored him, he strolled in on his own and closed the door behind him. Hearing the door close, Jiang Chuan felt a sense of foreboding, as if something bad was about to happen.

Zhang Hengyuan is tall and slender, and his sharp navy blue suit makes him look exceptionally energetic. As the atmosphere-maker of the law firm, he has a serious and dignified leadership demeanor when he is not speaking, but his true colors are revealed as soon as he opens his mouth.

"I heard you're dating someone?"

As soon as he sat down, he noticed Jiang Chuan's dark circles under his eyes and immediately grinned mischievously. "Want to have Japanese food for lunch? How about some oyster sashimi to help you recover?"

Zhang Hengyuan propped his elbows on the table and added, "Of course...it's your treat!"

Jiang Chuan didn't even look up, his pen flying across the documents. "The news travels pretty fast." He then sneered, "If our case-handling efficiency were this high, our law firm would have been on the Red Dot list long ago."

Zhang Hengyuan ignored Jiang Chuan's sarcasm, leaned forward, and looked at him with a gossipy expression.

"If you kissed that girl in the office with the door closed on Valentine's Day, even a mute person could write a whole book about it!"

He recounted the details he'd overheard in the break room with great enthusiasm, embellishing them as he went. "Even the cleaning lady pulled me aside this morning to ask, 'When is Attorney Jiang going to hand out wedding candy?'"

He slammed his fist on the table, clutching his chest in anguish. "Now look what's happened! The whole firm knows, except for your best friend, I'm still completely in the dark!"

"Do you know how embarrassed I was? No, this can't just be left like this."

"What do you want?" Jiang Chuan didn't even look up the whole time, completely ignoring the misunderstandings of others.

Zhang Hengyuan pointed to Jiang Chuan, who remained unmoved across the way. "When are we going to get together and introduce your sister-in-law to us guys? How about this Saturday?"

Jiang Chuan snorted coldly, the pen scratching across the paper. "We'll have to ask her if she'd like to have dinner with you guys first!"

"Goodness!" Zhang Hengyuan clapped his hands loudly, laughing so hard he almost fell over. "Are you that kind of person?"

"Who is it?" Jiang Chuan asked instead of answering.

Zhang Hengyuan observed Jiang Chuan's expression without revealing his feelings, and after a while concluded: "A guy who's completely dominated by his girlfriend."

Jiang Chuan lifted his eyelids and glanced at him. "This kind of thing is indeed hard for you to understand."

Zhang Hengyuan wiped away the tears of laughter from the corners of his eyes and said, "I'm really curious, who exactly is this person who can subdue you!"

Jiang Chuan didn't respond, but instead pushed a talent loss report in front of Zhang Hengyuan. The report clearly showed that three more promising newcomers had left the company this year, all of whom had been assistants for two years.

Zhang Hengyuan picked up the document and flipped through it, his playful expression vanishing as his brows furrowed involuntarily. "Young people these days are so impatient. Do they think getting started in high-net-worth business is so easy?"

"Clients wouldn't entrust hundreds of millions of yuan to a newbie for practice; they've never dreamed of such a good thing."

He paused, then suddenly remembered something. "By the way, what was that team collaboration plan you mentioned in the meeting?"

"It's just a preliminary idea." Jiang Chuan took off his glasses and gently wiped the lenses. "For example, with this cross-border equity case you have on hand, you could bring a few new people to do a structural simulation."

"The final proposal will be submitted with our signature. This way, it won't affect the customer experience, and it will also help to select people with real potential, just like the incentive policy we announced a few days ago."

"Do you know how difficult young people are these days? They can easily accuse you of workplace PUA if you're not careful," Zhang Hengyuan said half-jokingly.

Jiang Chuan frowned and said in a deep voice, "Our law firm has always had a flat management structure, and our bonus incentive and promotion mechanisms are more transparent."

"These people either patiently endure here and become partners, or they go to other law firms as senior assistants for life with confidentiality agreements. Which path do you think is more of a PUA (Pick-Up Artist)?"

"Alright." Zhang Hengyuan pondered for a moment, then nodded and stood up. "We'll discuss this in detail when Lao Yuan gets back."

He had just turned to leave when he suddenly stopped and slapped his forehead. "Oh, right, there's one more thing."

"We recently closed two big cases, and Yuan Jie and I discussed organizing a trip to Japan for everyone to relax. The current situation is quite sensitive, but it's also a good opportunity to strengthen team cohesion."

Yuan Jie is another partner at the law firm, with a personality completely different from Zhang Hengyuan's. He is stocky, wears black-rimmed glasses, and his round face always carries a gentle and calm smile.

As a representative of the early marriage generation, he started a family after graduation and is now the father of two children.

Compared to Zhang Hengyuan's carefree nature, Yuan Jie always exudes a sense of groundedness, like his long underwear tucked into his socks, and his speech and manner carry a composure that comes with the passage of time.

Upon hearing this, Jiang Chuan finally looked up from his documents, his slender fingers lightly tapping the table. After a moment's thought, he replied, "You can decide. Let me know when the time is confirmed."

......

Lin Yu, on the other side, suddenly sneezed. She rubbed her nose, thinking to herself, "Could it be some scoundrel secretly talking about me behind my back?"

After applying ice overnight, the swelling on her face had mostly subsided, but the wound was still throbbing with pain. Standing in front of the bathroom mirror, she carefully opened her mouth to examine the wound.

The black stitches at the suture site, like a spiderweb, clung to the swollen gums, a sight that sent chills down my spine. I wonder when I'll be able to open my mouth wide and eat without restraint again.

Lin Yu sighed, frowned, and turned on the tap to wash his hands, his gaze unconsciously falling on the watch on his wrist. The events of last night flashed vividly before his eyes once more.

If we could turn back the clock two months, she would never have imagined that her relationship with a man would develop so quickly and so hastily.

From the moment she first met Jiang Chuan until now, it seems that at certain crucial junctures, she is always being pushed by him to make decisions that align with his wishes.

His personality seemed to suit her indecisiveness, but this also made her unsure how much of her feelings for him were genuine and how much were impulsive.

It's unclear whether her feelings for him stemmed from his meticulous care and understanding, the broadened horizons he broadened for her, or the stable life he provided, or perhaps a combination of all of these.

The only thing she knew was that she could no longer be as single-minded and clueless about relationships as she used to be.

The father's romanticism and the mother's authoritarianism planted seeds of conflict in young Lin Yu's heart, making her both yearn for a stable support and unable to resist passionate desires.

Jiang Chuan's repeated acts of kindness and occasional glimpses of vulnerability seemed to perfectly match her emotional needs.

Her heart, once wounded by Chen Guang's wavering, is gradually healing, and she is beginning to look forward to a new relationship.

But the more perfect it is, the more dangerous it becomes. It all happened so fast that she couldn't be sure whether it was a gift from fate or another gentle trap that would make her fall into it.

The moment the thought crossed her mind, the scene of Chen Guang's first confession to her flashed uncontrollably through her mind.

If he had been as decisive as Jiang Chuan back then, giving him a helping hand at the crucial moment, would they be living completely different lives now?