Chapter 24 So, who do you want to marry?
Although she dawdled over greeting her relatives, Luo Xincheng was quite enthusiastic about eating.
Seeing that it was almost lunchtime, we arrived at the restaurant.
Servants carrying tableware came and went. While scanning the area, Luo Xincheng inadvertently spotted two unfamiliar children brought over by the nanny.
She looked for a long time but still couldn't recognize whose children they were. She grabbed Wang Jiayan, who had just come in, and asked, "Whose children are those? Are they my eldest cousin's and fourth cousin's?"
In her memory, only these two people had gotten married in recent years.
Wang Jiayan looked over and couldn't help but laugh. He then whispered mysteriously in her ear, "Fourth Uncle's illegitimate son."
Luo Xincheng stared in astonishment, speechless for a long time, "...They even brought it to the old house? I feel like I've missed a pretty exciting part."
Wang Jiayan shook his head knowingly, "Then you've missed out on far too much."
The two sat down next to each other and began to gossip quietly about their fourth uncle.
Luo Xincheng hadn't been back for two years, so she naturally didn't know as much as Wang Jiayan. Therefore, the whole conversation was basically Wang Jiayan talking animatedly, while she nodded and said "uh-huh, oh, and then what?" as the straight man.
When the elders arrived, the two exchanged a knowing glance and fell silent.
Then I picked up my phone and continued chatting.
She only turned off her phone reluctantly after her second cousin sat down on the other side of her.
The melons from home still smell the best.
"What has Chengcheng been busy with lately?"
Her second cousin slowly poured her a cup of tea.
"Busy with work, what else could I be busy with?"
Her second cousin is twenty-seven this year, a full five years older than Luo Xincheng. She feels there is a generation gap between them, and their conversations are always dry, so she basically doesn't contact him.
But since he's taken the initiative to talk to her now, she naturally won't be impolite enough to ignore him.
She returned the favor by asking, "What have you been up to lately, Second Cousin?"
He chuckled softly, "Just like you, I work, and occasionally go on blind dates."
Luo Xincheng picked up her teacup, stunned. "Blind dates? I seem to remember you getting engaged to Miss Li last year. Why are you still going on blind dates? Am I mistaken? You're not the one actually engaged?"
After saying that, she took a sip of tea with self-doubt.
“You’re not mistaken,” my second cousin said. “It was indeed me who got engaged to Miss Li.”
He laughed, his narrow, fox-like eyes squinting slightly.
He has a very shrewd face, and when he smiles like this, he looks like he's about to scheme against someone, but what he says next is full of resentment.
"But on the day of our engagement, she eloped with someone, so our engagement had to be canceled, and I had to continue going on blind dates."
"Cough cough!"
When Luo Xincheng choked on his tea, he couldn't believe his ears.
"...His fiancée ran off with someone else?!"
How could she not have seen such a dramatic and melodramatic scene?!
What did she do that day?
"Oh, right." Seeing her surprised expression, her second cousin's smile deepened. "I had invited you to the engagement party, but you said you had to finish your final assignments and didn't have time to reply, so you declined. You said you would give me double the wedding gift at the formal wedding ceremony."
Luo Xincheng: "..."
If she had known it would be this amazing, why would she have bothered with her final assignment?
"Then who stole your bride... uh, no," she quickly changed her address, "who was it that stole your fiancée? Do I know them?"
“An Englishman you don’t know,”
My second cousin looked on with emotion, saying that when he recalls it now, it feels like something from a past life.
"You have no idea how lively it was back then, my goodness." He said with a wry smile, speaking as if he were a bystander describing someone else's excitement.
"That guy showed up in a tracksuit and burst into the hotel. I thought someone had wandered into the wrong place. Before I could even react, he had already grabbed my fiancée and run off with her."
Luo Xincheng suppressed a laugh.
"So you didn't chase after them?"
"Why chase after her? She's not going to come back with me anyway, so let's not humiliate ourselves."
He said with considerable self-awareness, "Besides, that kid runs really fast. He disappeared in the blink of an eye. Even if I chased him, I couldn't catch up."
Luo Xincheng rubbed her sore cheeks from laughing, then looked at Wang Jiayan with displeasure.
"No way, why didn't you tell me about something so exciting? That's so unfair!"
However, when she turned her head, she saw that the seat next to her was empty; the person who used to sit there had long since disappeared.
Luo Xincheng: "...?"
"Jiayan?" The second cousin smiled calmly. "He probably doesn't dare to tell you."
Luo Xincheng found it unbelievable, "What wouldn't he dare to do?"
I was just chatting with her about the messy things in her elders' family, and she was so excited. Surely she wouldn't be afraid to talk about gossip about her peers, right?
My second cousin chuckled. "That Englishman is a junior in his club. He and Miss Li met through him."
Luo Xincheng:
She suppressed a laugh and took a sip of tea. "Looks like being too popular isn't always a good thing, huh?"
Her second cousin smiled nonchalantly, then gently asked her how she was settling into the company and whether she had recently found a boyfriend.
When the topic of relationships came up, Luo Xincheng smiled and changed the subject without batting an eye. Her second cousin didn't press for details and just followed her lead. But strangely, no matter how far-fetched their conversation became, it always inexplicably circled back to relationships in the end.
After a while, even the slow-witted Luo Xincheng realized something was wrong.
She asked bluntly, "So curious about my love life? What, are you going to introduce me to a boyfriend, cousin?"
“I don’t have any eligible male guests to introduce to you.” My second cousin didn’t mince words and said bluntly, “But my brother has some, so you…”
He offered Luo Xincheng a cup of tea, his tone tinged with anticipation, "Get ready."
Luo Xincheng remained expressionless. "Big cousin..."
She turned her head to look at the front of the table, focusing precisely on the man who was talking to his aunt with his head tilted to the side.
He had a cold and stern expression, his eyelashes lowered as he listened intently to the people around him, nodding occasionally in agreement. His custom-made black suit stood out among the casual home wear.
When he sensed someone looking at him, he glanced at her casually, nodded slightly, and before she could react, turned his gaze back to his aunt.
Luo Xincheng looked away and subtly rolled her eyes while pretending to drink tea.
There's a bunch of people in the family who work in hauling goods, and this one is the most pretentious. She doesn't even want to imagine how pretentious the woman he introduces to is.
Lost in thought, the old man took the seat of honor at the dining table.
Luo Xincheng looked up and examined him. He looked much older than when they met two years ago. His hair and beard were all white, and the flesh on both sides of his cheeks sagged. Dense and deep wrinkles extended down to the corners of his eyes. But he was in good spirits as he was about to celebrate his seventieth birthday. His eyes were bright and sparkling.
She glanced at it a few times, then lowered her head, no longer interested, and continued swiping her phone while drinking tea.
Wang Jiayan didn't sit down next to her, but before her grandfather arrived, her youngest cousin took that seat, exchanged pleasantries with her for a while, and then looked at her phone.
Luo Xincheng was really grateful to her; otherwise, with an empty space next to her, she would have been so conspicuous.
I don't know if people become more talkative as they get older, but Grandpa didn't stop talking after he sat down. He went around asking everyone he met at the table, and the topics were never new. Every other sentence was about his career, family, and children.
When asked about Luo Xincheng, she had already prepared her answer, her face showing a gentle and warm smile. She spoke softly and gently with her grandfather about his recent situation, and at the end, she also comforted him with concern, advising him to take better care of his health.
As she said this, she saw Wang Jiayan, who had gone to sit across from her at the table, smirking and his shoulders shaking.
After Grandpa turned his satisfied gaze to his cousin, Luo Xincheng looked at her phone and a new message popped up.
Wang Jiayan (owes me 100,000): [You're such a show-off! / fist bump]
Luo Xincheng didn't reply to the message. Instead, she switched her phone to camera mode and filmed him as he pretended to be even more obedient, then sent the video to him.
Luo Xincheng: [Who's more pretentious? Speak up!]
Wang Jiayan (owes me 100,000): [...]
Wang Jiayan (who owes me 100,000): [I give up.]
Fortunately, the Wang family's rule was that one should not speak while eating or sleeping, so Luo Xincheng was able to have some peace and quiet during the meal.
After finishing their meal, Luo Xincheng caught up with Wang Jiayan, who was walking quickly, and grabbed him by the back of his collar.
"Why are you running away?" she asked suspiciously. "Is it just my imagination? I always feel like you're hiding from your second cousin."
Wang Jiayan looked back and, relieved not to see the smiling tiger behind her, breathed a sigh of relief.
"I'm not avoiding him, nor am I afraid of him, I just don't want to have much contact with him... Do you understand what I mean?"
Luo Xincheng didn't understand.
"Just because his ex-fiancée and that Englishman met through you? That can't be right, can it?"
Wang Jiayan wiped his face, "Not only..."
Luo Xincheng's eyes lit up, and she leaned closer, "Tell me in detail."
“Actually…” He scratched his cheek, looking embarrassed, “The night before their engagement, Anthony asked me to drink with him. He got drunk halfway through and started crying, saying that the person he liked was getting engaged but the fiancé wasn’t him… And then I got drunk too, so my head wasn’t clear and I just rambled on…”
Luo Xincheng smiled knowingly, "What did you say to him?"
Wang Jiayan rubbed his nose, feeling slightly guilty, and said, "What else can I say? Let him bravely pursue his love. If others can steal their brides at their wedding ceremonies, then of course he can steal their engagement parties too..."
Besides, my second cousin is already twenty-seven. No matter how well he takes care of himself, his face can't compare to the youthful appearance of twenty-one-year-old Anthony. Miss Li would definitely prefer him..."
As he spoke, he covered his face as if he couldn't bear to look at him anymore, "Who knew he would actually try to steal it! I was just joking because I was drunk!"
Luo Xincheng laughed so hard she almost choked. "How can you be like this? You're even trying to put others down. Even if my second cousin is a bit old, you can't say that."
"I already told you I was drunk, I just couldn't control my mouth!" Wang Jiayan cried out in despair, clutching his hair, wishing he could travel back in time and shut his own mouth.
"I don't know which bastard betrayed me. He took a picture of what my second cousin said that day and sent it to him. Now every time we meet, he treats me with disdain."
Luo Xincheng rarely spoke a fair word, "I can understand. If it were me, I would be considered kind if I didn't beat you up."
Wang Jiayan was on the verge of tears, "So now..."
Before he could finish speaking, he caught sight of the person who had arrived, his expression immediately turned serious, and he said nothing more.
Luo Xincheng turned around and saw it was the butler.
He strode over, quickly bowed to the two of them, and then looked at Luo Xincheng, "Sixth Miss, the eldest young master is waiting for you in the study. He said he has something important to discuss with you."
Luo Xincheng's lips twitched. "They all came to me for advice, what could it be that's so important?"
The housekeeper smiled without saying a word, waiting for her response.
She listlessly tossed her hair and said, "Okay, I'll go in a bit."
"Let him wait."
...
An hour later, Luo Xincheng leisurely went to meet her eldest cousin.
As soon as she pushed open the study door, she looked around and went straight to the chair that had been specially prepared for her at the main desk, and plopped down in it.
Wang Yunzheng had just finished a video conference when she came in and sat down casually without saying hello. He frowned in displeasure.
"You are 53 minutes late."
Luo Xincheng looked surprised. When he mentioned the exact time he would be late, he was genuinely taken aback.
"The housekeeper didn't tell me what time to come."
Wang Yunzheng glanced at his watch, his tone flat and indifferent, "I asked him to notify you at seven o'clock. I was worried you might walk slowly, so I gave you an extra half hour. So no matter how long you dawdle, you should be here by seven-thirty, right? But it's already eight-twenty-three."
Luo Xincheng: "..." You're crazy.
She slumped limply in the chair, casually flicking her nails. "Oh, I ran into your daughter on the way and helped her walk the dog for a bit."
She lifted her eyelids and looked directly at him. "The little girl is so pitiful. Her parents are never home and don't care about her. It's so rare for her to have a cousin who can play with her for a while... Cousin, you wouldn't even care about this, would you?"
Wang Yunzheng narrowed his eyes seriously, and subconsciously reached out to take a cigarette from the cigarette pack.
Before he could even light it, Luo Xincheng suddenly sat up straight and stared intently at him.
He paused, clicked his tongue, and then put the cigarette back in.
The wrinkles between his brows deepened, making him look even more irritating.
Realizing he couldn't waste time on these arguments, he immediately got to the point, "There's a very important guest coming to Grandpa's birthday party tomorrow night, could you help me entertain him?"
Luo Xincheng really couldn't understand his thought process. "You're not going to personally entertain important guests, and you're making me do it?"
She half-jokingly asked, "Is he really an important guest? Or is he an enemy?"
Wang Yunzheng rested his chin on his hands, his dark eyes fixed on Luo Xincheng.
"The person who has come is Xu Minhui, the CEO of Hong Kong Island Zhengfeng Group. The Xu family intends to form a marriage alliance with the Wang family, so I will arrange for you to meet tomorrow night..."
Luo Xincheng interrupted him sarcastically, "Cousin, my dear cousin, do you even realize that you're just my cousin and I'm just your cousin?"
"You think you're worthy of pushing me into an arranged marriage?"
"Besides, isn't your own sister not married yet? If you want a marriage alliance, go to her, why are you coming to me?"
Wang Yunzheng was a little annoyed when he was suddenly interrupted halfway through his sentence, but he still told the truth, "They have met once, and their relationship did not go well. Moreover, Xu Minhui had seen your photo before and said that he preferred you."
Luo Xincheng's face turned cold. "Who told you to show my photos to others?"
“No.” Wang Yunzheng pinched the bridge of his nose and said patiently, “Before deciding on the marriage, they had already looked up information on half of the socialites in Yanjing before they came to our family.”
Luo Xincheng cursed inwardly, but her words were equally blunt: "If they want a marriage alliance, we have to comply? Send all the eligible girls in our family to him for blind dates? If the first one doesn't like him, send the second and third? Who does he think he is? Choosing concubines from our family?!"
She got angrier and angrier as she spoke, and suddenly stood up.
bass!
The stool legs made a screeching sound as they rubbed against the floor.
She glared at Wang Yunzheng, her face full of disappointment and frustration.
"So you're really just going to be such a spineless coward, letting them pick and choose as they please?"
"Wang Yunzheng, you have completely disgraced the Wang family!"
"I'm only twenty-two, why would I go on a blind date?!"
You want to see who can shout the loudest?
Luo Xincheng yelled back, "You didn't start going on blind dates until you were twenty-five, so why should I have to go on blind dates at twenty-two? Let whoever wants to go go go!"
After being harshly criticized by her, Wang Yunzheng wiped his face and calmed himself down.
"Xu Minhui is the only son of the Xu family, the undisputed heir. He is handsome and talented, and took over Zhengfeng Group at the young age of twenty-eight..."
Luo Xincheng screamed in horror, "Twenty-eight years old! Almost thirty!"
Wang Yunzheng declared righteously and sternly: "Only twenty-eight! In the prime of your life!"
Luo Xincheng wouldn't listen: "But I'm only twenty-two! I don't want to marry someone so old!"
"Then who are you going to marry?!"
Wang Yunzheng was practically being verbally abused, but his patience ran out. Instead, he calmed down, glancing at her with a half-smile, his tone as flat as a line.
"With that illegitimate son of the Fu family who's not fit to be mentioned in public?"
Author's note: It's here! Ahhhh, the temperature has dropped, everyone please take care of yourselves!
I'll be giving away 30 small red envelopes in the comments section! [kiss][cat paw]
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