Chapter 20 "Beg Me".
Jiang Jiaoming drove directly to the basement parking lot. To avoid making things more complicated, he didn't get out of the car. "Call me when you're done."
"Okay." Liang Kongxiang closed the car door and got on the elevator. Before leaving, she turned back to look at Jiang Jiaoming sitting in the car.
He was also staring at her, his mouth and nose buried in the collar of the cotton-padded jacket she had given him, with only his eyes showing. In the darkness, he was imagining an ambitious leopard, seemingly waiting for the right moment to leap out.
Liang Kongxiang only glanced at it for a second before looking away.
Chen Yun was waiting for her in the conference room. The legal and public relations staff were discussing solutions, and everyone looked exhausted.
"You're here," Chen Yun said, pulling out a chair to let Liang Kongxiang sit down. She then looked at the computer with the PR person and explained the details of the matter, "It's encrypted, and we can't find the original IP address yet."
The sender claimed that Liang Kongxiang was a mistress who interfered in a director's marriage, causing the couple to divorce. However, he didn't specify which director, but mentioned Liang Kongxiang's name at the end, asking her: "Ten hours to go, I'll ruin your reputation. Are you scared?"
Chen Yun turned the computer screen to face Liang Kongxiang. Liang Kongxiang leaned closer to the screen and quickly scanned the screen. The light from the screen shone on her cool face, revealing no signs of anxiety or guilt. She quickly confirmed with Chen Yun, "It's fake."
Chen Yun glanced at Liang Kongxiang with amusement at her firm denial, "How could I not know it's fake? The key is the picture they sent... take a look."
She opened the attachment, which contained a photo of a hand. It was clearly Liang Kongxiang's hand, indicating that the other party was not just making things up, but had real evidence. Although it was definitely false evidence, it was also carefully prepared by the other party. Perhaps they wouldn't be able to find a suitable way to clarify things for the time being.
“This person didn’t ask for money,” Liang Kongxiang leaned back in her chair, staring at the text on the screen. She pondered these lines repeatedly, analyzing, “Since his purpose wasn’t money, there are only three possibilities. First, he’s waiting for us to speak, hoping to dictate the price based on our attitude and make a killing. Second, he’s not a paparazzi, but one of our colleagues, and his motive is simply hatred towards me. Third, he’s a fan of some artist who dislikes me and wants to gain some psychological pleasure through this method.”
While Liang Kongxiang was analyzing, Chen Yun's mind was also racing.
"But this photo doesn't show when it was taken. If you really wanted to ruin you, releasing you when the police took you away would have been the best way to stir up trouble and attract attention." Chen Yun recalled that time, and how the public opinion was suppressed and then exploded at the same time. There must have been a dirty hand manipulating things behind the scenes, and many people adding fuel to the fire to watch the show. But Liang Kongxiang has had many enemies over the years. If you really analyze it, it seems that anyone could be a suspect.
These two things shouldn't have been done by the same person. If they were, she couldn't understand, "Why would he choose to release the information at this particular time?"
Liang Kongxiang was also not quite sure. Her gaze fell on the light wood table as she pondered whether these things were related.
Actually, Liang Kongxiang had a guess about who was in charge of public opinion regarding the money laundering incident. That person was always arrogant and ruthless and had once harmed her and Cao Lengyu. However, she suspected that this was just a one-sided guess with little credibility, so she could only tell herself to be careful and that there was no other way.
She had initially suspected that this was likely a threat and wouldn't cause much of a stir, but her recent reflections forced her to take the email seriously and share her analysis with Chen Yun.
Upon hearing this, Chen Yun frowned, finding the logic in it. She immediately instructed her legal department to draft a statement. If the matter escalated, a statement would be absolutely necessary. Now, it remained to be seen whether the other party was truly prepared or simply playing tricks, deliberately choosing an auspicious day to provoke people.
"The public relations department is now monitoring public opinion on several social media platforms. Xiao Lin will contact the platforms and submit the keywords. Once these keywords are found, we will immediately complain and delete the posts, and also ask the platforms to limit the traffic of such posts," Chen Yun instructed. "Have the fan club leader give the fans a heads-up in the group beforehand. If there is any false evidence released at eight o'clock, it will help to stabilize morale and prevent them from being fooled."
If the opposing team buys a few fake fan accounts and then sends a "unfollowing" trending topic, they can turn white into black, and some unsuspecting fans might actually believe it. It's good to give them a heads-up beforehand.
“There are only a few directors he can spread rumors about,” Liang Kongxiang predicted a few possible candidates while Chen Yun was dealing with the problem. “Director Han Pingsong, I have publicly stated that I like his work. Director Sun, we have had dinner together in private. And… Director He.”
“Director He,” Chen Yun thought for a moment, “about what happened with President Jiang. Actually, it’s understandable that it’s been exposed now, since it happened last month, but isn’t he about to be promoted to director? I doubt anyone would dare to drag him down with him.”
Liang Kongxiang suddenly realized something else, and found it somewhat amusing when she said it aloud. She looked at Chen Yun, then suddenly spread her hands slightly, laughing at herself. Her eyes crinkled as she concluded, "These directors are all divorced."
"You can still laugh?" Chen Yun was amused by her, saying that she always seemed like an outsider. "I heard that President Jiang went to the film set today?"
"Hmm." Thinking that Jiang Jiaoming was still waiting in the garage, Liang Kongxiang glanced at the time on her phone.
"The consequences of being discovered in a relationship are different for artists and capitalists, men and women, due to the different nature of their professions," Chen Yun suddenly said, as a reminder to her.
Liang Kongxiang knew, but she couldn't explain her relationship with Jiang Jiaoming in just a few words, so she just smiled and didn't respond to Chen Yun's words.
Perhaps even if given time to explain, she wouldn't be able to. Or perhaps it's not that she can't explain, but that she's unwilling to, and the reason she's unwilling to explain is precisely why she's temporarily afraid to think about it.
“Then I’ll head back to the set,” Liang Kongxiang said, standing up. An hour later, although the rain was still falling, Director Cao had just sent a notification in the group chat that filming might be temporarily halted after 1 a.m., and they would shoot a portion of the scenes first to allow all the actors involved to prepare.
Chen Yun hummed in agreement, then glanced at her sideways. "Be careful. Don't try to handle anything on your own. If you have any thoughts or speculations, report them to me immediately, okay?"
"I know." Liang Kongxiang patted her shoulder gently to reassure her, smiled at the other staff in the conference room, and raised her voice a little, "Thank you all for your hard work, coming overtime on New Year's Eve. I'll treat you to a vacation after this is all over."
The staff were naturally much more comfortable and politely said it was their duty. Before leaving, Liang Kongxiang ordered some food and drinks to be delivered to the company, and then went into the elevator to the underground parking garage.
The elevator door faced the spot where Jiang Jiaoming had parked his car. Liang Kongxiang stood in the middle of the elevator. As soon as the door opened, she and Jiang Jiaoming, who was sitting in the driver's seat, looked at each other.
He leaned his head on the steering wheel, staring in that direction for who knows how long. His eyes, beneath his high brow bone, were burning and unwavering. But when Liang Kongxiang came out, he lowered his eyes to look elsewhere.
"Let's go." Liang Kongxiang fastened her seatbelt.
Jiang Jiaoming started the car, turned the steering wheel to make a U-turn, and casually asked while looking in the mirror, "What do you mean?"
"They didn't specify which director, they just said they would release evidence at 8 o'clock tomorrow to ruin my reputation."
"
Jiang Jiaoming glanced at her and laughed, "Is this the kind of thing you need to hold a meeting about?" He turned up the car's temperature, reached out and moved the air vent in front of Liang Kongxiang up so that the air wasn't blowing on her. He added, "It's all about your mindset. Don't pay attention to him for now. It will be much easier to start with him after you confirm your target tomorrow morning."
"I'm afraid it's not that simple." As if remembering something, she asked Jiang Jiaoming, "What are the chances of He Ciqian being promoted to director?"
"Want to know?" The light was red, and Jiang Jiaoming turned to look at her, his tone becoming frivolous again: "Beg me."
Ten seconds of silent eye contact. Jiang Jiaoming squinted at her, while Liang Kongxiang leaned back on the soft pillow and looked back, seemingly lost in thought. Then she looked away and raised her chin to remind him to watch the road, "The light's green."
"It seems you didn't really want to know." Jiang Jiaoming sat up straight, looked ahead, and stepped on the gas, adding insult to injury for her.
"Even if you don't tell me, I have ways to find out." It just takes some time, and you have to judge for yourself whether what the other person says is reliable.
Jiang Jiaoming said "Oh," and then added, "That's strange. You have ways to find out, but you come to ask me... It seems that asking out is just an excuse, and you really want to strike up a conversation with me?"
Here we go again. Liang Kongxiang felt she had said this to Jiang Jiaoming at least ten times since their reunion, and now she couldn't think of anything more suitable to ask him, so she asked the old-fashioned question: "Does Mr. Jiang always speak in such roundabout ways?"
“It’s assigned to specific people,” Jiang Jiaoming said.
Liang Kongxiang didn't ask any further questions.
It was past midnight when she got back. Liang Kongxiang went back to the hotel first, and then asked Chang Xin to take her to the film set. Jiang Jiaoming seemed to have driven back to the company or somewhere. Liang Kongxiang only heard someone on the phone asking him when he would be there. He said he was dropping someone off and would be there in half an hour.
He added, "Nothing will happen."
He stared at her through the car window, his tone firm, just like he had said back then, "With me here, you won't lose out."
In fact, Liang Kongxiang could subconsciously fill in the missing part of Jiang Jiaoming's sentence.
Don't worry, I'm here, nothing will happen.
However, at 8 a.m. the next day, a trending topic quickly broke through all the hot discussions about the Spring Festival Gala and quietly climbed to the top.
#Liang Kongxiang's mistress# Exposed.
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Author's note: Jiang Jiaoming: Don't worry about it, I have my own rhythm.
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