Chapter 6 Contract
After Ling Shen left the bookstore, he quickly transferred 500,000 yuan to Su Nian through his own account, and also asked the company's legal department to draft a contract.
The cold light of the 500,000 yuan deposit notification pierced the silence of the late-night bookstore. Su Nian stared at the phone screen, the numbers reflected in her pupils like countless jumping fireflies.
He shook the whiskey glass in his hand. The sound of ice cubes hitting each other was as crisp as broken jade, and the amber liquor left winding tear marks on the wall of the glass.
He knew he had succeeded.
He poured the last sip of wine down his throat. The spicy burning sensation spread along his esophagus, but it was nothing compared to the ecstasy surging in his chest.
Su Nian stroked the necklace around his neck, the smile on his lips looking particularly ghostly. In some ways, he and Ling Shen were the same type of people. They were both looking through each other to see the person they wanted to see.
He didn't know what Ling Shen saw in him, nor did he know who the person Ling Shen missed so much was. However, he didn't care. He only knew that from now on, he could stay by Ling Shen's side with a clear conscience.
Even if there is a little similarity, he is willing to pay for it. He doesn't want to indulge in dreams anymore, and can only look at Chen Ran but can't touch him.
He pulled off the necklace around his neck and smiled happily, "Chen Ran, look, I caught you."
The cold wind blew into the room through the half-open window, but Su Nian didn't care. He put everything about Chen Ran in the safe, but only hung the necklace around his neck. His fingers brushed over the yellowed photo again, and then he closed the door resolutely.
As the morning light pierced the mist, the brass bell at the bookstore entrance suddenly rang sharply. The tires of a black Maybach rolled over the snow-covered ground. The driver swiftly opened the door, and a special assistant in a black suit stepped into the store.
The scent of sandalwood mixed with leather wafted in his face. His eyes swept over the scattered copies of "One Hundred Years of Solitude" on the bookshelf, and finally fell on the figure wiping the coffee machine behind the bar.
"Mr. Su, this is the contract that President Ling sent me." The document bag landed on the wooden table with a dull thud. The special assistant's bony fingers tapped the gold-plated logo. "He'll be arriving at 10 o'clock sharp. I hope you'll familiarize yourself with the terms in advance."
The white mist from the steam nozzle blurred Su Nian's lenses. He slowly and methodically tilted the latte art pitcher to a perfect 45-degree angle. The milk foam formed fine lines on the surface of the porcelain cup, eventually congealing into a rose bud about to bloom.
"Colombian Cymbidium blend with a bit of Ethiopian Yirgacheffe." He pushed the warm mug in front of him, the milk foam spreading an amber rim around the rim. "Want to try it?"
The man's Adam's apple rolled under his pale skin, and his eyes were like searchlights, fixed on Su Nian's face as gentle as jade.
In his mind, Jiang Yi's unruly and handsome face and the unfamiliar face in front of him kept overlapping and then suddenly separated.
Su Nian's eyebrows and eyes are somewhat tough, but the smile on her face makes people feel defensive. Jiang Yi always has an uninhibited smile and a carefree and easygoing attitude that others can't envy.
They were obviously two completely different people, but Ling Shen seemed to be under some mysterious spell, stubbornly wanting to turn Su Nian in front of him into Jiang Yi's shadow.
A strong aroma of coffee suddenly filled his nose, like an invisible hand gently plucked his tense nerves. He had clearly warned himself thousands of times in his heart not to be deceived by this seemingly ordinary aroma, and not to touch anything related to Su Nian.
But when his fingertips touched the warm coffee cup, the delicate touch of ceramic seemed to have a bewitching magic that made him pick up the cup involuntarily.
The unique mellow aroma of coffee beans, mixed with the sweetness of silky milk, bloomed layer by layer between his lips and teeth, like a grand taste feast, which made him unable to resist and even gave rise to a bit of greed.
Su Nian's slender fingers grasped the documents on the table, a subtle rustling sound as they rubbed against each other. Those thin pages seemed to carry a tremendous weight. A one-year contract, a massive monthly payment of half a million yuan—these figures flickered before his eyes like dancing flames.
The price he had to pay was simply to be a companion who was always available when Ling Shen needed him.
"Hehe." Su Nian hooked the edge of the contract with his fingertips, rolled the paper into an arc and then loosened it, and the metal bar counter emitted tiny reflections.
The assistant raised his head and looked at Su Nian, "What are you laughing at?"
Su Nian spread the contract on the bar counter. "I was just wondering what kind of person is worthy of President Ling going to such great lengths."
The special assistant put down the coffee cup and looked at the man in front of him warily. His eyes behind the lenses turned cold, and the dark pattern on the collar of his suit rose and fell with his breathing.
"Mr. Su, I hope you know your place. It's best not to cross the line when asking about things you shouldn't." He pulled out a handkerchief and wiped the rim of the cup. "I'll transfer the money for the coffee to you later."
Amid the creaking of the wooden door hinges, the bronze bell rang out a series of hurried ding-dongs. The special assistant's straight figure disappeared through the glass door, his dark blue tie clip flashing a cold light in the sunlight.
In his eyes, Jiang Yi was Ling Shen's benefactor and a close friend who had been with him for many years, while Su Nian was just a thief, a substitute who took advantage of the situation.
He believed that Su Nian was just Ling Shen's way of filling the void left by Jiang Yi, and when Jiang Yi came back, it would be natural for Su Nian, the imposter, to leave.
Su Nian looked at the bell above the door frame with some amusement. He didn't care who that person was. He just said that out of his feelings.
He hadn't expected a careless remark to cause Ling Shen's assistant to feel so threatened. As the bells lingered, he unconsciously stroked the gold-stamped logo on the contract, feeling deeply that his future would not be boring.
As Ling Shen pushed open the carved glass door of the bookstore, wind chimes chimed softly. Under the warm yellow light, Su Nian was arranging books on the top shelf. Her apron, stained with coffee, looked like a blooming iris.
The bookstore was filled with the mixed aroma of paper and coffee beans, and each customer was immersed in the world of books - two female students in the corner covered their mouths and giggled, and the bookmarks between the pages trembled slightly with their laughter; a man wearing gold-rimmed glasses by the window pushed the cold coffee cup aside, and his index finger unconsciously stroked the gold-embossed spine of the hardcover book.
"Welcome." Su Nian turned around, his hair brushing against the poster of Love in the Time of Cholera, his voice still lingering with a smile. His amber eyes curved into crescents as he saw who it was.
"You're here? Is it still the same as before?"
These words hit Ling Shen's heart like a heavy hammer. His restless mood slowly calmed down in the fragrance of the bookstore. He nodded slightly to Su Nian, "Yeah."
He loosened his dark blue tie and smelled the faint scent of cedar perfume on Su Nian, a completely different scent from the person in his memory.
The wind from the air-conditioning outlet swept across the bookshelf, carrying up a few pages of open poetry books. The sound of flipping papers and the hum of steam from the coffee machine intertwined into a net, gradually drowning him.
Su Nian turned and walked towards the bar, her shoes making a slight tapping sound on the floor, "Okay, sit down for a while."
Ling Shen stared at the new strands of hair on the back of Su Nian's neck, and watched the pair of bony hands holding the coffee pot with a carved copper handle. With a turn of the wrist, the dark brown liquid drew a delicate vortex of milk foam in the porcelain cup.
When Su Nian pushed the Blue Mountain coffee toward him, the steam from the cup blurred Ling Shen's vision. He looked at the condensation on the cup wall and suddenly realized that every time Su Nian made latte art for him, the pattern was never the same—today it was a butterfly fluttering, last week it was a swan holding a rose.
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