My Queen, My Rules - 55
Ribs
After so many years, Ji Mingshu's hatred for Li Wenyin had long since seeped into her bones. One overturned glass of red wine was never going to make it disappear.
The instant she stepped past Cen Sen, what she had really wanted was to throw the wine straight into Li Wenyin's face, or pour it over her head.
But her upbringing wouldn't allow it. She also refused to create trouble for Gu Kaiyang, who was responsible for the event, and more than anything, she didn't want Cen Sen to see the ugliest version of herself.
The splash of red wine seemed to linger in the air.
For several long seconds, the entire room fell into an almost frozen silence.
But Li Wenyin wasn't some helpless damsel who only knew how to cry after being bullied. Ji Mingshu had poured that glass of wine onto the floor right in front of her like an offering at a gravesite, telling her to stay away from her husband while she did it. If she simply stood there and took it, people would leave this event convinced she was shamelessly trying to steal another woman's husband.
Her expression shifted for a moment, but she quickly regained her composure and came up with the perfect counterattack.
Throw the wine back at Ji Mingshu.
Ji Mingshu had provoked her first. Whatever retaliation followed would seem justified. Besides, everyone knew Ji Mingshu had a spoiled temper. No matter who heard the story or how it was told, public opinion would naturally side with Li Wenyin.
Just like back in school. No matter what the truth had been, Ji Mingshu had never managed to come out ahead when facing her.
But just as she lifted the glass to throw it, Cen Sen suddenly turned around and fixed her with a cold, unwavering stare.
Li Wenyin froze.
By then, however, the motion of her arm could no longer be stopped.
Without the slightest hesitation, Cen Sen caught Ji Mingshu's slender wrist with one hand and gently drew her behind him. With the other, he seized Li Wenyin's wrist with precise force, twisting it inward. At the very last second, he forced the angle of the wineglass to change.
The deep crimson wine flowed backward over Li Wenyin's arm, soaking her almond-colored A-line dress almost instantly. The liquid trickled down her sleeve and skirt before dripping steadily onto the floor.
Her lips pressed tightly together, her face turning pale.
Partly because Cen Sen had shown absolutely no mercy. He had twisted her wrist hard enough that it genuinely hurt.
And partly because she simply couldn't believe he would cast aside every trace of their past for a woman like Ji Mingshu.
Meeting her gaze, Cen Sen spoke in a voice devoid of warmth, stripped of even basic courtesy. He delivered a final warning with exhausted patience, "Li Wenyin. Enough is enough."
At that moment, the man before her suddenly felt like a stranger. He was nothing like the refined, gentle young man she had known ten years ago.
She shook her head faintly, murmuring to herself as though unable to accept reality.
"A-Sen... how did you become like this?"
Anyone who truly knew Cen Sen would know he had always been this way.
Li Wenyin had simply become trapped inside memories she had polished until they shone, hopelessly lost inside fantasies softened by nostalgia.
She had forgotten that even the refined, gentle young man from ten years ago had never showered her with much tenderness after accepting her confession.
Perhaps what she had truly loved had never been Cen Sen himself.
Perhaps what she missed was the envy and admiration from her classmates that came with dating him. The countless conveniences and open doors his name had afforded her. The intoxicating feeling of standing at the center of everyone's attention beneath the halo of being the academic prodigy's girlfriend.
The rest of her life had never again reached those dazzling heights.
The Zero Degrees PR manager responsible for keeping the event under control noticed the disturbance and hurried over, calling security through her radio in case someone was deliberately causing trouble and needed to be escorted out.
She had barely taken a few steps when someone grabbed her arm.
"Leave it."
Turning around, she found Gu Kaiyang standing behind her. Somehow, despite being one of the event organizers, she had been mysteriously appearing and disappearing all evening.
"Gu-jie, but over there..."
Gu Kaiyang followed her gaze without blinking. The corners of her lips even curled upward slightly before she repeated herself.
"I said leave it. I'll handle it."
Their little princess had bottled up this grievance for so many years. Now that Cen Sen had finally stepped in, how could she possibly interrupt?
The PR manager clearly didn't understand, but with Gu Kaiyang giving the order, she could only wave the security guards away and pretend she hadn't seen a thing.
The incident happened right beside the dessert table, where Jiang Chun had been lingering nearby.
Drawn over by the spectacle of husband-and-wife in action, she sat bolt upright from her beanbag chair, so stunned she completely forgot to eat her cake. Absentmindedly waving her tiny fork through the air, she screamed silently inside her head:
Destroy her! Keep going! Teach her a lesson! That Little Lotus Li, the shameless bitch who made our Little Canary Baby suffer for so many years, deserves to drop dead on the spot and turn straight into ashes!
Sadly for Little Earth Goose, that wish was destined to go unfulfilled.
Whatever Li Wenyin had done, she had still once been Cen Sen's legitimate girlfriend. No decent man would publicly hit and humiliate an ex-girlfriend, least of all someone like Cen Sen.
In truth, the fact that he'd intervened at all, and then warned Li Wenyin so mercilessly, had already shocked Ji Mingshu beyond belief. When he'd grabbed her earlier, she'd assumed he was simply trying to shield her from the wine. Someone as rational as him... how could he...
Standing behind him, it took her a very, very long time to realize something.
The impossible scene she had imagined countless times, Cen Sen had actually chosen her side.
She secretly peeked at Li Wenyin from behind Cen Sen's sleeve, not expecting to meet Li Wenyin’s gaze, rarely so undisguised in its hatred.
...Huh. For some reason, that felt incredibly satisfying.
Completely forgetting where she was, Ji Mingshu flashed Li Wenyin the sweetest, most infuriating smile imaginable before giving an innocent little shrug. Her expression full of a helpless ‘So sorry, my husband insists on defending me. There's really nothing I can do about it’.
The next second, Cen Sen turned back.
Ji Mingshu instantly switched expressions, transforming into an innocent little white lotus. Timidly tugging at his sleeve, she looked every bit the kindhearted woman who didn't wish to argue with someone like this.
To her surprise, Cen Sen completely fell for it.
He took her hand on his own, then gently rubbed the top of her head in quiet reassurance.
Ji Mingshu's plastic friends had spent more than a decade swimming through high society. Their instincts were razor sharp. Earlier they'd watched the drama in absolute silence. Now, sensing the finale had arrived, they rushed forward one after another, instantly launching into a full performance. They comforted Ji Mingshu while taking every opportunity to tear into Li Wenyin.
"Sweetie, you're just too kind. What kind of person bullies you right to your face, and you still refuse to make a fuss? I'm furious just watching!"
"Xiao Shu has always had a soft heart, don’t you know her by now? Oh, that reminds me. A friend once told me she's most afraid of offending people who write books, paint, or make movies. Upset one of them and who knows how vilified you in one of their so-called artistic masterpieces. There are more and more people these days using art as an excuse to settle personal grudges."
"Exactly! People like that should be blacklisted."
"And anyone with rotten morals should be blacklisted too."
"I think what's even scarier than using art to settle scores is using art to live out delusions. I've never seen someone honestly believe a married man is still secretly in love with her after all these years."
"Haven't you? You're looking at one."
Several of the girls burst into laughter.
When the laughter died down, someone added, "Xiao Shu, we really shouldn't come to events like this anymore. These days just anyone can get an invitation."
"Even without an invitation, they can just latch onto someone who has one. Who's going to stop them?"
They exchanged knowing smiles before looking at Li Wenyin together, every pair of eyes filled with the exact same contempt.
Normally, Ji Mingshu took compliments in stride.
But standing beside Cen Sen while everyone praised her so extravagantly made even her feel a little guilty. Besides, her plastic friends' sarcasm and synchronized expressions were so perfectly delivered that she almost embarrassed to turn around and see Li Wenyin's face.
But still… it was so damn satisfying tvt!
She was practically floating with happiness. Afraid that pushing things too far might make Cen Sen dislike her or feel sympathy for Li Wenyin, she quickly agreed to a few invitations to future shopping outings before apologizing and saying she needed to leave.
As she spoke, she glanced around the room for Gu Kaiyang and Jiang Chun. Gu Kaiyang, probably feeling too guilty for her treasonous non-intervention, was nowhere to be seen. But Jiang Chun was easy to spot.
Ji Mingshu quietly gestured for her to call later. Then, surrounded by her flock of socialite friends, she took Cen Sen's hand, and the two of them left the chaotic event behind.
"Do you think... I went a little too far with Li Wenyin today?"
Snow drifted steadily through the winter sky as they drove home. Ji Mingshu finally couldn't stop herself from asking.
"No."
Cen Sen was looking over the schedule on his tablet. His answer came without the slightest hesitation.
Ji Mingshu relaxed a little.
Sneaking a few glances at him, she tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear and pretended to scroll casually through her phone.
"Li Wenyin said you've completely changed... but I don't think you have. Were you... gentler when you were dating her?"
When no answer came even after a long silence, she muttered to herself instead. "Well, I'll find out once her movie comes out."
Cen Sen closed the tablet. "It won't be released."
...?
He had warned Li Wenyin more than once not to make the movie. She hadn't listened. Even after Junyi withdrew its investment, she'd stubbornly secured funding from the Yuan family instead.
In that case, he could no longer guarantee that somewhere along the production process, an insurmountable problem wouldn't suddenly appear.
After all, countless complicated steps stood between a movie's first draft and its theatrical release, and the process took a very long time.
The film industry was especially sensitive these days. A movie scheduled to premiere could be pulled the day before release without warning.
And the later the problem surfaced, the greater the price paid.
Until audiences actually sat in theaters and watched it, who could truly claim a movie had been released?
"It won't be released?" Ji Mingshu repeated blankly.
Cen Sen nodded. "Just wait a little longer. There's no rush."
At that moment, the last heavy stone weighing on Ji Mingshu's heart was finally lifted away by Cen Sen himself.
She turned to look out the window, but no matter how hard she tried, she couldn't stop the smile tugging at her lips.
The Bentley carried them from the event back toward Mingshui Manor. As they approached the fork leading toward the suburbs, Cen Sen glanced at the sign of a nearby supermarket and suddenly asked,
"Mingshu, do you feel like having braised pork ribs tonight?"
"..."
Now, every time Ji Mingshu heard the words pork ribs, her heart immediately skipped a beat.
Still staring out the window, she waited until the traffic light was about to change before stammering,
"I... I wouldn't mind. It's been a while."
The driver understood immediately and turned toward the supermarket.
Even after answering, Ji Mingshu blushed like an innocent teenage girl, her heartbeat racing so wildly that she had no choice but to crack the window open for a little air.
Snow in the capital always fell thick and fierce.
A gust of icy wind swept snowflakes through the narrow opening, one of them landing lightly in Ji Mingshu's hair.
Cen Sen suddenly leaned over, brushed the snowflake from her hair, then lowered his head beside her ear and murmured in a husky voice,
"When we get home... I'll make it for you."
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