Unlike the popular stereotype of boring Betas, Su Yuan was very charming.
Lu Sili still did not quite understand what people meant by the novelty of being in love, but the more he learned about Su Yuan, the more interesting he found him.
The next morning, just after Lu Sili arrived at the office, news about Wen Xiao and Jiang Mingcheng broke. Wen Xiao did not have an enormous fanbase, but he had several prestigious awards to his name. The scandal involved sensitive legal issues currently in the public eye, and there were even suspicions that he and his manager Jiang Mingcheng were lovers. It was such a spectacle that plenty of people joked they had barely worked all morning.
Lu Sili took two calls and immediately had to cooperate with police questioning. By the time he finished, it was already after two.
The PR and Finance employees had barely slept the previous night and had started working again first thing that morning. Lu Sili asked Xiao Qiao at reception to order food and drinks to placate everyone.
He and Fiona returned to his office to have lunch as well.
Fiona heated Lu Sili’s meal for him. Just as Lu Sili was about to message Su Yuan to say he was finally eating, Su Yuan called.
“I’m downstairs at your company. Can I come up, Director Lu?” Su Yuan asked.
Lu Sili smiled. “Aren’t you working?”
“The hospital rushed me to deal with visa paperwork today, so I took an impromptu day off.”
“All right. Come up. I’m in my office.”
“Esteemed Director Lu, I can’t get upstairs,” Su Yuan said with a laugh.
Only then did Lu Sili remember. He immediately stood. “I’ll come get you.”
Access to the F&A office building required a keycard. Su Yuan had only visited two or three times, so the staff did not know him yet.
Technically, Lu Sili could simply have called reception. Instead, he decided to go down personally. That way everyone would naturally learn that this was “Director Lu’s husband.”
The weather was fairly nice that day. Because he had been meeting with media and government departments over the past couple of days, Lu Sili was dressed formally in a black-and-white shirt and trousers.
Before he had even passed through the ground-floor turnstiles, he spotted Su Yuan beside reception.
“Director Lu.” An employee passing by greeted him.
Lu Sili gave a distracted acknowledgment and quickly waved. “Su Yuan!”
His voice was not loud, but for some reason no one happened to be talking just then. Everyone heard him and turned to look.
When they saw Lu Sili hurry toward reception, their gazes followed to the man standing beside the desk carrying two large bags.
The man wore a loose gray sweater and light-colored jeans, smiling as he told Lu Sili he had brought something tasty.
The normally decisive and formidable Director Lu looked almost unfamiliar.
Why did Director Lu look so… sweet when he smiled?
Looking at the milk tea and desserts Su Yuan had brought, Lu Sili could not help saying, “Thank you.”
“And these snacks. The ones we didn’t get to try the other day. I saw somewhere selling them, so I bought a box for you to taste.”
“Come on, let’s go upstairs first.” Lu Sili naturally slipped an arm lightly around Su Yuan’s, but when he turned and caught the young security guard staring in shock, he silently lowered his hand.
Everyone who worked in the building knew Lu Sili, and they had certainly heard F&A employees talk about the stern Omega director. But because Lu Sili drove to and from work and usually went directly through the garage, the security staff did not see him often.
So he was actually pretty cute!
“Director Lu, in the future your husband can just let us know. There’s no need to trouble yourself coming downstairs,” the guard said with a smile.
Mission accomplished. “All right, thank you,” Lu Sili said.
Su Yuan had bought so many desserts and milk teas that Lu Sili shared some with the employees. Everyone on the twentieth floor ate very well that day.
Fiona was already eating lunch. Seeing Su Yuan arrive, she greeted him familiarly, and the three continued eating together.
Su Yuan asked about the company trouble of the past two days.
“What we know now is that Jiang Mingcheng really did run. Most likely he’s trying to get out of the country,” Fiona said.
Lu Sili nodded and habitually picked up his phone to photograph his lunch. “Mm. But Wen Xiao isn’t cooperating much. Did those two grow up together?”
“Mm…” Fiona ate a shrimp. “I’ve heard some industry gossip, but I can’t vouch for whether it’s true.”
Su Yuan smiled. “I’m not buying a melon. No guarantee needed.”
Elio’s Notes: “Eating melon” is Chinese internet slang for following gossip. Su Yuan is joking with Fiona’s “can’t guarantee it’s true” as though she were literally selling him a melon.
Lu Sili took a sip of soup. “I want to hear it too.”
“Wen Xiao has no parents. I heard he met Jiang Mingcheng in the orphanage when they were kids. Wen Xiao was bullied by the other children there, and Jiang Mingcheng protected him. Later, the two of them left the orphanage together. They had no money, and Wen Xiao was an Omega, so Jiang Mingcheng took whatever under-the-table jobs he could to earn money. Pool halls, little gambling dens, things like that. Anyway, he treated Wen Xiao well and even sent him to school.”
Lu Sili and Su Yuan listened intently while eating.
“Work like that is easy to get into and hard to get out of. They were probably fifteen or sixteen when Jiang Mingcheng got into trouble and needed a large amount of money. Wen Xiao somehow got it for him. Then they had a conflict and separated for two years. When they met again, a director had discovered Wen Xiao and he was about to start acting, so Jiang Mingcheng became his manager.”
Fiona suddenly sighed. “After that, everyone knows what happened. Wen Xiao was extremely talented and began making a name for himself. But Jiang Mingcheng gambled, and he also…”
“What?” Lu Sili frowned.
“I only found this out just now. For the past few years, Jiang Mingcheng has been treating Wen Xiao as a resource, sending him to sleep with people to climb higher and bringing people overseas to gamble.”
Lu Sili had previously assumed Jiang Mingcheng held some kind of leverage over Wen Xiao. He had not expected this.
“Are they lovers?” Su Yuan asked.
Fiona lowered her eyes in thought, then looked at Su Yuan. “Does that count? Would you do something like that to Director Lu?”
Everyone fell silent.
Whatever their relationship, Wen Xiao and Jiang Mingcheng now faced more than public opinion. Jiang Mingcheng had fled, while Wen Xiao might face prison.
The scandal dragged on for half a month. F&A’s PR and Finance departments, together with the Executive Office, barely had a proper May Day holiday. Even when they were away from the office, their phones kept them firmly tethered to work.
Jiang Mingcheng had already fled to Southeast Asia. Wen Xiao had been detained in connection with overseas gambling and prostitution, and the investigation had spread to several other people in the industry.
For F&A, however, the dust had more or less settled. Lu Sili finally had time to complete his first-quarter medical examination.
Over those two weeks, Su Yuan had watched work grind Lu Sili down. Fortunately, Su Yuan’s own work schedule remained fairly normal, so he could look after Lu Sili’s daily needs. Lu Sili’s two heats during that period had both passed relatively smoothly.
“Grandma has been worried about you lately. Let’s go see her this week,” Su Yuan said while they waited in Luke’s office for the reports.
Lu Sili hummed and pressed his fingers against the spot between his brows.
“Grandma must have been nagging you, right?”
Su Yuan did not deny it. Lu Sili’s health had always weighed on Grandma’s heart. Her outlook was traditional. She hoped Lu Sili would marry, have children, and live a stable life.
But settling into the role of spouse and parent was not the life Lu Sili wanted.
Lu Sili sighed softly. “It’s not like I’m deliberately wrecking my health. I always think things will get better once I make it through this busy stretch, but somehow I only get busier. I can’t even get the gland-removal surgery.”
“Lili.”
“Mm?”
Su Yuan stood and moved behind Lu Sili, placing both hands at his temples and gently massaging them.
“I support whatever decision you make. But lately… I can feel that even you’re struggling to keep up. Every time I see you suffering, I feel helpless.”
Lu Sili smiled faintly. “Why?”
“I want you to be happy, but there’s nothing I can do.”
“I want you to be happy too,” Lu Sili said softly. It sounded as though there was more he wanted to say, but he did not finish.
I don’t want you to hurt because of me.
A while later, Luke returned with a thick stack of reports. The quarterly examination included a full “gland-removal surgery assessment.” Luke had originally thought there was no point evaluating it after only one quarter, but Lu Sili wanted to see where he stood, so they had done it anyway.
“How is it?” Su Yuan asked.
The three sat at Luke’s desk. Luke turned his monitor toward them and displayed a CT scan of the gland.
“After reducing the suppressants, the gland is much healthier. Look, this is the scan from the first time you came for pheromone matching. At that point the gland was swollen, and its outer end was fragile. But there are still…”
Luke compared scans from several examinations. Su Yuan looked at the dark areas around the back of Lu Sili’s neck on the CT, and his gaze unconsciously shifted to Lu Sili’s slender nape.
The weather had begun warming recently, and Lu Sili was wearing a T-shirt. Only a slight raised outline of the gland was visible, with a burn scar over it.
Su Yuan was not a doctor specializing in secondary-sex characteristics, but even he knew how gland-removal surgery worked: a high-frequency electrosurgical knife opened the raised area, the superficial gland tissue was removed, then heat was used to cauterize the glandular nerves extending outward.
After surgery, a scar would stretch across nearly half his back.
How desperate and overwhelmed must Lu Sili have been back then to impulsively injure his own gland with something from home? How much pain must he have endured before that despairing version of him finally stopped?
Su Yuan lowered his eyes slightly. By the time he looked up again, Luke had finished discussing the CT.
Su Yuan studied Lu Sili’s profile thoughtfully, looking again and again. He wanted so badly for him to be healthy.
Naturally, the surgical assessment did not approve the procedure. It listed numerous recommendations for improving Lu Sili’s health, including one item: “Stop using suppressants.”
“Most pairings are Alpha-Omega, so the report doesn’t specifically mention this,” Luke said, “but I need to remind both of you that frequent use of artificial pheromones can still have side effects on Su Yuan’s body.”
Luke handed Lu Sili the updated medication list. “One of these medications has to be prescribed through the Municipal Hospital this time. Director Lu, I understand the nature of your work, but frankly, if you continue like this, gland removal will remain nowhere in sight. Please think carefully about it again.”
After leaving with the reports, Lu Sili remained silent on the road, merely watching the scenery outside the window.
They were heading to the police station to supplement their statements.
When they arrived, they discovered Wen Xiao was there too. He had no family or friends with him, only the assistant the company had assigned him.
The assistant approached Lu Sili. “Director Lu, could you talk to him?”
She was a timid-looking young woman, obviously introverted and not much of a talker.
“All right,” Lu Sili said.
Her eyes lit up at his agreement. Lu Sili thought Wen Xiao must have treated this assistant well. He had heard before that Wen Xiao behaved well on set and was easy to work with.
Wen Xiao sat in a small room. He showed little reaction when Lu Sili entered.
Lu Sili sat opposite him. “Your assistant wanted me to come see you.”
Wen Xiao looked up and noticed Su Yuan beside Lu Sili. “Is this your husband? A Beta.”
“Yes,” Lu Sili said.
“Brother Cheng is a Beta too.”
“He ran away. Wen Xiao, are you still going to protect him?”
“You don’t understand.” Wen Xiao lowered his head. “When we were kids, Brother Cheng saved me. He worked to support me. We promised we’d stay together forever.”
Wen Xiao rambled about many things from their childhood, saying he wanted to go back to the past. Listening to those fragments, Lu Sili could not help thinking of himself.
“But he’s already changed,” Su Yuan suddenly said.
Lu Sili turned toward him. Su Yuan’s voice was gentle. “You’re grown now, and you have your own life. You’ve trapped yourself in the past, but there’s no one there anymore.”
Wen Xiao lowered his head and said nothing. After a while, his shoulders began to tremble.
Lu Sili and Su Yuan went home together.
The past was real. So was the present.
Lu Sili, trapped in the summer when he was eighteen, had always known that there was no one there anymore.
The car moved through the glittering city. It was eight-thirty in the evening. Lu Sili looked at the low-battery warning in the top corner of his phone. After one more work call, it was almost dead.
“Want to charge it?” Su Yuan pulled out the charging cable in the car.
Lu Sili shook his head. “No. Let it die. I want a break.”