Afternoon.
In the taxi.
Dong Xuebin had been thinking of finding a chance to tell them anyway. They would soon find out that they were all family members accompanying this Jiangnan Province research trip, so there was no need to hide it. Since Hou Wen had brought it up, Dong Xuebin smilingly went along with it.
"Your wife?"
"Yeah."
"You mean Secretary Xie?"
"Yeah, Xie Huilan."
"You're getting more and more outrageous with your bragging!"
"...Come on, what am I bragging about?"
Hou Wen was not surprised in the least. Instead, he burst out laughing. "Never mind whether you've even met her—you say she's your wife? Keep bragging, and you'll blow the whole cowhide apart! How old is she? Over thirty. We're only in our twenties. How many years apart is that? And with her looks... ah, I won't even go there. You know it yourself. If you could marry Secretary Xie, then I'd believe I could rule over an entire region in my lifetime. Besides, Secretary Xie has been married for ages, and her rank is right there. She's even one level higher than my dad. Xuebin, not bad. You're getting more and more humorous."
"...I know she's married," Dong Xuebin said.
"Then why are you still bragging?" Hou Wen grinned mischievously.
"But she married me." Dong Xuebin said helplessly, "I came on this business trip to travel with Xie Huilan. Aren't you here with your dad too? This was organized by Jiangnan Province. I'm family from Jiangnan Province too, so we happened to be on the same route."
Hou Wen clearly did not believe him. "Oh? You sure know a lot. Right, your wife is a civil servant too, so she must have heard about the leaders going on a business trip."
"...Huilan is the leader. Why would