Page 46

Ye Mingzhao looked at Ruan Cuimei. At last, her reflection appeared in his pitch-black pupils.

After a moment, he spoke, asking the question they both already knew the answer to. "How did you find out about me? Who sent you to find me on set? And who leaked our relationship to the media and hyped it up?"

Watching Ruan Cuimei's face suddenly turn deathly pale as she swayed on the verge of collapse, Ye Mingzhao said lightly, "You could have continued living your peaceful life. Supporting your husband, raising your children, enjoying filial devotion from them. It was just that there was no place for me in that world."

"But you chose to let yourself be used. You chose to become a blade, wielded by someone else as a sharp weapon against me."

Ruan Cuimei hurriedly tried to defend herself. "That's not—"

"You had plenty of ways to acknowledge me," Ye Mingzhao continued, ignoring her explanation. "Yet you chose the one that put me in the most passive position. I don't want to pursue the tangled interests between you and whoever is behind this. I only want you to understand one thing."

"You should bear the consequences of the choices you made yourself."

"You will be judged for the mistakes you made back then, but I won't be the one sitting in judgment," Ye Mingzhao said as he rose to his feet and looked down at the woman who had given him life. His voice was gentle. "It will be your own conscience, your values, and every convention of public order, morality, and decency in this world."

"If you have any."

Ruan Cuimei's pupils abruptly dilated. The instant Ye Mingzhao's gaze locked onto hers, she reflexively stumbled backward.

She scrambled back on her hands and feet, only to crash into the low coffee table behind her. The tremendous noise jolted Ruan Cuimei back to her senses, and her body suddenly froze.

In the quiet lounge, her ragged breathing was clearly audible. She looked around in panic, only to discover that every person seated on the sofa was staring at her with cold eyes, judging her.

Every one of them sat high upon the judgment seat, lofty and untouchable. Everything before her suddenly began spinning at dizzying speed. The ceiling seemed to press lower and lower, while the walls twisted out of shape. Ruan Cuimei seemed to hear the voices in everyone's hearts. They were condemning her without restraint, accusing her, scrutinizing her, mocking her. And she was the only defendant.

"That's not how it was!"

"It's not what you think at all!"

"You think I wanted to abandon my own flesh and blood? I carried that child for ten months! He was flesh from my own body!"

"But what choice did I have? More than twenty years ago, how was an unmarried woman supposed to live with a child? What would people say about me? What would they say about my family? Did I have no shame?"

"Why are you all making things difficult for me? Why can't you understand my hardships?"

Ruan Cuimei screamed at everyone. She had not even noticed that the lounge door had been opened the moment Jiang Shangyun ran out. Fortunately, Yu Mingze had already arranged for the crew members crowding the corridor to disperse, though some people still lingered farther away, standing on tiptoe and craning their necks to peek at the commotion.

Ruan Cuimei noticed none of it. She only felt humiliated, as though she had been stripped naked. She could not bear being looked at with such contempt and disdain. In an instant, she was back more than twenty years ago, when the man's wife had stormed into their home with a group of people and grabbed her by the hair while she was heavily pregnant. The neighbors, drawn by the commotion, had packed the doorway and pointed into the room.

The woman sat on the sofa with her legs crossed, not even removing her sunglasses. "You're the woman Lin Feng has been keeping on the side? Did you know he was married?"

Of course Ruan Cuimei had not known. She had just graduated from university that year. Wanting to earn more money, she had given up the job assigned by her school and gone to work as a secretary at a private company. The company manager was an elite executive the owner had recruited from Harbor City. He was handsome and refined, witty and charming, and very attentive.

Fresh out of university, Ruan Cuimei had been utterly unable to resist his pursuit. In less than half a year, she had moved in with him. Not long after they began living together, Ruan Cuimei became pregnant. She had thought she would return to Harbor City with him to get married, but instead, his wife came for her.

Only then did Ruan Cuimei learn that Lin Feng had long been married. His wife was named Gu Tingjun, also from Harbor City, and her family owned a jewelry store. Lin Feng had married into the Gu family.

"I can't have children, so I don't mind Lin Feng being with other women. If you can give him a son, I can even let the child take the Gu surname and inherit the Gu family's jewelry store someday. As for you..." Gu Tingjun's gaze fell on Ruan Cuimei's belly. "I won't let you suffer a loss either. I'll give you one million. Give birth to the child, take the money, and leave. No matter where you go, you'll be able to live in comfort and style."

"You should think this through. Lin Feng will never divorce me. Given the standard of living on the mainland now, you couldn't earn one million in your entire lifetime. Do you want to keep making a fuss and end up with neither money nor man, or obediently give birth to the child? The choice is yours."

Many years later, Ruan Cuimei still remembered the way that woman had looked at her, as well as the whispers of the neighbors outside the door. As though she really were some unforgivable, promiscuous, wicked woman.

But what could she have done? She had already been more than six months pregnant. She could not possibly choose an abortion. She could only give birth to the child.

"If you want to blame someone, blame yourself for having such bad luck!" Ruan Cuimei looked at Ye Mingzhao with a chaotic gaze. It was impossible to tell whether her eyes held hatred, resentment, or something else entirely. "She clearly said she couldn't have children. Who knew that the moment I gave birth, she suddenly got pregnant?"

That woman had not even known whether she was carrying a boy or a girl, yet she immediately returned the newborn child.

"He's useless now. You can have him back!"

But what use was a child with an unknown father to Ruan Cuimei, an unmarried woman in her twenties?

What was more, this child was proof that she had been deceived and abandoned.

As long as the child existed, she would be nailed to the pillar of shame forever.

Ruan Cuimei held the child and thought for a long time. She had considered taking him back to her hometown. But she could not. She could not let her family learn of that shameful past. She could not let anyone know that she had been tricked and had become another woman's mistress! She could not let anyone know that she had been willing to give her child away for one million! She could not ruin the rest of her life over one child.

That was right! She could not throw her life away for one child!

She had never been the one in the wrong! She was a victim too! She had been deceived back then as well!

Since someone had to pay the price, why shouldn't Lin Feng and that woman receive their retribution?

At that moment, Ruan Cuimei even came to hate the mastermind who had urged her to come to the set. If they had not pressured her step by step, she could have continued living her peaceful life. She could still have been a good wife in her husband's eyes and a good mother in her son's eyes, instead of being judged from on high by these people now...

Everyone in the Ye family noticed that Ruan Cuimei's expression had suddenly changed. It was as though she had completely regained her senses. She said nothing, only glanced at Ye Mingzhao, seeming to want to speak but hesitating. "I know you can't accept my existence. You have your own family now, new parents, and they must treat you very well. They even gave you shares in the group. It's only natural that you don't want to acknowledge me as your biological mother. After all, I can't give you—"

"What are you even talking about?" His second brother, Ye Mingxi, could no longer hold back and cut her off. "Ma'am, what exactly did you come here for?"

She had blurted out something completely out of nowhere. "Who can't have children? Who got pregnant?"

"Were you a surrogate?"

"Do you know that's illegal?"

No one knew which remark struck a nerve, but Ruan Cuimei suddenly became agitated. "I wasn't! Don't you dare slander me. I'm an innocent woman. How could I possibly do something like that? They tricked me. They forced me! I did nothing wrong! I didn't do anything wrong!"

As Ruan Cuimei spoke, she could no longer hold herself together. She forced herself to her feet, then staggered out.