When Su Yiran arrived at the shop, the sky was still hazy, not yet fully bright. Today was Sunday, and the shop was continuing its new store promotion, just like yesterday, meaning it would be busy.

He prepared most of the things needed for today’s business alone, and it was still not yet eight o’clock when the part-time employees gradually started to arrive. 

Xiao Wen was the first to arrive. 

Seeing that the shop had already been prepared by Su Yiran, she was surprised and quickly came over to help Su Yiran: “Boss, you’re so early today!”

Su Yiran managed a strained smile.

As expected, the shop was very busy today, with several repeat customers from yesterday coming again. 

Su Yiran and the four employees were bustling nonstop. In the midst of all the busyness, the anger he felt in the morning gradually faded, forgotten without him realizing it. 

When he finally had a moment of leisure and remembered the incident, his anger had already dissipated.

This was their first argument as a couple in all these years. 

In all the years before, they had never even had a red face, and any small conflicts were quickly resolved. Su Yiran calmed down, realizing that all kinds of problems would naturally arise in a marriage, and they just needed to be resolved properly. 

Gu Yuanting’s mistake this time wasn’t very serious, so he decided to forgive him and talk to him properly tonight. To maintain a good marriage, couples still needed more communication and tolerance. Thinking about these things, Su Yiran relaxed, and his earlier low mood lifted.

Around 1 PM, the shop had a brief lull. While he and the employees were eating takeout, Xiao Wen, who was beside him, suddenly asked Su Yiran, “Oh, by the way, boss, do we employees get a discount if we buy desserts here?”

Su Yiran smiled: “What do you want to eat? It’s free today.”

Xiao Wen and the other three employees cheered when they heard this: “Boss is so generous!”

The few of them chatted and laughed. Su Yiran looked at these employees and had an idea. After interacting with them, he found that Xiao Wen and another employee, Xiao Chen, were both excellent. 

They worked efficiently, knew how to find things to do, and were very smart, quickly picking things up with a little teaching. 

After this weekend’s new store promotion ended, business would return to normal. On weekdays, with lower customer traffic, two people attending the shop would be enough. 

However, on weekends, the shop would be short-staffed, so it would be best to have two long-term part-time employees. 

Su Yiran thought that he would privately ask about their intentions later, whether they would be willing to work part-time here every weekend. If he could secure two long-term part-time employees at once, that would be even better.

---

Gu Yuanting felt restless all day.

Xiao Zhu, the driver, secretly glanced at his boss in the rearview mirror, feeling the low pressure throughout the car, and dared not speak. 

Xiao Zhu was originally a famous special assistant in City A’s business district, doing well at a well-known company. 

Two days ago, a headhunter suddenly contacted him, offering a job opportunity with exceptionally generous compensation. He was startled by the figure the headhunter quoted. 

After some interaction and mutual assessment with the employer, he resolutely resigned from his original job and changed employers, becoming a private special assistant for the new boss, CEO Gu. 

Although after starting the job, he found that as a private special assistant, he had to be a driver, secretary, and assistant all at once, much busier than at his old company, practically spinning like a top. However, the money he earned was also much, much more. 

Xiao Zhu again glanced at the rearview mirror; it was just that the boss’s aura was too strong, making him a bit difficult to get along with. Especially today, for some reason, the boss’s pressure was even lower, and the oppressive air in the car was practically suffocating.

The car stopped in front of an old building. Xiao Zhu braced himself and spoke, “CEO Gu, we’ve arrived.”

An hour later. Gu Yuanting emerged from the building and got into the back seat of the car, which slowly started again. He held a folder in his hand, which he had just obtained inside, and slowly flipped through the documents.

Ten years ago, under the original owner’s covert operations and arrangements, a major human trafficking case that shocked the entire country was announced as solved, leading to the arrest of over forty members of the trafficking group, involving nearly a hundred individuals and close to a thousand cases. 

One of the involved individuals was his so-called “stepmother,” the president’s wife of the Gu Group, who was taken away by the police for investigation. 

With the original owner’s various covert assistance, the police obtained a large amount of evidence, and with irrefutable proof, the “stepmother” was finally imprisoned. 

The Gu Group erupted in a scandal of its president’s wife trafficking her stepson, and the stock price plummeted overnight, causing a huge stir in the business world at the time. 

After this major human trafficking case was solved, the police followed clues to find the abducted children, and hundreds of broken families were thus reunited. 

It was also at this time that the Gu family learned that their former eldest legitimate son had not simply gone missing as a child by accident, but had been deliberately abducted. 

After learning the truth, the Gu family also searched for the original owner, but the original owner had cut off all clues, preventing anyone from finding him. Gradually, the Gu family gave up.

But now, Gu Yuanting frowned as he held the folder. He had received news that in the past two months, the Gu family had secretly begun searching for him again. Although there were no overt actions, they had almost used all their resources in secret, seemingly determined to find him regardless of the cost, for reasons unknown.

Gu Yuanting knew why. He closed his eyes, pretending to nap, and let out a silent sneer in his heart.

Gu Yuanting returned “home” in the evening. 

The house was dark, just as he had left it, empty. Su Yiran hadn’t returned yet. 

He didn’t turn on the lights and sat on the living room sofa. He pulled out a pack of cigarettes from his pocket, lit one, and started smoking. 

There were no cigarettes in the original owner’s house; he had just bought this pack on his way home today. Clearly, the original owner didn’t smoke, while he, in his previous life, especially in his later years, smoked at least half a pack a day. 

Gu Yuanting found another difference between himself and the original owner, which made him more clearly aware that he was not the original owner. 

The red glow of the cigarette tip flashed on and off in the darkness. 

These were just ordinary cigarettes. In his previous life, the people he interacted with in the business world mostly smoked cigars, but he was different. 

Smoking cigars didn’t require inhaling, but he liked the feeling of deeply inhaling the inferior smoke into his lungs, letting it thoroughly corrode them. This gave him a kind of pleasure from being corroded.

Time passed by bit by bit. He didn’t know how long it had been when he heard a “beep” at the door. Su Yiran had returned. Gu Yuanting didn’t look up.

Su Yiran opened the door and found the house dark, feeling puzzled. It was so late, had Ting Ge not returned yet? He put down his things in the entryway and entered the living room, only then seeing a tall figure sitting on the sofa. In the darkness, a fire flickered between the figure’s fingers.

“Why didn’t you turn on the lights?” 

He turned on the lights, and the living room instantly brightened. He saw Gu Yuanting sitting on the sofa, a cigarette between his fingers, exhaling smoke. 

Su Yiran took two steps closer and smelled the smoke, unable to help but cough twice. He had always been unable to tolerate the smell of smoke and was somewhat surprised, as in his memory, Gu Yuanting hadn’t touched a cigarette in many years. He couldn’t help but ask, “Why are you smoking again?”

He only saw as he got closer that there were over a dozen cigarette butts in the ashtray on the coffee table. He frowned, “Smoking so much?”

Gu Yuanting suddenly felt inexplicably guilty, his hand holding the cigarette frozen.

Meeting Su Yiran’s gaze, Gu Yuanting stiffened for a moment, then finally pressed the cigarette into the ashtray, extinguishing it.

Su Yiran opened the glass door between the living room and the balcony to ventilate and dissipate the smoke, then poured all the cigarette butts from the ashtray into the trash can. 

Looking at the dozen or so cigarette butts, he could probably understand why Gu Yuanting had smoked so much. During their argument this morning, not only was he feeling bad, but Ting Ge must have felt just as bad. 

Thinking of Ting Ge sitting silently in the darkness, smoking so many cigarettes in distress, Su Yiran, uncharacteristically, felt a pang of heartache.

However, heartache aside, the mistakes that needed to be corrected still had to be. Su Yiran sat down on the single sofa nearby, calmly: “Ting Ge, let’s talk about the problem from this morning.”

Gu Yuanting didn’t speak. Su Yiran asked him: “Do you still want to sleep in separate rooms with me?”

Gu Yuanting was silent for a moment. He hadn’t changed his mind: “Yes.” 

The influence of the original owner’s residual consciousness on him was constant whenever he was around Su Yiran. Just now, he had instinctively extinguished the cigarette due to that influence. This feeling of being out of control at any moment disgusted Gu Yuanting.

Su Yiran really didn’t expect to still hear Gu Yuanting say he wanted to separate. 

He thought that after a day of cooling down, Gu Yuanting would have realized his mistake. His anger, which had dissipated during the day, suddenly surged back. He said huffily, “Don’t you think you’re wrong? Is separating rooms something you can just casually say? Just because of jealousy? And I don’t think there’s anything to be jealous about. What I did yesterday was completely fine, you—”

“No,” Gu Yuanting suddenly interrupted him, his voice cold, “It’s not because of jealousy.”

Su Yiran choked, feeling his thoughts getting tangled: “Not… because of jealousy?” 

He was even more confused: “Then why?”

Gu Yuanting said lightly: “In a few days, I will leave.”

Su Yiran froze. He calmed down from his angry state, realizing that things seemed to be heading in another direction: 

“Leave?” He asked: “Where? For work?”

Gu Yuanting said, “No.” 

He looked at Su Yiran indifferently. Su Yiran also looked at him. The air became quiet for a moment. Su Yiran suddenly realized he had never seen Ting Ge look at him so coldly before.

“Then…” Su Yiran felt a faint sense of panic: “Why?”

Gu Yuanting said, “There’s no why.” 

He had no reason he could articulate, nor did he bother to lie.

Feeling Ting Ge’s cold attitude towards him, Su Yiran was at a loss: “Then, then how long will you be gone? When will you come back?”

Gu Yuanting said, “I won’t be coming back.”

“Won’t be coming back… what does that mean?” Su Yiran was already bewildered, his brain seeming to stop working.

Gu Yuanting was silent for a moment. For a time, neither of them spoke. A terrifying silence permeated the air. Su Yiran vaguely realized something, and he suddenly felt a little scared.

Gu Yuanting finally spoke: “In a few days, we…” Divorce.

The words “divorce” hadn’t even left his lips when he suddenly stopped. 

He saw tears slowly welling up in Su Yiran’s large eyes, wetting his long, thick eyelashes. Tears quickly filled his eyes, swirling within them. 

Gu Yuanting’s throat felt as if something was caught in it, suddenly becoming extremely uncomfortable. He couldn’t utter a single word.

Su Yiran didn’t know what words Ting Ge was about to say, but he already felt sad and heartbroken. 

He was at a loss, wanting only to get closer to Ting Ge. Su Yiran held back his tears and slowly sat on the long sofa where Gu Yuanting was sitting, moving closer to Gu Yuanting, wanting to lean into his embrace. Gu Yuanting dodged slightly to the side.

Su Yiran pitifully scooted over himself, leaning against him. 

He was too sad to speak, no longer bothering with their earlier argument. 

He didn’t know what was happening, only that he desperately needed affection and comfort, to feel secure. 

He slowly reached out and hugged Gu Yuanting’s waist, burying his face in his chest, desperately holding back his tears. 

But he waited a long while and still didn’t feel Ting Ge hug him back. He took Gu Yuanting’s hand and rubbed his head against it, as if being petted.

“…” Gu Yuanting, uncontrollably, felt his heart melt. He slowly, slowly embraced him, gradually tightening his arms.

I must be crazy, he thought.