Liang Meng came out of the bathroom after her shower.

Lin Qing’s mother was there to greet her, craning her neck to peer past into the room.

“Auntie, did you need to use the bathroom?” Liang Meng asked.

Lin Qing’s mother brushed past her, ducked into the bathroom for a quick look around, then came back out.

“Where are the clothes you changed out of?”

Liang Meng’s face went pink. She looked down.

Although there had been an underwear washing machine in the bathroom all along, she’d felt too self-conscious to use it. And so, over these past few days, this princess who had never once in her life done a lick of housework had indeed been hand-washing her own clothes every evening.

“Oh goodness! You could just toss them in the laundry basket next to it — I’m here to take care of that!” Lin Qing’s mother said warmly.

Liang Meng said nothing, and hurried back to her room, embarrassed.

Lin Qing’s mother’s kind of well-meaning, boundary-free fussing left her feeling a little at a loss.

Lin Qing’s mother followed her right in, and picked up the thread of the conversation: “What’s the matter, Xiao Meng? Are you embarrassed?”

Liang Meng gave a small nod, silently confirming.

Lin Qing’s mother slapped her thigh!

The sudden exclamation made Liang Meng flinch.

“What’s there to be embarrassed about! You’re just like Lin Qing! Have you ever seen her embarrassed about anything? Some days she comes home with one sock here and the other halfway across the room!”

And with that, Lin Qing’s mother went right ahead and sat down on the edge of the bed, taking Liang Meng’s hands in both of hers.

“Since you’re living under the same roof, don’t be shy about anything. You’re a big-time CEO — you don’t need to be bothered with these little things. From today on, everything around the house is my responsibility! Whatever Lin Qing does, you do the same! If you need anything from me, just say the word!”

Liang Meng’s heart felt warm hearing that.

Her parents had passed away when she was still young. And while Jiang Han and President Liang had always treated her well — and there was a whole household of maids and housekeepers to manage things — the kind of care that comes from an elder was something she truly hadn’t experienced in a very long time.

She looked into Lin Qing’s mother’s eyes — earnest and full of genuine warmth — and thought to herself: this kind of sincerity can’t be faked.

“Xiao Meng, are you going out tomorrow? It’s Saturday,” Lin Qing’s mother asked casually.

Liang Meng smiled and answered: “I made plans with a friend to go fishing.”

It was actually for work.

Fortunately, Lin Qing’s mother didn’t dig any further this time, and went off to take care of the chores.

The next morning.

Liang Meng had washed up and dressed in her sportswear. She swung a backpack over her shoulders and was ready to head out.

She and Wang Zaiwu had arranged to meet at eight, to swing by the fish market and pick out some fresh bait and fish feed first.

“Meng, wait a moment, wait a moment!”

Liang Meng had just pulled the door open when Lin Qing’s mother came rushing in from the kitchen.

She pressed a plastic bag into Liang Meng’s hands — inside was a carton of warm milk and some egg-filled steamed buns.

Then she picked up a canvas tote she’d prepared from the sofa and handed it over as well, with instructions: “Have your breakfast on the way. This bag has everything I put together for your fishing trip: a sun hat, a pair of sunglasses, and a spare pair of dry socks! And most important of all — here —”

She reached into the bag and produced two clear zip-lock bags, holding them up for Liang Meng to see.

“This one is steamed and ground barley flour. This one is roasted and mashed sweet potato. You can use them as fish bait. Back in my hometown, people always say mixing these into the feed works like a charm — the fish can’t resist the hook!”

“Thank you, Auntie.”

Liang Meng accepted everything, so moved she barely knew what to say.

She had only mentioned in passing the evening before that she was going fishing — and yet Lin Qing’s mother had prepared all of this down to the last detail.

For these past twenty years of her life, what kind of charmed existence had Lin Qing been living?

Beyond admiration came envy. And the longing Liang Meng felt for that kind of family love was fast edging into something that felt almost like resentment.

At that moment, Lin Qing shuffled out of her room half-awake, heading to the bathroom, and spotted Liang Meng through squinting eyes: “Do you want me to come with you?”

Liang Meng: “No need — Wang Zaiwu is coming.” And with that, she headed out.

Lin Qing’s mother had been all warmth and smiles for Liang Meng just a moment ago, but the instant she turned to her own daughter, her expression shifted entirely — barely containing her irritation.

“You useless girl!”

“What did I do now?!” Lin Qing stared back at her mother, genuinely baffled.

“Your boss is up at the crack of dawn and heading out — and you’re lounging around sleeping in!” Lin Qing’s mother went on, grumbling. “What a missed opportunity — you could’ve gone along and built a bit of rapport with your boss. Beats lying around the house like a corpse on your day off!”

“Mom! She’s the one who didn’t want me tagging along!”

“That was your boss being polite!”

All right.

Other people’s children were always more impressive.

Bosses were always right.

The older generation never quite managed to purge themselves of these lingering relics of thinking.

Lin Qing had no interest in arguing with her own mother. She squinted and turned to head back to sleep.

She had only taken a few steps when Lin Qing suddenly stopped, turned back with a sharp look, and demanded: “Mom… Are you being so nice to Liang Meng because she’s my boss?”

She knew her own mother too well. She was the type who never stirred without a reason.

Lin Qing’s mother pursed her lips and said nothing, scrubbing the cloth back and forth faster: “What kind of thing is that to say? What’s wrong with being good to someone?”

Lin Qing’s drowsiness vanished completely. She walked over and gave her mother a firm warning: “Mom! Don’t bring your small-town schemes of ‘winning people over through flattery’ to bear on Liang Meng! I’m telling you — Liang Meng lost both her parents at the age of ten. She’s starving for affection. If you play games with her like this, she won’t be able to handle it! So if you’re being good to her with ulterior motives, stop it right now!”

Lin Qing’s mother’s face went red then white. She did indeed have private intentions — but she couldn’t bear having her own daughter strip away her cover like this, and so she protested: “As long as the other person doesn’t feel like it’s fake, what does it matter?!”

“I said stop it!”

Lin Qing was severe.

Over the years, Lin Qing’s smooth sailing at school — apart from her own excellence as a student — had owed quite a bit to her mother’s yearly habit of winning over Lin Qing’s teachers with exactly this kind of emotional charm campaign.

Lin Qing had always pretended not to know.

But it couldn’t entirely be held against Lin Qing’s mother, either. Years of single motherhood had left them with very little to protect their position. Who didn’t want to be the one in a seat of honor? Who actually wanted to flatter and defer to others?

Emotional warmth was a currency too.

The fish bait market.

Wang Zaiwu, sunglasses on, led Liang Meng through a full circuit of the stalls, selecting a few boxes of the bestselling fish feed.

Two trust-fund kids — neither of them haggled.

The stall owner’s grin nearly split his face. In that spirit, he threw in a couple of extra compliments for free: “I’ve been in this business for years, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen a couple where the man is this handsome and the woman this gorgeous! You two — you’re made for each other. Truly, perfectly matched!”

At this, the stall owner’s wife cut in: “What couple?! Old man, are your eyes going?! They’re clearly siblings! Same fair skin, same long legs, same height, same shape of eyes…”

“Hey! Now that you mention it! You’re right, I do have a bad eye for these things!” The owner handed the fish feed over to them and was still at it, digging for more: “You’re blood siblings, am I right?”

Liang Meng and Wang Zaiwu exchanged a glance. It was a little awkward.

In the end it was Liang Meng who graciously accepted the fish feed, gave the owner a nod, and said: “Yes. My little brother.”

Liang Meng thought to herself — these two stall owners were people she’d almost certainly never cross paths with again in a million years. What did it matter if she played along?

This wasn’t a census registration.

Wang Zaiwu stood rooted to the spot. It took him a while to process, then he scratched the back of his head and followed after Liang Meng.

A sister, conjured out of thin air.

Wang Zaiwu drove his Lamborghini with Liang Meng aboard, and they arrived at the farm resort.

It wasn’t yet ten o’clock, but Daiwei had already settled comfortably into his spot at the “fishing platform.”

There was an empty creel at his feet. Clearly, his morning had not been productive.

Liang Meng’s timing could not have been worse.

“What are you doing here?”

It was clear that Daiwei was not pleased by the interruption.

Liang Meng forced a smile: “I came to fish with Uncle Daiwei!”

“Please! Don’t call me ‘uncle’!” Daiwei waved his hands emphatically in refusal.

“That’s at the office,” Liang Meng said, sidling closer. “Today’s Saturday — a day off. Here, you’re still my uncle.”

As the saying goes, you can’t slap a smiling face. Seeing Liang Meng pull up a folding chair and plant herself cheerfully at his side, Daiwei couldn’t very well physically drive her away.

So he began to pick fault, pointing at Wang Zaiwu: “And who is this — your new boyfriend?”

He knew the Liang family well, and was taking a guess.

“Ah… ” Liang Meng glanced over at Wang Zaiwu for a moment and hesitated, then quickly answered, “My little brother!”

“Your brother?!” Daiwei wasn’t buying it.

“A distant cousin! Very distant!” Liang Meng had no choice but to start improvising on the fly, spinning a bit of a sob story to gain Daiwei’s sympathy: “The farm resort is so far out. Uncle Daiwei, you know I’ve ‘run away from home’ — my sister and Jiang Han took away both my apartment and my car, so it’s not like I can walk all the way here! I need a ride!”

Wang Zaiwu quickly adapted, playing along: “That’s right! I’m her distant cousin! If you and her need to talk privately, I can step away.”

As he said this, Wang Zaiwu made a show of turning to leave.

Daiwei simply said, coolly: “There’s no such thing as ‘privately’ here.”

Wang Zaiwu paused, his lifted foot uncertain whether to come down or stay up.

“Uncle Daiwei, are you still angry with me?” Liang Meng wheedled.

“I wouldn’t dare! President Liang!”

Daiwei refused to engage, delivering cold retort after cold retort.

When he wasn’t talking, he was constantly loading bait onto the hook.

The float bobbed several times, but each time he lifted the rod, it came up empty.

“It’s because of you two! The fish hear voices and see movement and won’t bite! Go away! Both of you!”

After several empty pulls in a row, Daiwei made no bones about telling them to leave.

Liang Meng reached into her backpack and brought out the fish feed she and Wang Zaiwu had just bought at the market, and offered it to Daiwei: “Uncle, try this! The fish in this pond have been eating the same feed for so long — not only does it stop satisfying them, over time they build up a kind of resistance to it, and stop biting altogether.”

On the surface, she appeared to be commenting on fishing. In reality, she was still steering the conversation back to Longquan’s transformation.

The distributors were the fish in the pond. Longquan’s current profit-sharing model was the old bait Daiwei had always relied on.

Daiwei was too seasoned a fox not to catch the meaning beneath her words.

And so he replied in kind, speaking on two levels at once: “A fish that keeps its mouth shut doesn’t get caught.”

His meaning was equally clear: how he fished was his own business. If Liang Meng saw him as the fish — well, as long as he kept his mouth shut and didn’t bite, she could do absolutely nothing to him.

“No — a fish that keeps its mouth shut dies. Starves to death.”

Wang Zaiwu shot back without a second’s hesitation.

He didn’t catch the meaning layered underneath — but when it came to argument, he was always ready to jump in.

Daiwei shot him a withering glare.

Free from the impasse, Liang Meng also smiled: “Uncle! We came today to fish. If you head home with an empty creel, your aunt will laugh at you! Why not give mine a try? New things have their own advantages.”

Without waiting for a response, Liang Meng simply reached over and took Daiwei’s fishing rod out of his hands, loaded one of her bought baits onto the hook without ceremony, and with the float still attached, cast it out with one firm swing.

Line and hook arced through the air, landing together at the center of the lake.

They waited.

After some time, Daiwei pulled the rod — another empty hook.

“So it seems this new bait and the old bait work about the same.” Daiwei seized the opportunity to smile coldly. “This is treating the symptom, not the disease.”

One sharp remark, and Liang Meng’s face fell.

Just as her spirits sank, her hand found something in her jacket pocket — the two clear zip-lock bags Lin Qing’s mother had tucked in for her that morning.

She vaguely remembered Lin Qing’s mother saying this stuff worked like a charm.

Liang Meng decided to take a gamble.

She rose to her feet with an air of composure, even taking off her sunglasses, and reached for Daiwei’s fishing line: “They say: if you don’t have the skill for it, don’t take on the job. The secret weapon is always kept for the very last moment — you don’t lead with your trump card. Just one question: if I help my uncle land a big one today, will you give me credit for it?”

“Only if you can truly win me over.”

Daiwei had absolutely no faith in her.

Wang Zaiwu tugged Liang Meng’s sleeve cautiously. He had begun to suspect that the fish market owner might have taken advantage of two obvious amateurs and sold them ordinary feed at a premium.