Twenty percent of the group shares belonged to his mother?!

Du Zhaohui heard this for the first time.

The expression on his face was utterly priceless.

“That old bastard—”

Even before verification, Du Zhaohui had instinctively believed this claim.

Every child has expectations of their parents.

Of course, he had no expectations of Du Chengrong, but regarding his deceased mother, Du Zhaohui still harbored fantasies… If his mother were still alive, she would have cared for him and wanted to help him. Although he might not have needed such care, at least he wouldn’t have been fighting alone in the Du family.

Being alone is always lonely.

Even if she couldn’t help with anything, just lying there sick would have been emotional support for him.

But for all these years, he didn’t even have that kind of support—no, perhaps he did. His mother wasn’t just lying there helplessly; she had fought for some things for him, only they never reached his hands.

Du Zhaohui preferred to believe this explanation.

He stood there, momentarily dazed.

“Try not to get excited. We’re not sure how much truth there is to Yu Shihua’s words,” Xia Xiaolan said. “Even if it’s true, nobody has mentioned these twenty percent shares all these years. While Chairman Du could certainly impose a gag order, the fact that not even a whisper leaked out, despite so many people involved, suggests very few people knew about this in the first place! Yu Shihua seems to know too much detail as if she was there watching it happen… What’s your impression of Yu Shihua?”

Xia Xiaolan knew Du Zhaohui was emotionally agitated.

Such agitation could be counterproductive, so it was time to calm down, analyze the truth, and understand why Yu Shihua chose to reveal this “truth” now!

Du Zhaohui was consumed by anxiety and anger.

He felt confined by his proper business suit.

After removing his suit jacket, loosening his tie, and unbuttoning his shirt, he was like a shark stranded on the beach, gasping for air—

“Damn it, I’m going to throw that worthless stylist into the sea when I get back!”

Xia Xiaolan remained silent, watching him quietly, waiting for him to calm down.

As Du Zhaohui’s mind cooled slightly, he recalled his impressions of Yu Shihua:

“I never really liked Yu Shihua.”

“Look at the women around that old man—which one hasn’t he bedded? Yu Shihua is my father’s ‘close female friend,’ but I always thought that was just a cover-up. They’re lovers. Yu Shihua is different from those concubines at home because she inherited her late husband’s estate. Even if my father wanted to make her a concubine, Yu Shihua wouldn’t agree—it would also violate social ethics, as my father and Yu Shihua’s late husband were friends!”

The saying goes that one shouldn’t covet a friend’s wife.

Of course, there were also those who “took care” of their friend’s widow and even took their family fortune—that was another kind of “beautiful tale.”

In the case of Du Chengrong and Yu Shihua, the situation was different. Yu Shihua could manage her late husband’s business herself, and she had children. Why would she want to bring her money to become Chairman Du’s concubine? Neither of them could save face that way. It was better to remain friends, to be his confidante.

Even marrying Du Chengrong as his principal wife wouldn’t be worth it. She might not get much money but would have to deal with the Du family’s mess and fight with so many women.

If her luck was worse, not only would she fail to gain any advantage in the Du family, but Du Chengrong might even swallow up Yu Shihua’s money—this was entirely possible—

This was all Du Zhaohui’s previous perception of Yu Shihua.

Since Yu Shihua had no intention of marrying into the Du family, she wasn’t a competitive threat to Du Zhaohui, so he didn’t harbor much ill will toward her.

“That old man is quite the philanderer. Besides those concubines at home, he has countless casual affairs outside. If I were to go after each one of them, I wouldn’t have time to do anything else all day!”

Du Zhaohui complained, and Xia Xiaolan rolled her eyes… She remembered when she first met Du Zhaohui, he had plenty of free time, with little real power, relying on university donations to maintain his presence.

Never mind, she wouldn’t expose him on this.

“If Yu Shihua has connections with your Du family, it’s supposedly because her late husband and Chairman Du were friends. After her husband’s death, she gradually grew closer to Chairman Du. But the timing of your mother’s death doesn’t match with Yu Shihua’s husband’s death, does it? She must have been close to your family very early on to know such confidential matters—or perhaps her late husband knew about the twenty percent shares and told Yu Shihua, his wife?”

Du Zhaohui could still remember Yu Shihua’s late husband’s face.

But to say he was that close to his father—that wasn’t quite right.

“…Yu Shihua must have been my mother’s friend. I remember seeing her when I was young.”

Many childhood memories fade unless deliberately recalled.

But memories are connected, and following one clue can gradually make blurry memories clear again.

“I remember now, when my mother was bedridden, Yu Shihua visited her several times. I always thought she came to our house as part of her husband’s social circle—”

“Perhaps Yu Shihua was friends with your mother first, and that’s how her husband began associating with Chairman Du?”

Xia Xiaolan continued naturally, “All these years, you never thought about this because Yu Shihua wasn’t particularly close to you. She was like any other family friend, so you forgot your childhood impressions.”

Throughout Du Zhaohui’s growth, he had been fighting against everyone. He didn’t even trust his father, so how could he grow close to Yu Shihua?

When he was a bit older, Yu Shihua bore the reputation of being Du Chengrong’s “close female friend,” which made Du Zhaohui keep an even greater distance from her.

Du Zhaohui nodded:

“Hong Kong is such a small place, everyone seems connected to everyone else somehow. Whether Yu is my mother’s friend or my father’s friend doesn’t matter much—true or false, they’re all associated with the Du family!”

“But regardless of whose friend she was, the deaths of your mother and her husband haven’t distanced her from the Du family all these years, so she likely knows some things from back then. Let’s not analyze her motives for revealing the ‘truth’ now. Yu Shihua has made it clear that she knows about this but won’t confront Chairman Du about it… Assuming she’s telling the truth, the first thing to consider is whether those twenty percent shares still exist.”

What had Du Chengrong done with those twenty percent shares?

When Chengrong Group went public, were they directly diluted, or merged with his shares?

Yu Shihua’s words were vague about these twenty percent shares. Du Zhaohui’s mother had entrusted them to Du Chengrong’s care, but how exactly were they to be managed? Was there a specified timeframe for the management? How much belonged to Du Zhaohui? Yu Shihua said Du Zhaohui’s mother was a woman who didn’t seek love but was rational and intelligent—surely this intelligent woman wouldn’t have trusted Du Chengrong’s verbal promises without even consulting a lawyer!