In the end, they were both sore all over. Jin Ran himself was completely bewildered.

It wouldn’t have been a big deal with anyone else, but this was his best friend’s sister.

Although Lu Linlin went out drinking and clubbing, she’d always had standards. So had Jin Ran.

Who knew things would get this absurd?

He hadn’t quite believed it at first. But that night, they had both been a little clumsy.

At that thought, Jin Ran quickly patted his own cheeks. His ears flushed red. He couldn’t let himself dwell on it.

Now that this huge mistake had been made, Jin Ran had no idea what to do.

Lu Linlin was the first to speak. “Don’t let my brother find out!”

Jin Ran said, “…Okay.” ‘So she thinks this is something to be hidden,’ he thought. ‘In that case, I shouldn’t bother her.’

“Um, do you… need me to take responsibility?”

Lu Linlin quickly shook her head. “It’s the 21st century. I know the scene, and I get how these situations work. We just go our separate ways and don’t bother each other. Let’s not contact each other again.”

“Jin Ran, I’m not going to pester you, so you’d better not pester me.”

Just as she finished speaking, there was a knock on the hotel room door. Someone was there with a delivery.

Jin Ran took the package, but Lu Linlin snatched it away. She showed no inhibitions, deftly and quickly putting on her own clothes. Then she said, “Jin Ran, an accident should be treated as such. I don’t like you, and you don’t like me. The best thing for us is to have no contact from now on.”

“And don’t even think about pulling some kind of deeply-in-love act. I’m not too fond of men these days.”

Jin Ran nodded. There was nothing more to say, but a heavy feeling settled in his chest.

These were usually the lines he used on other women. Having them turned on him felt… strange.

In truth, Lu Linlin had really blossomed and was quite beautiful. It’s just that he had always thought of her as a little kid.

He’d always seen her as the little girl with a runny nose who trailed after Lu Shijing, speaking in a slow, deliberate drawl. She was a completely different person in front of her brother—a good little girl, but behind his back, she was out at the clubs.

Initially, he just saw her as an accessory permanently attached to Lu Shijing’s leg.

He never imagined things would get so out of hand that they would actually… get involved.

The more Jin Ran thought about it, the more he regretted it.

He pulled his thoughts back to the present and continued to drink sullenly, sighing as he looked at Lu Shijing across from him.

Lu Shijing said, “I’m the one getting divorced. Why do you look more miserable than I do?”

“Yeah. You’re my brother, and I’ve always wished you the best. I was hoping you and Gu Shengsheng would grow old together. But with you two… there’s just no progress. I feel awful for you.”

Lu Shijing was speechless. ‘I’ve never met anyone so exasperating.’

“You can get lost,” Lu Shijing said, glancing at him. “But you clearly have something on your mind. Found a girl you like?”

“Nope.” He feigned a casual, devil-may-care attitude, his red suit adding to his air of unruliness and languor.

“Hah.” Lu Shijing scoffed. “With you, whoever you end up liking is just in for some bad luck. You haven’t even figured out how to properly care for one person, so what right do you have to talk about anything else?”

“Like whoever you want; it’s got nothing to do with me. Just don’t let me catch you messing around,” Lu Shijing said. “And more importantly, don’t make my wife think there’s something wrong with your character.”

“After all, if she forbids me from hanging out with you, I won’t be speaking to you.”

He even chuckled to himself as he said this.

Jin Ran was speechless.

“No, it’s nothing. But I do know a friend who’s going through something troublesome.”

Lu Shijing eyed him sharply. “What friend? You mean yourself? What did you get into? Out with it.”

Jin Ran’s heart leaped into his throat. He forced himself to calm down and quickly picked someone to use as a cover. “It’s not me, it’s Lin Kai. I ran into him a few days ago.”

“What’s up with Lin Kai?” Lu Shijing asked, slightly curious.

“He, um… a few days ago, he hooked up with his childhood best friend’s younger sister. He barely ever interacted with the sister, and his friend is super protective of her. It was a complete accident, and now he doesn’t know how to face his friend. Lin Kai asked me for advice the other day, but I couldn’t come up with anything either.”

As Jin Ran spoke, he held nothing back, his words flowing more and more freely.

Lying without a script only gets smoother with practice. It’s human nature.

Of course, the poor scapegoat, Lin Kai, was completely unaware of all this.

Jin Ran continued, “What do you think?”

“He got together with his childhood friend’s little sister,” Lu Shijing repeated.

Lu Shijing said, “What do I think? It has nothing to do with me. It’s Lin Kai’s private affair. The real question is what his childhood friend thinks.”

‘So, if it were Lu Shijing, he wouldn’t care?’ Jin Ran thought. If that was the case, he could relax a little. At least the pressure wouldn’t be so immense, and he wouldn’t feel so tormented by his conscience.

But then Lu Shijing added, “If I were that childhood friend, I’d probably break Lin Kai’s legs.”

“Getting together ‘out of nowhere’? How could something like that happen for no reason? It’s either a question of taking responsibility or being genuinely in love.”

“Anything else?” he asked, looking at Jin Ran.

Jin Ran was breaking out in a cold sweat, and he could feel a distinct chill in his legs.

He didn’t even know what to say.

He could only stammer, “My mom’s calling me home for dinner, so… you stay here. I’m going to go home, play the part of the good son tonight, and get up early tomorrow.”

“Mm,” Lu Shijing grunted. He hadn’t expected Jin Ran to be of any help anyway.

He went back to drinking alone.

After he’d had his fill, he went back to sleep. His room was right next to Gu Shengsheng’s.

Even though he was living in the adjacent courtyard house, Lu Shijing didn’t dare let her know. He was staying there in secret. If she found out, what if she moved away?

He had to think carefully about his next move. One wrong step, and every subsequent step would be wrong too.

If he hadn’t hesitated about revealing his identity back then, they might have already been together for real.

Of course, this was what he considered to be the best plan.

Following that thought, Lu Shijing hoped that by getting drunk tonight, he wouldn’t be able to wake up the next day to go through with the divorce proceedings.

Although they didn’t have to go to the Civil Affairs Bureau for a divorce certificate, Mrs. Lu Sr. had been so thorough with the initial paperwork that the process was quite involved.

As a result, the proceedings would take an entire day.

But as luck would have it, there were no such accidents the next day. He even woke up early, with enough time to go and call for Gu Shengsheng.

Just as he was thinking of sleeping a little longer and pretending he hadn’t woken up, Mrs. Lu Sr. called. “I’ve arranged for the people to handle the divorce. They’re waiting for you two in the company conference room. Be there on time, and don’t waste Shengsheng’s time.”

Lu Shijing was speechless. ‘Whose grandmother are you, anyway? Mine or Gu Shengsheng’s?’

“Grandma, I need a little more time.”

“Mm, as long as you’re awake, that’s all that matters. Don’t try to pretend and not show up,” Mrs. Lu Sr. said. “Be a man about it. What’s the big deal? Go get the paperwork done now, and you can just win her back again afterward.”

“There’s no one else in the picture with Shengsheng; Grandma has been keeping tabs for you, so you can go after her without worry. Of course, if you don’t have the ability to win her over, well, that’s a different matter.”

After she said that, Lu Shijing fell silent.

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