“Before you and me, other housewives had even more preferred daughters-in-law.”
Author's Note:
The last day of the holiday, ending with another 7,000-word post! The ultimate villain is offline!
SuSu: Is this the end? This is clearly another trap set for me.
45# It's so good, I'll give you everything that's best.
The news that Qi Xiang'an had terminated his acting career and was under police investigation spread throughout the country in just a few days.
Although the police have not given the reason or result of their investigation, the reason has been roughly guessed by netizens with their wild speculations: money laundering and illegal transfer of assets.
"I heard that the money transferred through his hands must have been at least eight hundred million, if not ten billion."
Inside the TOPISSUES hair salon, two wealthy socialites were back for haircuts and facials. Unlike last time, this time they brought along Su Yanxi's agent, Zhou Tong.
“Eight hundred million! That’s enough to build so many roads and install so many streetlights in remote towns!” Zhou Tong echoed Cai Yuyan’s words, shaking his head and sighing, “Such a large sum of money is enough for Qi Xiang’an to serve ten or eight years in prison.”
“It could be more serious than that; he could be sentenced to more than ten years.” Cai Yuyan sighed. “The most pitiful one is his mother. She spent fifteen years searching and finally found her son, but he went to prison. She might have to wait another fifteen years.”
“Yes,” Zhou Tong sighed as well. “I hope Qi Xiang’an can repent and reform himself, and get a reduced sentence so he can be released from prison soon.”
Cai Yuyan and Zhou Tong were seated first on the left and first on the right, respectively, chatting animatedly with Su Yanxi in the middle.
Su Yanxi listened blankly, her thoughts drifting to the ends of the earth.
"Mr. Su, Mr. Su?"
Only after being called by the shop assistant did Su Yanxi come to her senses and reply, "W-what's wrong?"
"This is the stylist we selected for you, Xiao Xie. He'll be handling your styling today, is that alright?" the receptionist introduced the stylist beside her.
The stylist, wearing a work apron, bowed humbly to Su Yanxi and said "Hello".
Su Yanxi glanced at the stylist and asked, "What kind of styling do you specialize in?"
"I'm good at both, and I'm confident I can do both everyday and glamorous/flashy styles well."
"What aspect of styling do you focus on most? Are you also capable of handling makeup and clothing coordination?"
"Sure!" Xiao Xie nodded confidently. "As long as Mr. Su entrusts me with the answer sheet, I will definitely give you a satisfactory answer!"
“Okay.” Su Yanxi nodded. “I like your confidence. Let’s get a haircut first, so I can see what your taste is like.”
"I want to cut my hair shorter to look more refreshing—but not too short, so as not to deviate from the image of the character I play. I'm going to my alma mater to receive an award in a little while, so I'll wear this outfit; I hope my image can be more understated in everyday life, but not too reserved."
"We're going back to our alma mater, why are you still trying to keep a low profile?" Cai Yuyan joked with her sister-in-law, urging Xiao Xie, "Make it glamorous and high-profile! It has to be dazzling, so that it will dazzle all the junior students when it gets out of the car!"
Zhou Tong, who was visiting TOPISUES for the first time and was using a VIP card, asked, "Didn't Su Su have a stylist she usually used? Why do you need to choose someone?"
“Yes, Mr. Su’s usual stylist is Xiao Chen from our shop.” Stylist Xiao Xie answered for Su Yanxi generously. “Xiao Chen is away for work recently, so I’m taking over his position. We both graduated from the same beauty academy, so our styles are quite similar.”
"Oh?" Zhou Tong raised an eyebrow. "Won't Xiao Chen be angry now that he knows you've taken away his regular customer?"
"No, Xiao Chen and I are very good friends." Xiao Xie laughed heartily and began to direct Su Yanxi. "We don't play those underhanded rivalries; we have a great relationship in private!"
"Sometimes when we encounter customers with bad tempers, we even try to pass the buck to each other."
Zhou Tong, intrigued, secretly tried to fish for gossip: "Who has a bad temper? Tell me secretly, and I promise I won't tell anyone."
Xiao Xie moved his lips, almost taking the bait, but then stopped himself.
"I'm sorry, Miss Zhou, I can't say."
Cai Yuyan laughed twice, trying to smooth things over for the stylist: "Don't tease Xiao Xie, their shop has rules against discussing customers' gossip or revealing their privacy."
Chapter 108
"I'm curious, is there some important event going on recently? Why are all the familiar stylists in the store nowhere to be seen?"
"It's almost the end of the year, there must be a lot of ceremonies and events going on," Zhou Tong suddenly remembered something. "By the way, Su Su, you also have a few important ceremonies to attend at the end of the year. Do you think it's necessary to hire a stylist to accompany you?"
Zhou Tong asked Su Yanxi for her opinion, but Su Yanxi remained silent for a long time. Cai Yuyan noticed her sister-in-law's blank stare and called out to her in surprise.
"Yanxi...? Your manager is asking you a question, why aren't you answering?"
"You've been so distracted all day, you haven't said a word in our conversation, what's wrong?"
Caught distracted for the nth time, Su Yanxi quickly apologized to her brother, sister-in-law, and agent.
"I...it's nothing, I'm just a little restless and can't concentrate." Su Yanxi stammered, "In the end, it's all Qi Xiang'an's fault."
Why is Qi Xiang'an still trying to get points here when he's about to die?
Because of that phrase "there is a more suitable daughter-in-law", Su Yanxi has been tossing and turning for many nights and hasn't had a good night's sleep for several days.
He was riding high at the time, and in his victorious arrogance, he didn't pay any attention to Qi Xiang'an's words. But after a few days, his emotions had calmed down, but his curiosity had only grown stronger!
He increasingly wanted to know if what Qi Xiang'an said was true. If it was true, then who was that person?
Who is it!
"Besides asking me to take good care of Aunt Ji and find her a job to make a living, he also... said some other things to me." Su Yanxi felt a throbbing in her temples, but couldn't raise her hand to press them because of the barber's cape. "I'm not sure if what he said is true or false."
Under the watchful eyes of her brother, sister-in-law, and agent, Su Yanxi repeated Qi Xiang'an's words.
Qi Xiang'an provided a lot of specific and seemingly convincing details. For example, the other party was a young lady from a wealthy family, whose family had a long-standing friendship with the other family, and the marriage between the two families was the will of the people and a perfect match.
Qi Xiang'an also said that the eldest daughter is an outstanding student with exceptional academic achievements, and she showed remarkable business acumen during her junior and senior high school years. For the business tycoon, the eldest daughter is a unique and exceptional daughter-in-law candidate; this marriage between a wealthy young master and a prodigy is destined to elevate the overall strength of both families to a new level.
But for some unknown reason, the marriage ultimately fell through—because Su Yanxi had already married Bie Yunzong.
"Qi Xiang'an told me that the reason he hadn't suspected my relationship with Yun Zong was because he had heard about this 'marriage rumor.' He thought that the news of Yun Zong's marriage to the 'young lady' was true, and that I was just a playboy's pre-marital pastime."
“He was even full of confidence, believing that if he could break me up with Yunzong, he could also prevent the two families from getting married.”
Cai Yuyan frowned and asked her sister-in-law, "You believed him?"
Feeling guilty, Su Yanxi weakly replied, "I said I didn't believe it at the time. After Qi Xiang'an saw that I didn't believe him, he didn't continue and instead asked me to take good care of Ji's mother for him."
"If you don't believe me, why are you worrying?" Cai Yuyan said helplessly, and made the stylist stop. He moved his chair to poke his sister-in-law's head. "Don't you know whether Yunzong likes girls or not?"
Su Yanxi pouted, feeling wronged, and touched her head while the stylist stopped to change tools: "Sister-in-law, Yunzong's problem isn't whether he likes girls or not—he's just obsessed with looks!"
"His orientation is not based on sexual orientation, but on whether it is attractive or not."
Zhou Tong raised an eyebrow: "Looks-oriented?"
"Yes, it's face-obsessed!" Su Yanxi felt a surge of anger when she thought of the term, and rolled her eyes. "He says he doesn't like girls, but look at his social circle, does he hang out with girls less often?"
“Here we go again.” Cai Yuyan looked at her sister-in-law with a helpless expression. “Haven’t you gotten over the seven-year itch yet? Others make a few unfounded accusations, and you immediately assume that Yunzong is cheating on you behind your back.”
"I didn't misunderstand either," Su Yanxi grumbled, "It's good to be prepared for danger in times of peace. If it weren't for that nemesis constantly doing shady things, would there be so many messy rumors? And they all sound so real."
"They're both young masters from other families, so why doesn't my eldest brother have any strange rumors about him? It's because he's well-behaved!"
Cai Yuyan said earnestly, "That's not necessarily true."
"Is it because everyone knows that the young master of another family is already married?" Zhou Tong, the only honest person in the room, answered objectively, "If he's married, it's hard for rumors to spread. People who spread rumors aren't stupid, of course they'll choose an easy target to smear."
"Young Master Bie is naturally a womanizer, making him a good target for slander."
"That's right. That bastard knows he's easy to smear, yet he doesn't know how to restrain himself!"
Su Yanxi glanced at her phone, its screen black, with a disgruntled expression. The phone remained silent, offering no "surprise" call notification.
"Last time he came over, I complained that he was clingy. Now, it's like we're back to square one."
"He comes home late every few days, and his whereabouts are getting stranger every day. Today he took Nubi out for a bath and grooming, and a couple of days later he said he wanted to take Nubi for a bath and conditioning treatment. He... he... he's really not afraid of washing the cat bald?"
In Su Yanxi's opinion, taking her cat son out was a pretense, and the real purpose was to use the cat son as a cover!
“If you care so much, why don’t you just ask him directly?” Cai Yuyan sincerely suggested. “Yanxi, you really like to keep things to yourself. Yunzong’s personality is so straightforward, you should be more direct with him.”
"Never mind," Su Yanxi sighed. "It's not a big deal. It's just that after dealing with Qi Xiang'an, I suddenly had nothing else to focus on, so I had no choice but to concentrate all my attention on Yun Zong."
Chapter 109
"Once the crew resumes filming after a while, I'll focus on my work, and things will naturally get better."
Cai Yuyan gave Zhou Tong a meaningful look across the seat, signaling: Did you hear that? Something's off about this guy, keep an eye on him!
Zhou Tong nodded in understanding.
"Alright, alright, you two can sort out your relationship issues yourselves." Cai Yuyan changed the subject. "But what about the rumors? How about I ask them for you when we go to your parents' house sometime?"
If he didn't ask, Su Yanxi would feel awkward, constantly thinking that he wasn't his mother-in-law's first choice; the more he thought about it, the more upset he would feel, as if his marriage to his nemesis husband was something he had just stumbled upon by luck.
But even asking made Su Yanxi feel awkward. Would asking her mother-in-law about such a small matter leave her with a negative impression that he was irresponsible, unreliable, and not someone she could entrust with her life?
"Forget it, don't ask anymore. It's just a rumor, I didn't pay much attention to it; let's not bother Dad and Mom with trivial matters."
"Is this how you show you don't care? I think you care a lot." Cai Yuyan appeared impatient, but actually patiently persuaded her sister-in-law, "Do you think those rumors are plausible? What do you mean by a marriage between prestigious families, a union that everyone hopes for?"
"Has my prestigious family been reduced to relying on marriage alliances to advance further?"
Cai Yuyan's words were like a wake-up call. Su Yanxi's eyes widened in sudden realization: "That's right..."
Do other super-rich families of this caliber need to form alliances through marriage? Do they need to rely on marriage to acquire business resources and then "go further"?
If it ever comes to that point, then it's because someone else's family has fallen on hard times.
"Think about it carefully again. Why did your mother arrange your marriage? Isn't it because your mother didn't have any good daughter-in-law candidates, so she had to pick someone from the school?"
Su Yanxi suddenly understood and turned to her brother and sister-in-law with delight: "Sister-in-law, what you said makes so much sense! How strange, how come I didn't notice so many things that were wrong?"
Cai Yuyan chuckled and sneered.
"Because you've been blinded by your intense desire to win!"
After getting their hair cut, the three of them also got a simple facial treatment and a hand trim.
After finishing, Xiao Xie applied light makeup to Su Yanxi, making Su Yanxi, who was already beautiful even without makeup, look even more radiant and charming.
Su Yanxi felt the makeup was too heavy and a bit too eye-catching. But Cai Yuyan and Zhou Tong both said it was just right and wouldn't go too far.
Because the final result was quite good, Su Yanxi wanted to book Xiao Xie's schedule directly. Filming for "Red Flower" will wrap up in a little over two months. After filming wraps up, he will attend many ceremonies to promote the drama.
He can't be without a stylist at such a grand event.
Zhou Tong was cautious and wanted to review Xiao Xie's past works first. The film and television awards ceremony was packed with big names, and everyone was vying for attention on the red carpet. Zhou Tong couldn't let her own talented artist falter in the red carpet styling segment.
Xiao Xie said no problem. He has experience accompanying celebrities on two separate trips and can prepare at least 24 different red carpet outfits for an artist in one night. He is absolutely confident in being Su Yanxi's stylist.