By day, NJ Corporation was a hub of activity, but now, at 5 in the morning, it was as quiet as a ghost town. The only light that shone out of its glass windows was right at the top on the 50th storey, which was the executive floor reserved solely for the CEO.
Zhou Ye opened the door to his office and nearly dropped his briefcase in shock as a large piercing scream assaulted his eardrums.
"Have you lost your mind?" he muttered, walking over to his desk as he tugged on his tie to loosen it. "Why haven't you gone home?"
"WAHHH! What the fuck?!" Yao Xun scrambled up from the couch, clutching the blankets to his chest like a virginal woman as he pointed an accusatory finger at Zhou Ye. "Xiongdi, I literally just watched 'Strange Tales of a Chinese Studio' two hours ago, have some consideration for my poor heart!"
Zhou Ye raised an eyebrow. His best friend and business partner had a bizarre obsession with period horror films, the kind with fox demons and female ghosts that haunted temples. He personally didn't see what was scary about that. But Yao Xun had always been a wuss.
"You're scarier than Sadako with your hair all over your face like that."
"Oh my god, don't talk about her at night, she's a whole other level of terrifying." Yao Xun yawned as he flopped back onto the cushions. "How come you're here so early? I would have thought you'd be at home cuddling the missus."
The look Zhou Ye shot him was dirty enough to make him hold his hands up in surrender. "Okay, okay, sorry. Touchy subject, I know. I was just being mouthy because you nearly made me wet myself."
"If you dare do that in my office, I'll—"
"You'll what?" Yao Xun interjected, with a cheeky smile. His good looks were of a very different brand to Zhou Ye's. Where Zhou Ye was a cold, striking kind of handsome, Yao Xun looked like a frivolous playboy. His dyed blond curls and trademark lazy grin often made girls in the street mistake him for a movie star. "You'll fire me?"
"I'll give Zhuang Miaomiao your WeChat contact."
Yao Xun paled. "Ah, no no, it's okay. Wow, buddy, you're harsh." Zhuang Miaomiao was the daughter of a Chinese oil magnate that'd been stalking Yao Xun for years now, dying to offer him a position in her father's company. The kind where he'd need a divorce to quit his job. "I'll be good, Master, I won't pee on the furniture."
Zhou Ye rolled his eyes. "Are you a dog now?"
Yao Xun fluttered his lashes. "Only for you, darling."
"…why are we even having this pointless conversation."
Yao Xun shrugged as he snuggled back into the chunky knitted merino wool blanket that Zhou Ye's mother had made for him. "Well, the alternative is me asking you why you've decided to come into the office at this ungodly hour." He threw Zhao Ye a sly glance. "And then you getting upset at me for insinuating that there's trouble in paradise."
What paradise? For there to be trouble in paradise, paradise had to exist first.
Zhou Ye sighed. He raked a tired hand through his hair and reclined back in his swivel chair. Why hadn't he gone home? Because after everything that had happened today, he was agitated and frustrated. He didn't know how to face Wen Rui at the moment, uncertain about what the amnesia meant for their future. If they even had one.
Actually, he'd never told his family or Yao Xun, but just one month ago, he'd been so close to giving up.
He'd almost not gone through with the marriage registration. He'd almost let Wen Rui go. It'd been the rational thing to do. Zhou Ye had spent many nights sitting alone in this office after everyone else had gone home, drinking by himself and deliberating his next step. He did this often with business deals too, plotting and planning until he was certain that he had them in the palm of his hand.
But Wen Rui wasn't a small company he could just buy over. Wen Rui was human, and more than that, he was the person Zhou Ye kept tucked away like a secret in the deepest part of his heart.
Zhou Ye couldn't bring himself to force Wen Rui into submission. But he still wasn't ready to give up on Wen Rui yet.
And now, just one week after the registration, Wen Rui had lost his memories, one again the prissy young master he'd been at 18, and before their one-sided rivalry had evolved into something even uglier.
It was like a jolt of electricity through Zhou Ye's veins.
Quietly, he told Yao Xun about the amnesia. He also tried to tell Yao Xun about meeting his grandfather for the handover of the hotel IPO and his grandfather's blatant insinuation that Wen Rui's latest scandal was a stain on the family. But Yao Xun was too excited to listen.
"Yezi ah," he said, leaping off the couch to run over and seize Zhou Ye by the arms. "Why do you look so troubled? This is excellent news!"
"I just told you that my husband is suffering from a concussion and has forgotten 4 years of his life," Zhou Ye replied, deadpanned. "And you want me to celebrate? It's a good thing he's still alive then, otherwise, you'd be telling me to throw a party on his grave." If possible, he would like to refund this best friend, please. It was so useless.
"No, don't you see?" Yao Xun tried to shake him but Zhou Ye shrugged him off without difficulty. He refused to budge even as Yao Xun attempted to pry him from the chair. "Fuck!" Yao Xun swore. "How come you're still so much stronger? I upped my weights training regime two months ago!"
Zhou Ye remained unfazed. "You call that a training regime? Doing just enough bench presses to break out a sweat before taking photographs of yourself to post to your Weibo fans?" He rolled his eyes and shoved Yao Xun unceremoniously back.
Yao Xun just chuckled. "It's not Gege's fault that he's so attractive," he said, shamelessly praising himself. "I'm not stingy like you, I'm more than happy to share the gift of me with whoever wants a piece. To be honest, a word of advice for you since we're so close. There are so many fish in the sea, Yezi. Why do you insist on hanging yourself to death on this one tree?"
He leaned against his desk and folded his arms, looking down at Zhou Ye in a manner that would be sagely if it weren't so smug.
Zhou Ye chose to remain silent. Let the peacock have its limelight, otherwise, it wouldn't shut up.
Not for the first time, he wondered why they were even friends.
But he considered Yao Xun's question. It wasn't the first time Yao Xun had said this to him, and every time he had thought about it carefully.
Did he have other options? Yes.
Did he want those other options? No.
Did he like Wen Rui? Yes.
It was as simple as that.
Yao Xun let out a languid sigh. "Okay, okay," he said, rubbing at his temples in an exaggerated show of exhaustion. "I get it, he's the one that you want, your one and only, your white moonlight, your red cinnabar—"
"If you're going to keep talking rubbish, just get out. I need a nap."
Yao Xun had to hold his hands up placatingly again. Dealing with Zhou Ye sometimes felt too much like dealing with an irate cat. "Don't be like that, Master. I'll behave, I promise." He was true to his word, the joking demeanour around him fading away into a more serious one. "But Yezi, I do think this is your big chance."
Zhou Ye nodded for him to elaborate.
"You said he thinks he's 18 right?" Yao Xun held his fingers up and lowered them one by one as he ticked off a list. "So firstly, at least to him, he hasn't done all of that rebellious crap yet. Secondly, he's now feeling young and vulnerable, and you can swoop in like a romantic big brother and shower him with your hot, steamy love—okay, I'm sorry, stop looking at me like that."
"Can you just cut to the chase?" Zhou Ye pinched the bridge of his nose. He was already suffering from a low-key migraine that had started after he'd dealt with his cousin's stupidity earlier in the day. Yao Xun was a good friend when he wanted to be but he was always so…verbose.
"It's hard, I feel like when it comes to the matters of the heart, I have to give you detailed instructions. Not trying to put you down further when you're clearly already in a slump, but you're basically a xuezha when it comes to relationships, you know? A mediocre student, an underachiever."
"What's your point?"
"My point is…" Yao Xun paused for dramatic effect. "This little peach of yours is ripe for the picking, why are you even hesitating?"
"He didn't like me more at 18 than he did at 21," Zhou Ye said flatly. "In fact, he hated me. Because of—"
"Su Jiali. I know."
Zhou Ye's mouth tightened into a flat line. How many years had it been since that time she'd confessed? He would never forget that day, Wen Rui drunk in his arms and clinging to him as he'd bawled his eyes out.
"Zhou Ye," he'd sobbed repeatedly, a red-faced bundle of snot and tears, and somehow still managing to melt Zhou Ye's heart. "Why are you always in my way? Before you, everyone liked me best, but now it's like all I'm good at is losing to you in everything. I hate you, you know?"
"Zhou Ye, I really hate you."
Maybe a bit of all that pent-up rage had been due to their competitiveness in school. But Zhou Ye knew that must of it had been because of Su Jiali, whom Zhou Ye hadn't even looked twice at.
What had Zhou Ye done wrong? He hadn't asked her to like him. He'd never given her even the slightest false hope.
And he'd never been more jealous of anyone in his life.
"Oi, Xiongdi, your expression's really scary. No matter what you may believe, it's illegal to hire a hitman. This is a lawful society."
He didn't bother dignifying that with a response, but in a way, a lot of the things Yao Xun had said today was right. This Wen Rui thought that he was 18 again. He was alone in a world that had changed cruelly, with a failure of a father and a man he hated for a husband.
And Zhou Ye, the hated husband, was the closest thing Wen Rui had to family now. Even if Zhou Ye wasn't going to take advantage of Wen Rui's vulnerability, even if he wasn't intending to manipulate Wen Rui into becoming reliant on him.
Zhou Ye was going to support Wen Rui through his hardships, even if Wen Rui didn't want his help.
"Thanks, Xiongdi," he said, standing up and grabbing his spare residential access cards from the drawer. He'd handed his original set over to the driver earlier and Wen Rui would probably not appreciate waking up now to let him in.
"Whoa, why so sudden—"
"You can continue sleeping in here if you want, but if you harass my secretaries when they come in tomorrow morning, I'm giving Zhuang Miaomiao your home address."
"Oi! No, wait, where are you going?"
"Home," he said.