Tonight, a few real estate tycoons from the Hong Kong Region invited a prestigious guest to the GLD club to discuss business.
Starting from five in the afternoon, the elevators leading to the second-floor VIP banquet hall were all out of service. Who exactly was the person that a group of famous business magnates from near and far went to great lengths to host?
A waiter who witnessed the scene quietly let slip three words, "Mr. Chen."
The private room was serene, with a subtle fragrance in the air. It was only separated by one floor from the dizzy revelries of the bar below, yet it seemed like a different secret world altogether.
By the window, where the view was best, Chen Jingyuan glanced downward absentmindedly, his dark gaze halting at a figure in front of the bar on the lower level, eyes locked, motionless.
Different from her usual professional and neat work attire, the girl had changed into her regular clothes tonight, wearing only a French vintage dress. Her demeanor was lazily elegant without losing sweetness, making her stand out as exceptionally aloof and unblemished amidst the gaudy lights and shadows.
Yet, the current scene was discordant.
A few young men from wealthy families surrounded the girl, blocking her way, and she found herself in a dilemma, with no effective strategy to escape. A touch of coldness seeped into her otherwise gentle facial features, signaling her patience was on the brink of exhaustion.
Standing to the side, Special Assistant Xu Zhou followed his boss's gaze and quickly recognized the main character downstairs as Liang Weining, and among the young men from the wealthy families, the leader was none other than the second young master of the Chen family, Mr. Chen's brother.
Astonished, how could Secretary Liang, with her docile and quiet nature, come to such a place late at night, and even have a conflict with the second young master?
In the midst of these thoughts, he heard Chen Jingyuan's faint order, telling him to take the bodyguards and handle the situation.
Those below acted with extreme efficiency. Soon, after a bout of commotion, the bar downstairs returned to normal.
Over the phone, Xu Zhou gave a brief report of the incident, and was about to ask if the inebriated second young master should be taken directly back to the family mansion.
Unexpectedly, the man casually uttered, "Tie them both up, throw them in the police station."
Xu Zhou was slightly taken aback.
To protect his secretary, was Mr. Chen really unwilling to show leniency even to his own brother?
Once the call ended, the private room fell silent as Chen Jingyuan gazed at a certain spot downstairs, silent for a long time, his thoughts unknown.
After sitting still for a moment, the man stubbed out his cigar and rose from the deep leather sofa. The company heads noticed his movement and stood up. "Mr. Chen, are you leaving?"
"Yes, I have some matters to deal with." He reached out to take his suit jacket handed over by a waiter, draped it over his arm, gestured for the others not to see him out with a half-raised hand, and walked toward the exit with a cool expression toward the VIP elevator.
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A few minutes ago, at the GLD club located in the Kowloon commercial area, a shocking scene unfolded.
The usually unruly second young master of the Chen family was abruptly dragged out of the bar's dance floor in front of everyone's eyes.
It was said that the assailant was a fit man with a firm face, somewhat familiar-looking, suspected to be a personal bodyguard of a certain capital tycoon...
As everyone speculated, Liang Weining held a glass of wine in her hand, leisurely drinking most of it.
Soon after, she received a message on Whatsapp from her best friend. It said that she had to pick up a client and couldn't make it for now.
She didn't read the rest of the message in detail, but she guessed that she was probably going to be stood up by that person.
As the night deepened, Liang Weining saw that it wasn't early anymore, so she turned off her phone, picked up her coat and bag, and walked out of the bar.
The evening was cool, with the temperature dropping to the teens.
Not far away, amidst the flashing neon lights, Xu Zhou waited silently. Seeing the girl come out, he stepped forward slowly, "There's an online meeting in ten minutes, Mr. Chen requests your presence."
When Liang Weining saw him, she was slightly surprised, "Was the boss also at the club just now?"
Xu Zhou replied with a wry smile, "You know very well."
As the bodyguard took the person away, you, right here, were leisurely sipping wine and watching the whole scene unfold.
Feigning surprise was nothing more than a resistance to working overtime.
Having worked together until now, Xu Zhou had also gotten a good understanding of Liang Weining's character.
A laid-back employee, who would not stay a second past the time when she could leave work punctually.
Yet, it was this very Secretary Liang who had steadily and firmly passed the full three-month probation period in the director's office.
How stringent Mr. Chen's requirements for a secretary were, no one knew better than Xu Zhou.
Liang Weining was far from being merely a decorative vase.
Turning left from the club parking lot exit, the extended Pullman quietly rested under the shade of the trees. Between the flecked lights and shadows, the brightly lit license plate, starting with the character for Hong Kong, was a string of special sequential numbers.
The two of them got into the car, one from the left and one from the right, respectively.
The space in the back seat of the luxury car worth millions was spacious. Apart from the boss's designated seat, there were two foldable temporary positions behind the driver and the front passenger seat reserved for the convenience of an assistant or secretary to give work reports during the journey.
November in the Hong Kong Region was not too cold, and the car only had the ventilation on. The light brown leather seats were expensive and comfortable. If one could ignore the invisible pressure emanating from the person sitting opposite, on the whole, it could indeed be considered an ultimately enjoyable office environment.
"Thank you, Mr. Chen, for helping me out back at the club," was the first thing Liang Weining said to the man after fastening her seatbelt.
Chen Jingyuan, who was flipping through the financial report on his tablet, didn't show any extra emotion upon hearing this. Instead, he simply responded with an indifferent "Hmm" under the girl's calm gaze.
Thinking of her impulsive speech earlier in the evening and how she had further offended Chen Shao'an, Liang Weining paused for a few seconds before quietly adding, "Could Mr. Chen help me arrange a meeting with the second young master? I plan to find some time to apologize to him in person."
"There's no need for that."
This time, the man's warm and deep voice clearly entered her ears as he said, "For at least a year, Chen Shao'an will not have the opportunity to trouble you again."
Liang Weining was slightly startled.
A year?
Chen Shao'an, born with a silver spoon, a person so reckless and unafraid of anything, only feared his elder half-brother.
To what extent was he afraid?
Rumor had it that with just one look from the head of the Chen Family, the younger one would lose all his bravado, becoming silent as a chill-struck cicada.
Reflecting on the recent incident at the bar, Liang Weining couldn't help but feel subtly moved.
She didn't know exactly what method the boss had used to help her out of this predicament.
In any case, after three months of working together, Liang Weining felt that being able to follow Mr. Chen as a subordinate indeed gave her a great sense of security.
The night in the Hong Kong Region was as bustling as day, and the extended Pullman drove at a steady pace through the undulating commercial avenues among tall buildings.
The interior of the car was tranquil. The A-grade bulletproof windows, thicker than the standard, tightly sealed out noise from the night wind. At this moment, apart from the faint sound of ventilation, only the well-organized work reports of the high-level managers from the tablet meeting could be heard.
This meeting actually didn't require much of Liang Weining's involvement.
She was making records in the software throughout the meeting, occasionally correcting discrepancies due to 'slips of the tongue' by financial personnel.
Whenever this happened, Chen Jingyuan would slowly lift his gaze, looking at her with a calm that was undisturbed by ripples.
The executive at the other end, though, would break out into a cold sweat, sighing in appreciation of Secretary Liang's high emotional intelligence in correcting mistakes, while secretly taking note of her goodness.
But only Special Assistant Xu Zhou knew that Liang Weining had only reviewed those figures once, and she didn't keep electronic copies with her.
This meant that she had stored the entire financial department's reports from the previous quarter in her head, with a memory so clear that at any moment, she could retrieve any data from each row and column, down to the exact decimal places.
Regarding sensitivity to numbers, Liang Weining was comparable to a walking high-capacity storage device.
In this respect, Xu Zhou truly felt inferior.