Chapter 178: Mr. Wu, Are You Trying to Screw Me Over?

Chapter 178: Mr. Wu, Are You Trying to Screw Me Over?

The silence in the office lasted more than ten seconds.

Wu Yurong watched him through narrowed eyes, still smiling.

To say he had designs on her was plainly offensive. Yet Wu Chen showed no discomfort at all. He simply met her gaze and gave nothing away.

“Young people these days really are bold.” Wu Yurong smiled as she said it, half a sigh. She raised a hand, swept her hair lightly behind one ear, and went on, “Mr. Wu, what exactly are these… designs you have on me?”

“It’s complicated.” Wu Chen held her eyes, still smiling. “This may be presumptuous, but President Wu is an extremely guarded person, particularly where men are concerned. So I had no choice but to use this method to make you come to me of your own accord.”

“Complicated designs?” Wu Yurong’s smile was lovely. “Mr. Wu, does Li Ruobing know what you’ve been doing? Does she know… that you have designs on me?”

“Of course.” Wu Chen smiled.

“She knows?” Wu Yurong wanted it confirmed.

“Yes. She knows.” Wu Chen nodded.

The smile on Wu Yurong’s face shifted, subtly.

When Wu Chen first said he had designs on her, she had thought him bold—a young man who might have some ability and enough nerve to entertain any thought at all, however outrageous.

Then she had realized what he was doing.

Wu Chen had chosen ambiguous words on purpose.

He had offended her on purpose.

If she took offense and called him on it, he would certainly be able to explain the words away, and she would be the one left uncomfortable.

“Is your relationship with Li Ruobing fake?” Another possibility occurred to her.

“How could it be fake?” Wu Chen kept smiling. After a brief pause he added, “We haven’t slept together yet, but… I’ve already met Li Maoren.”

Again her smile turned subtle.

She was weighing whether he was telling the truth.

In fact she knew very little about him.

Before today, almost everything she knew about Wu Chen had come from rumors circulating in Donghai’s business community.

Yesterday one of her people had reported that her daughter had met an older schoolmate who quoted her a hundred thousand yuan for a song, and that her daughter had refused.

It had been a minor episode in Song Xuan’s ordinary day, and Wu Yurong had given it little thought.

Then, around noon today, Wang Xiaomei—one of the eyes Wu Yurong had placed around Song Xuan—suddenly reported that Song Xuan was behaving strangely, as though she had suffered some kind of shock. Her reaction to a song that had abruptly gone viral was especially odd. Wang Xiaomei could not tell whether Song Xuan had been discouraged or something else entirely, and she was worried something was wrong with her.

That drew Wu Yurong’s attention to the suddenly viral “Antidote for the Soul.”

And she knew—

“Antidote for the Soul” was the very song Wu Chen had tried to sell Song Xuan yesterday.

The bodyguard watching the café had mentioned it in her report.

Wu Yurong even had someone trace the IP address used to upload “Antidote for the Soul.”

Once she confirmed that Wu Chen the schoolmate and Wu Chen the boyfriend of Li Ruobing were the same man, she ordered a closer investigation and had information gathered on him.

Even then they turned up very little that was genuinely private.

At present, the one thing Wu Yurong could be certain of was that Wu Chen had approached her daughter deliberately.

He had deliberately maneuvered her innocent daughter.

His intentions were unclear, but they were certainly not innocent.

And now—

Wu Yurong could be certain of one more thing.

Wu Chen had been aiming at her from the start.

“Li Maoren didn’t warn you off? Tell you to stay away from Li Ruobing?” Wu Yurong asked at last, smiling.

“No. We had a very pleasant conversation.” Wu Chen smiled.

“You’re something, young man…”

From her tone it did not sound much like praise.

She still could not tell whether he was telling the truth.

So she dropped that line.

“Let’s talk about me instead.” Wu Yurong smiled at him again. “What exactly are these designs you have on me? We’ve met now. Don’t you intend to tell me?”

“President Wu, do you know Ding Ruilong?” Wu Chen asked first.

“How could I not?” She met his eyes. “Get to the point.”

“He wants to kill me,” Wu Chen said.

“That…” Her expression shifted oddly for an instant, then she smiled sweetly. “Mr. Wu, what does that have to do with me?”

“So I’m certainly going to kill him.” Wu Chen smiled.

“Wow. Then good luck.” Wu Yurong smiled encouragingly.

Her tone was that of a sweet-voiced idol urging some shut-in fan to better himself.

Whatever lay between Wu Chen and Ding Ruilong was nothing to her.

Naturally she did not believe he had the ability to kill Ding Ruilong either.

She simply did not say so.

It had nothing to do with her.

“So I thought I should give you a warning, President Wu. You ought to pull your money out of Chuanhang Fund early, before you’re caught in the fallout.” Wu Chen smiled at her. “President Wu, you’re so beautiful, and you’re at the very prime of your life. Wouldn’t prison be a waste?”

Wu Yurong’s brows drew faintly together as she looked at him.

“Of course, if President Wu is willing to pay a certain price—beautiful as you are…” Wu Chen went on, smiling. “So long as you’re willing, I imagine someone would be willing to save you when the time comes.”

“You… what are you talking about?” Wu Yurong laughed again, sounding both baffled and amused. “Mr. Wu, don’t you think you’re being rather inexplicable? What’s wrong with Chuanhang Fund? Whatever is going on between you and the Li family and Ding Ruilong—what does any of that have to do with this?”

“Not only Chuanhang Fund. I expect Tonghaiyuan Trading, which you also invested in, is going to run into trouble,” Wu Chen said.

Wu Yurong kept smiling. She tilted her head a little and blinked at him.

She looked entirely at a loss as to what he was talking about, or trying to say.

Of course she knew Chuanhang Fund and Tonghaiyuan Trading.

Both were businesses she had invested in over the past five years, separate from Senlan Group.

Chuanhang Fund was an investment fund founded jointly by several partners, and Wu Yurong was one of them.

Tonghaiyuan Trading was an import-export company established with capital from Wu Yurong and another major businessman out of Modu.

It was her own private venture, yet it had commercial dealings with Senlan Group in clothing exports.

It was also worth noting that under Wu Yurong’s direction, Chuanhang Fund had once made a venture investment in Tonghaiyuan Trading.

That was simply what happened when businesses grew large.

Connections of every kind formed between them.

Ordinarily—never mind someone at Wu Yurong’s level—even a minor shareholder in a large company would also turn up as shareholder, director, legal representative, or actual controller of dozens of other firms, large and small.

Some of those businesses would touch the person’s main industry.

Others would have nothing to do with it.

Wu Yurong was more unusual still.

She was exceptionally adept at cultivating relationships.

Over the years she had used her advantages to the fullest, and with formidable balancing skills and rare business talent she had grown both her companies and her network.

A great many powerful men who entered Wu Yurong’s network also became men orbiting her, harboring improper hopes about her while becoming her partners in business.

“So?” Wu Yurong asked at last, having thought it over.

She still could not find the logic in any of it.

“You say Chuanhang Fund is going to have trouble, and Tonghaiyuan too. You say I’m going to have trouble. I don’t know why you’ve suddenly come here to tell me all this, but I’d like to ask—what does any of it have to do with you?”

It truly made no sense.

Wu Yurong did not believe him. It sounded like alarmism with neither head nor tail.

At the same time she found Wu Chen exceedingly strange.

Whatever happened to those businesses, what was it to him?

Why had he come here to talk about it?

“It has everything to do with me,” Wu Chen said, smiling.

“How?” she asked, smiling.

“Because the trouble coming for Chuanhang and Tonghaiyuan—” Wu Chen paused, then smiled. “I’m the one causing it.”

Wu Yurong’s eyes narrowed sharply.

And slowly, the smile on her face spread wider.

“Mr. Wu,” she asked through narrowed eyes, “are you trying to screw me over?”