Chapter 140: My Daughter’s Boyfriend Has to Be Fake!

Chapter 140: My Daughter’s Boyfriend Has to Be Fake!

Smack!

The file slammed onto the table with a loud smack, sending several photographs tucked inside flying out.

Li Ruotai got to his feet at once.

He was still somewhat afraid of his father.

“Dad, I really did—” He did not know what else to say. He truly had done everything he could.

He had not investigated Wu Chen for the family’s sake. He had done it because he was afraid his sister was being deceived. As he had said before, one thing was one thing and another was another. Wu Chen had saved his life, and for that he was genuinely grateful. On the surface he called him Brother-in-law and treated him very well. But he understood perfectly well the simple principle that one must always keep some guard against others.

Wu Chen had appeared too abruptly.

And the contrast between his extraordinary abilities and the ordinariness of his family only made it plainer that something was wrong with him.

Li Ruotai had truly investigated with everything at his disposal.

He had even had people look into the kindergarten Wu Chen attended as a child. He had obtained the records from the county hospital where Wu Chen had been born.

An investigation that thorough, and nothing wrong anywhere.

Which of course proved that something was very wrong with Wu Chen indeed.

Li Ruotai understood that.

What the wrongness actually was, he had no idea.

Li Maoren regarded his son without expression.

For a moment he even wondered whether son and daughter had joined forces to deceive him. On second thought, impossible. The problem with this Wu Chen was too glaring. If the two of them had deliberately arranged someone to satisfy the family, they would never have picked a man with a problem this obvious.

Too ordinary.

Even if his daughter were blind, she would never choose someone this ordinary. She did not consider Ding Ruilong good enough for her. Her standards were practically higher than the sun.

Li Maoren picked the file up again and leafed through it idly.

He could not find a single suspicious point.

“There are only two possibilities,” he said, looking up again. “One. He isn’t Wu Chen. The real Wu Chen is already dead, and this man has taken over his identity. In which case, however thoroughly you investigate the identity itself, you would never find—”

“Dad! That’s absolutely impossible!” Li Ruotai cut in at once.

“Hm? Why?” Li Maoren frowned.

“We ate together once. After we left, I had someone take away the bowl and chopsticks he’d used. His saliva was on them…” Li Ruotai spoke rapidly. “Then I had people quietly find opportunities to get hair from his home, from his parents… We ran DNA. They’re his biological parents!”

Li Ruotai’s investigation had been thorough in the truest sense.

Confirming that Wu Chen was Wu Chen was the foundation of any detailed investigation. There was no chance he would have overlooked it.

“Why isn’t any of this in the file?” Li Maoren asked, still frowning.

“Dad, you came too suddenly. You didn’t even call ahead—you flew in first thing this morning. Some of the material isn’t here…” Li Ruotai explained, and then went further on the question of Wu Chen’s identity.

“He has to be the real Wu Chen. His whole upbringing is documented clearly and it’s easy to check—there are photographs of what he looked like at every stage. And he was never kidnapped, never missing for any stretch of time. There’s no possibility of somebody killing him and taking his place…”

Strictly speaking, none of that needed saying. The DNA settled everything.

He was only talking this much because the pressure was on him. His father’s arrival had been too sudden.

“Then only one possibility remains,” Li Maoren said, thinking it through.

“Go ahead, Dad,” Li Ruotai said quickly.

“Your sister is up to the same ridiculous trick as before.” Li Maoren looked at his son. “This boyfriend of hers is fake too. Everything he’s done in Donghai these past few days was arranged by your sister in advance…”

“Well…” Li Ruotai hesitated.

Everything Li Maoren knew of Wu Chen’s activities in Donghai these past days had of course come from Li Ruotai and was in the files. Li Ruotai did not know everything—of Wu Chen’s dealings with Lei Cheng, for instance, he knew nothing. What he did know was mostly what had happened out in the open, such as the near-conflict with Lu Guangnian at Laopinxuan.

“What is it?” Li Maoren asked, seeing his son’s face change.

“Maybe. Maybe he is fake…” Li Ruotai said, in the tone of a man who did not know how to answer.

In truth his manner came from believing that Wu Chen could not possibly be fake.

But he could not say so.

Not only because he believed Li Ruobing was pregnant and could not reveal it.

Also because saying so would drag in the matter of Wu Chen pulling him out of his own crisis.

Wu Chen had instructed him at the time: tell the family the situation, but leave Wu Chen out of it. Li Ruotai was to say that he had spotted the problem himself, investigated deeper, and uncovered the enormous danger. Wu Chen had to be kept clear of it.

On that point, Li Ruotai had done as he was told, and concealed him.

Because it served his own interests enormously.

Li Ruotai’s trouble was serious enough that it might have left him dead in prison, dragging the Li family in with him and setting the whole clan in turmoil. If he admitted that someone else had saved him, it would make him look utterly useless: he had played too big, nearly brought disaster on himself, and in the end still needed someone else to save him.

So he had to say he had discovered it himself.

It amounted to proof that he was not useless. Yes, he had played too big; but he had not ruined it. He had caught the problem in time.

He could still salvage it.

Li Ruotai was currently the leading figure of the Li family’s third generation, and his position was very secure—but only on the premise that he was not a useless young master who had caused some enormous disaster. His grandfather was still alive. His father was not yet the one in charge. He could not let the family think he lacked ability.

Otherwise the family’s focus in grooming the next generation might well shift away from him.

“Maybe he’s fake… maybe he’s real… I think he’s probably real…” Li Ruotai made himself sound uncertain on purpose. “I think Sis has genuine feelings for him. It doesn’t look like an act…”

In reality he was certain.

Wu Chen was his real brother-in-law.

“How could it possibly be real…” Li Maoren said.

In his own mind the matter was already settled.

Wu Chen was his daughter’s fake boyfriend. Nothing else made sense of it.

Ring, ring…

Li Ruotai’s phone rang.

He answered, listened a moment, and said, “Understood.”

Hanging up, he turned to his father. “Dad, Sis and the others are downstairs. They’re on their way up.”

“Mm.” Li Maoren gave a noncommittal grunt and leaned back. Then he gestured at the table, and Li Ruotai immediately called someone in to gather the documents and take them away.

The coffee table held not only the extraordinarily detailed file on Wu Chen, but also the material concerning Li Ruotai’s trouble.

That, in fact, was the real reason his father’s face had been grim from the start.

He knew his son wanted to make something of himself.

But he had gone too far.

A few minutes later, a jumble of footsteps sounded outside the suite. Faintly, someone could be heard greeting the Eldest Miss.

Then the door opened.

Li Maoren turned his head and saw his daughter come in holding a young man’s hand, wearing a long dress and a glittering diamond necklace.

He knew she did not particularly care for dressing this way. She was beautiful by nature and had no need to adorn herself much. But today the impression she gave was entirely different. Some of the businesswoman’s formidable aura was gone.

She looked more like a woman.

Li Maoren had enough self-awareness to know his daughter had not dressed like this to see him.

Because she was really in love? For this kid?

The more he thought about it, the more certain he became that it was fake. His daughter would never change herself for any man.

It was all an act.

A bodyguard drew the door shut. Only Wu Chen and Li Ruobing came farther in.

“Sis, Brother-in-law, what kept you? Dad’s been waiting…” Li Ruotai came forward a couple of steps to meet them, and with his back to his father he flicked them a look as a signal.

Li Maoren glanced at his son’s back. He could not see the signal, of course; but his son calling Wu Chen Brother-in-law—that he could account for as well. The boy might not be doing it willingly. He was afraid of his sister; he would hardly dare address her boyfriend any other way.

Arm through Wu Chen’s, Li Ruobing came as far as the sofa opposite her father before she spoke.

“Dad. You’re here. Why didn’t you call ahead?”

Li Maoren looked at his daughter once, then moved his gaze straight to Wu Chen’s face.