The Villain's Wife

After leaving Scarlet City, Lily checked the time and cursed when she saw that it was almost four in the afternoon. How could she still bring coffee to her husband at this hour? So she decided to cook dinner instead. But first, she needed to shop for groceries.

"Yang Mi," Lily called.

"Yes, president."

"Go to the nearest bookstore and get me the best-selling recipe book by Gordon Ramsay," she said.

Lily knew that she was lacking in the culinary department but she was willing to challenge herself and improve her skills. For a start, she would follow Gordon Ramsay's recipes. Nothing could go wrong with that right? Since it would be more convenient to refer to his recipes from a book, she had tasked Yang Mi to purchase a recipe book for her. She was determined to spend more time in the kitchen to experiment and learn for her husband's sake.

Yang Mi nodded and walked away in the opposite direction. As Lily was making her way to the supermarket, she felt her phone vibrate. Seeing it was her husband, she immediately answered it.

"Hey, are you busy?" Zhuo Jingren asked.

"Nope. Not at all. I am about to buy some groceries," she said.

"Groceries?" She could hear a tinge of amusement in his voice. "Are you going to cook dinner later?"

"It was supposed to be a surprise," Lily replied. How was he able to guess? Was she really that easy to read?

Zhuo Jingren burst out laughing in response. "I will be there in ten minutes. Wait for me. Let's cook dinner together." Then the line went dead, leaving Lily's mouth hanging open. 'Is he going to leave work just like that? Is he going to use the legendary 'honeymoon phase' excuse again?' Lily could only shake her head as she smiled to herself.

When Lily reached the supermarket, she headed straight to the meat section while checking her phone for a previously saved recipe that she had found online. She wanted to try making Gordon Ramsay's sticky pork ribs for dinner tonight. A small smile escaped her lips as she studied the recipe on her phone, already anticipating the outcome of her efforts.

In less than a minute, Lily arrived at the meat section and after she had picked up the pork ribs, she headed to the vegetables section and started gathering the ingredients one by one while occasionally checking her surroundings to see if her husband was already here.

….

Xuan Films.

Xuan Hui frowned as he played with a pen. "So, you are saying that Tang Wei Dong followed Lily that night but when you arrived at the terrace, Lily wasn't there?"

"Yes, you are right. Tang Wei Dong was very pale and he looked fearful," said Yuan Dehua, who was sitting across Xuan Hui in the latter's office.

"So you think that Lily might be involved with what happened to the Tang family? That-that is too much, isn't it?" Xuan Hui said as fear started to build up inside him again. The Tang family's downfall was the talk of the whole city for days. Their names would still flash in the news sometimes.

"I don't know, because I cannot see any connections," Yuan Dehua said.

"Hmmm… Me too." Xuan Hui nodded. Today, Yuan Dehua had barged into his office and told him about what happened that night of the after-party. Though it was nothing but a story and Yuan Dehua claimed that he did not see Lily at the terrace, a little voice inside Xuan Hui was telling him that Lily was actually involved in the matter of the Tang family.

"Hui… Do you think… Do you think she is exacting revenge on all of us because of what happened at the club? Tang Wei Dong was not with us back then, but he is related to the Qin family. What if…" Yuan Dehua did not continue his words, fear apparent in his eyes. What if Lily went after everyone that had wronged her in the past?

Yuan Dehua's words turned Xuan Hui silent. If Lily was exacting revenge, wouldn't she just target him and Qin Fei? However, on that night though Qin Fei and him suffered some losses, the Tang family had it worse. Wouldn't it be right to say that Lily had planned something against them right from the beginning?

'No.' Xuan Hui immediately shook his head. That was impossible. How could Lily do all that in a single night? The Tang family was an empire with many connections. Surely, their influence in the Far East was much greater than Lily's.

"I don't think it's her. Maybe this just a coincidence," Xuan Hui uttered. He wondered if he was trying to convince himself or Yuan Dehua.

When Xuan Hui first discovered Lily's identity, he was anxious that Lily might come for him. However, as time went by, he felt less anxious since Lily did not make any moves and seemed uninterested to deal with him. In fact, she even declined his repeated invitation for a meeting.

However, now that Yuan Dehua brought up the matter with Tang Wei Dong, Xuan Hui felt himself becoming anxious again. It was as if Yuan Dehua was reminding him of the events that happened that night.

Xuan Hui was reminded of what happened between him and his secretary. After the latter tried to get his mother's attention and sympathy, Xuan Hui immediately threatened her to stop or else he wouldn't know what he might do to her. However, who would have thought that Tang Biyu had something to threaten him back with and she had the guts to do so. As proof that she was serious, Tang Biyu showed him a short clip of a video of them kissing in the car. She confidently said that if something happened to her, one of her friends would immediately send the video to Qin Fei.

Xuan Hui was furious. He did not even realize that Tang Biyu took a video at that time. However, Tang Biyu's video was enough to tell him that the latter was the one responsible for what happened between them and not Lily. The scheming, the videos, and threat... It was obvious that Tang Biyu had already planned this for a long time.

Still, with everything that had been going on, Xuan Hui naturally felt frustrated. He felt that he had been facing lots of problems lately. From his mother to Qin Fei to Tang Biyu and now what Yuan Dehua said was troubling him. Was Lily somehow involved in all these troubles he was facing?

…

Meanwhile, in one of the prestigious hospitals in Singapore, an old man was frowning as he looked at the photos in front of him.

"Are you sure that she had someone follow her too?"

"Yes, chairman," a respectful voice answered. Then silence ensued once again.

The old man continued to look at the photos, his face extremely grim. "So this man has been her friend for a long time now?" he asked for the third time. In his hands were photos of Lily hugging Fernando at the airport.

"Yes, she has two close friends. One of them is named Li Shanshan, a famous directress, while the other is Fernando Kim, a famous jewelry designer."

The old man only let out a sigh after that. From the photos, it was evident that Lily and this Fernando were quite close. In fact, he felt that they were overly intimate with each other. For some reason, the old man couldn't help but ask if his own grandson knew that Lily already had someone else in her heart but still married her in the end. Was it for her money?

…

Panda Novel