Letter from Hong Kong Chapter 32

Being an assistant was really no fun at all. Ying Yin lasted until eight o’clock, but before her “experience card” expired, she had already thrown in the towel, slipping away along the wall to heave a huge sigh of relief.

Inside, a banquet was underway, while the assistants and other staff had a separate area for their meals. Ying Yin was not only ill but also needed to maintain basic strength, all while cutting out sugar and carbs for the next month’s red-carpet events. Eating a small, entirely vegan salad was sheer torment for her.

It tastes terrible…

A stranger came over to strike up a conversation – blonde-haired, blue-eyed, tall and broad-shouldered, with an inverted triangle figure wrapped in a suit. He asked in fluent English, “I know a light meal place with great flavors, but going alone feels like overkill. Two people would be just right. I don’t suppose your boss has arranged for someone to take over your shift?”

Ying Yin had been chewing on grass-like greens. Hearing him talk about good food, both her stomach and her involuntarily salivating mouth showed their temptation.

In recent years, because of attending overseas film festivals, learning English had become a hard requirement from her company. Two years of private tutoring later, she had at least reached a level of standard pronunciation and fluent conversation. She swallowed a soft-boiled egg with difficulty. “Is it far?”

“Six hundred meters.”

Hah, a little trick. If he says six hundred meters, it’s definitely a kilometer.

Ying Yin saw through these men’s flirting tactics like a clear mirror. As her mind waged an internal battle, she heard him ask, “Do you have a cold? Judging by your stuffy nose, it sounds pretty bad.”

Ying Yin nodded.

Her face was delicate and ethereal. The bun held in place by a shark clip gave off a gentle, lazy elegance. Amid the surrounding crowd of serious, straight-laced Germanic faces, she was a sight to behold.

The man smiled at her. “Wait a moment.”

After a while, he somehow produced a nasal decongestant patch.

Afraid of being improper, Ying Yin didn’t dare use it right away and tucked it into her jeans pocket. The man then showed her his summit work ID – name and position clearly listed. Starving as she was, and thinking that Shang Shao was certainly too busy inside to look after her, she actually went with him to the light meal shop.

Who knew this handsome guy would be so honest? Six hundred meters really was six hundred meters, and delicious really meant delicious. Ying Yin was so moved she nearly cried, and furiously devoured a bowl of avocado chicken salad.

Her round trip took less than half an hour. But as it turned out, she – this counterfeit, shoddy assistant – was now blocked at the entrance to the venue and wouldn’t be let back in.

“I just came here with Mr. Shang,” Ying Yin said, trying to get the guard to make an exception.

“I’m sorry, miss, but we need to see your ID or an invitation.”

How could Ying Yin have either of those? The blonde handsome guy could only offer an apologetic look – but then his boss summoned him, so he had to excuse himself first.

With no other options left, Ying Yin had no choice but to call another of the actual assistants.

After a while, it was Shang Shao himself who came out to get her.

He had clearly had some alcohol – his expression was gentler than usual – but his aura and his steps remained unhurried. Beneath his deep-set, heavily creased eyelids, his eyes were a cold, ice-like black, making it impossible to tell whether he was drunk or not.

The official reception staff apologized to him, but they had only been following protocol. Shang Shao didn’t scold anyone. He led Ying Yin inside and asked, “Why did you run outside?”

“I…” Ying Yin skipped over the irrelevant details and answered, “I went out to eat something.”

“Wasn’t dinner arranged here?” He had reviewed the menu – it was the same inside and out, no preferential treatment. It should have been palatable.

“Are you not used to the food?”

“No, it’s just that I’m doing intermittent fasting.”

Shang Shao understood and nodded. “My fault – I didn’t take care of you.”

The banquet, attached to an evening meeting that had stretched on from the late afternoon, was unbearably long and tedious. He glanced at his watch. “Wait for me another twenty minutes. Then we’ll head to the airport.”

He was a very punctual person – if he said twenty minutes, he wouldn’t linger a minute longer. After exchanging pleasantries and saying goodbye to the organizers, he left the banquet hall. Just as he stepped out, he happened to see a man walking away from Ying Yin’s side, as if the two of them had been talking.

The man had a quintessentially Italian look – good physique and good looks.

Shang Shao paused briefly in his step. Draping his coat over his arm as he walked over, he lowered his gaze and placed a cigarette between his lips. “Aren’t you afraid of being recognized?”

“How could I possibly have that kind of international fame?” Ying Yin knew her own limits well.

“Italian men are very good at flirting,” Shang Shao said casually, as if making small talk.

“Really?” Ying Yin replied guiltily. “Well, his English was so good – I never would have guessed he was Italian.”

But she had no idea that Shang Shao hadn’t actually seen the man clearly. With just a few words, he had already figured out her situation.

So he did flirt with her.

Shang Shao took the unlit cigarette from the corner of his mouth. His gaze paused unhurriedly on her face for three seconds, but he said nothing.

A Mercedes business van glided to a smooth stop outside the entrance hall – it was there to pick them up. Inside the car, Anna had already placed cold medicine, water, and a freshly printed, typewritten letter of apology. Their carry-on luggage had been sent to the airport in advance.

“The flowers.” Ying Yin realized they had switched cars and looked around. “The flowers are still in that other car.”

“Didn’t you say you didn’t want them?”

Ying Yin froze mid-motion. “You threw them away?”

“Yes.”

Ying Yin couldn’t let it go. “Really?”

“They were just a bouquet. Why would I lie about something like that?” Shang Shao took out the cold and anti-inflammatory medicine, unscrewed the cap of the Fiji water bottle for her, and said, “Take your medicine.”

“You’re not lying to me, are you?” Ying Yin was still fixated on the flowers.

How annoying – she had only had a momentary fit of pique. It wasn’t that she really didn’t like them.

Shang Shao handed her the water, his expression and tone flat. “When I give something away, I don’t take it back. If you don’t want it, I’m not obligated to keep it for you either.”

In her cold-induced drowsiness, Ying Yin thought of that high-grade sapphire ring.

“That ring…”

“That’s already been thrown away too.”

Ying Yin choked on her words, but the urgency she’d felt moments ago about the flowers had vanished. She slowly leaned back against the seat, lowered her gaze, and gave a small nod of her chin.

“Take your medicine,” Shang Shao ordered again.

The vehicle exited the quiet neighborhood, turned past a snowy street corner, and glided onto the road leading to the airport.

Ying Yin took the pills, swallowed them in one gulp with water, and moistened her dry lips. “You really are rich.”

Her words dripped with sarcasm, but Shang Shao merely smiled lightly. “Since I can afford to lose them, why would I keep them?”

Ying Yin felt something more blocked than her nose – perhaps the pill had been too large and gotten stuck in her chest.

Her chest and her nasal passages couldn’t both be clogged, could they? One of them needed to clear.

She fumbled in her tight jeans pocket for the nasal patch, carefully and meticulously tore it open, and stuck it onto the tip of her nose.

Shang Shao watched her movements as she applied the patch, then asked, “Where did that come from?”

The outer packaging was already gone, and she had only a single patch – clearly not something she’d bought herself. Someone else must have given it to her.

“That Italian guy from earlier.” Ying Yin pressed down on both sides of her nose.

Shang Shao: “…”

“He also took me to a really good light meal place,” Ying Yin continued, her tone light and airy. “He’s such a nice person.”

Shang Shao was silent for a long moment. For a while, he couldn’t quite tell which carried more weight in her heart as “nice” – his giving her an umbrella, or that man giving her a nasal patch.

She remembered his umbrella. She had spoken solemnly of repaying him, saying that even those small, effortless favors were, to her, each and every one of them extremely important.

“Ying Yin,” he said, his tone subtly turning heavy.

“Hmm?”

“Shouldn’t you raise your standards a little for what you consider ‘nice’?”

“He wasn’t after anything from me. He bought me a meal, gave me medicine, didn’t even ask for my contact info – he just helped me. Isn’t that nice?” Ying Yin asked with natural curiosity, interlacing her fingers as she stretched her arms straight out and relaxed into a lazy stretch.

“From now on, whenever anyone mentions Germany, the first thing I’ll think of is that stranger.”

She did that on purpose.

“Stop the car.”

An ice-cold order from the back seat made the driver faithfully ease off the gas, then turn the steering wheel, gliding the Mercedes van to a slow stop by the side of the road.

“Sir?” The driver half-turned to ask.

“Get out.”

The driver got out promptly, recognizing the situation – it probably wouldn’t be resolved anytime soon. He stood by the car and lit a cigarette.

The car’s heater was blasting warmly, and the seat cushions were automatically heated. A wave of oppressive heat rose up from beneath Ying Yin.

Her heart was pounding in panic. Before she could prepare herself, her wrist was caught in Shang Shao’s palm, and then she was pulled up by the seat of her pants.

Her sharp-toed high-heeled boots stumbled over the carpeted floor of the car, and she lurched, half-falling, half-kneeling, onto Shang Shao’s side.

She lay half on his chest, her hand pressed against him, her pulse resonating with his heartbeat.

His heartbeat was so steady. It made her own breathless, tense composure seem utterly worthless.

She avoided his ambiguous, deep gaze, keeping her face lowered, her eyes shifting in the dim cabin light. Her defiant posture weakened by the second.

The next moment, her stretched waist was forcibly pressed down by Shang Shao. The hand that had been gripping her wrist let go, only to move to the back of her head.

Shang Shao kissed her without reason. His tongue was fierce, carrying a hint of champagne’s sweetness and wine’s astringency, twining around her tongue tip, wreaking havoc in every inch of her mouth.

He wasn’t deeply drunk – but after round after round of all-nighters, after rising desire after rising desire, after holding back time and again – all his self-restraint was overturned in this moment. He pressed so hard that the veins bulged on the back of his hand.

Ying Yin’s nose was blocked; even the nasal patch was useless. No air could go out, and none could come in. Her face flushed deep red, her soft tongue being teased until it was slick and wet.

She hit him with her fists – weak, feeble blows. Somehow, the center of her wrists tingled numbly.

She was about to suffocate. Tears seeped from her eyes, but Shang Shao only intensified his grip, pinching her waist and pressing her hip. Her long legs, wrapped in dark blue jeans, knelt on either side of his legs. Eventually, they went soft and slack, and she sat down on his lap without a single gap left between them.

The forced kiss became a conspiracy.

Only when her resistance had reached its limit, on the verge of suffocation, did Shang Shao finally take pity and let her go. His gaze, heavy and dark, fixed on her swollen lips. He raised his hand and, with no hint of tenderness, wiped the glistening moisture from the corner of her mouth with his thumb.

Ying Yin wrapped her arms around Shang Shao, leaning on his shoulder as she coughed and gasped for air.

The car was warm, so she wasn’t wearing her coat. A thin, earth-colored cardigan over a black high-neck base layer. The cardigan’s buttons were tiny, mother-of-pearl – and with one heaving breath, they popped open on their own, revealing her round, heaving chest.

Shang Shao patted her back gently, as if soothing a child. His hand lingered on her waist, unwilling to leave.

When Ying Yin had coughed herself dry and caught her breath, she lifted her face, expressionless. “Mr. Shang, aren’t you catching a flight?”

A man’s desire cannot be hidden from his voice. His was hoarse, raspy with a rich, granular texture, yet still composed and unhurried as he said, “It leaves when I arrive.”

Ying Yin pressed her lips together. “So what exactly are you trying to do right now?”

Shang Shao raised his eyes and studied her carefully. Then, he gently peeled off the nasal patch – the one gifted to her by another man – from her nose.

As if he wanted her to remember the process, he tore it off very slowly, watching Ying Yin through half-lidded eyes. Once it came off, he twisted it into a small ball between his fingertips and casually tossed it into the car’s ashtray.

“Don’t remember him,” he said, like an order.

“If I don’t remember him, then I’d have to remember you,” Ying Yin replied, petulant, her tear-moistened eyes fierce.

On the plane, she’d given him the cold shoulder. After landing, she’d dodged him. He’d taken advantage of her drunkenness to witness all her vulnerable moments, seen her in her most unguarded state. And now this – forcing a kiss on her.

Smiling for him, crying over him, pitiful and sorrowful, wronged and aggrieved, stamping her feet in frustration, secretly overjoyed – five episodes of SpongeBob SquarePants‘ worth of drama.

When you added it all up, there really wasn’t much worth remembering.

Shang Shao raised his hand, letting the side of his finger brush vaguely against her cheek. “Isn’t there anything about me worth remembering?”

Ying Yin met his gaze with silence.

A car passed by outside the window, its warm high beams sweeping across the interior of the vehicle, illuminating it for a fleeting moment.

“The flowers…” She lowered her face, tears trembling in her eyes, on the verge of falling. “…were the first bouquet a man has ever given me.”

“The first?” Shang Shao’s movements paused, as if he could hardly believe it.

“Yes. Before that, I only ever received flowers when my shoots wrapped, or from fans.” She sniffled, her nose now half-clear from the kissing. “No one ever gave me flowers. Maybe they think a bouquet isn’t expensive enough, isn’t worth trying to win me over with.”

Shang Shao understood.

She was beautiful and proud, with a reputation as a gold digger. She could earn well on her own, and wouldn’t look twice at just any piece of jewelry. Wealthy businessmen, eager to curry favor with her, would rather offer a mountain of gold than a bunch of flowers – and those who couldn’t afford a mountain of gold were too intimidated to try.

But she was just a young girl. All she wanted was a bouquet.

Just as she only wanted an umbrella for the rain, a shawl for the autumn wind, a soft “Do you mind?” before a jacket was draped over her shoulders.

Shang Shao was quiet for a moment. “Then why did you try to give them back to me just now?”

“You gave flowers to your ex-girlfriend too.” Ying Yin lowered her face even further, half of it hidden in the dimness, the other half illuminated by the high streetlights outside the car, casting her features in soft contrasts.

“Who told you that?”

“Not Anna. I guessed.”

Shang Shao didn’t react visibly. “Why guess something like that?”

“I studied acting. My brain just does it on its own. I don’t want to guess.” Ying Yin said this without much pride, mumbling to herself.

“If your brain is so self-taught, didn’t it guess anything else?”

He asked with clear implication, his palm resting against her thin shoulder and neck. His thumb and forefinger pressed the acupoints at the back of her neck, kneading them slowly and deliberately.

Ying Yin had never been treated like this before. Her entire body softened, her scalp tingling as if waves of static electricity were passing through it.

She didn’t know which aspect Shang Shao was referring to – until he said, “For example, setting off fireworks for her, being romantic, giving her jewelry, sleeping with her.”

Ying Yin lifted her face and bit her lip. “Mr. Shang, I don’t want to hear the details of your love life.”

“Call me Shang Shao.”

“Shang Shao.”

No wonder she was a genius-level Best Actress. Those two short, ordinary syllables, spoken by her, sounded utterly enchanting.

“The first one – no. The second – occasionally. The third – of course. The fourth…” He gave a faint, teasing smile. “Didn’t you think I had erectile dysfunction? How would that work?”

Ying Yin lowered her head to look.

The light inside the car was dim, and the colors of their clothing were dark. All she could make out were layered folds and shadows – nothing clear. Shang Shao didn’t stop her, but only offered this one understated remark.

“Not hard.”

They had kissed like that, yet he hadn’t even gotten an erection. Ying Yin thought, So that one time really was an accident, and this is the norm.

What she didn’t know was that the man before her possessed extraordinary self-control and was skilled at delayed gratification. He had already had his first taste – knew the flavor. The second time around, he was no longer so inexperienced. Unhurried, he savored every detail he had missed before.

As for the next satisfaction? That would be saved for the next novelty.

But right now, Ying Yin’s mind wasn’t on whether he had a problem or not.

She was thinking only of the Victoria Harbour fireworks that had kept her up half the night – turns out they were fake.

“You are really stingy when it comes to romance.”

Shang Shao’s lips curved slightly, as if with a hint of self-mockery. But his expression was calm, and Ying Yin couldn’t read him.

“Alright,” he said, giving her a light pat on the hip. His tone carried the languid satisfaction of someone who had finished a meal. “The flowers weren’t thrown away. They’re already on the plane. You’ll see them when you board.”

He was trying to get her to move off him. His eyes glanced at her cardigan, whose buttons had come undone, and he casually fastened them for her.

Shang Shao’s movements and expression were indifferent, but beneath that thoughtfulness lurked something less than innocent. Ying Yin watched his fingers lazily toying with her mother-of-pearl buttons, fastening them one by one from her belly upward.

He didn’t take the opportunity for any casual, lingering touches. Ying Yin thought, He had enough of grinding against him last night. Now he’s playing the gentleman.

“What’s the name of that flower?” Ying Yin asked, looking for something to say.

“Queen of Sweden.”

“Why did you give me that one?”

“It resembles you. Very proud. Whether it likes something or not, it never bows its head.”

Ying Yin was silent for a moment. Shang Shao kept fastening her buttons all the way to the top. When he reached the last one, he lifted his gaze and met Ying Yin’s eyes.

“So tell me, Mr. Shang – am I someone you like, or someone you don’t?” she asked, even more softly, looking at his Adam’s apple.

It was prominent, resting just above his tie. Under her gaze, it rolled with visible intention.

Shang Shao didn’t answer her. He held her gaze. A car glided to a stop on the opposite side of the road, its headlights briefly illuminating his face – eastern, profound, gently elegant – and also lit up the desire in his eyes.

The next moment, one of them lifted her face and the other turned his head down, and they rushed back together into another kiss.

Apart and together, close and distant, shallow and deep – until it turned fierce. In the confined space, the wet sounds of their kissing filled the air.

When they finally parted, he stroked her face with an air of noble restraint. “It’s up to you.”

“Mr. Shang, you’ve violated the contract terms. You’ve defaulted.”

Shang Shao smoothly clasped her hand, interlacing their fingers with quiet dominance.

“I will keep violating it from now on,” he said, lifting his eyes slightly as he glanced at her. “I told you. I want you.”

The plane took off. Where in France it landed, Ying Yin had no idea – all she knew was that it was a port city.

From the airport to the port, a private car awaited them. Upon arrival, they boarded a yacht.

It was a superyacht, just like the one Ying Yin had caught a fleeting glimpse of at the Ning City Sailing Marina that day.

Once on board, she stepped into a dazzling, glamorous world of luxury – perfume and fine gowns, glittering lights everywhere. There was a day of leisure and a day of cocktail parties. The banquet hall wasn’t crowded; Ying Yin vaguely recognized a few familiar faces but couldn’t put names to them.

Nor did she imagine that two nights later, some of her photos would be reposted from a retired supermodel’s Instagram to Weibo by fans.

Fans marveled at how sweet and graceful her smile looked even in such high-profile company. But only true insiders knew that the real focus of those photos wasn’t the so-called celebrities or models – it was the other faces.

One was the heir to a globally renowned luxury goods conglomerate. Another was the young scion of an international publishing empire, accompanied by his supermodel girlfriend. Their flagship fashion magazine was called Moda.

This was a private yacht gathering on the high seas. For anyone appearing in these social circles, their status went without saying.

The moment Ying Yin set foot on the yacht, the domestic entertainment industry -always quick to fawn on the powerful and look down on the weak – was shaken.