Beneath His Breath

Lu Chiye is the Lu family's illegitimate son. Cen Ruan was the eldest daughter of her own house until it discarded her. They spend one night together, and Cen Ruan takes it for an affair and nothing further. Three years later he is in front of her again and will not be shaken off. He holds her by the waist at the reunion and asks whether she thought she could play and then run. In private he puts her against a wall and asks her to touch him again. He also has a position behind several of the businesses around her, and he uses it to get back for her what her family took. By then Cen Ruan is at the top of her field. He comes in formal dress, kisses her feet, and tells her he had no heart until she came. Most of what put her there was arranged by him.