After Setting Me Up With My Ex, The Aloof Alpha Regrets It - Chapter 2

Chapter 2: Miss Shi, I’m heading that way anyway.

“What?”

Zhu Yunqi’s brows furrowed, almost imperceptibly. “You’ve broken up? Have you completely broken up?”

A flicker of displeasure passed through her deep gray eyes.

The information she had researched clearly stated that Wen Yue and Shi Li had been in a deep relationship for seven years and were already preparing for their engagement. How could they break up so quickly?

But it was fine. Even if they broke up, they could get back together. As long as Shi Li and Wen Yue were together, Wen Yue might propose canceling the engagement, and she wouldn’t have to be a pawn in an arranged marriage and an instrument for family expansion.

Everything could still be turned around.

Zhu Yunqi quickly composed herself.

Just then, a cafe employee came over to clear away Shi Li’s empty pistachio latte and asked if they would like to order anything else.

Shi Li was parched because of Zhu Yunqi’s appearance. She ordered another latte and asked for extra sugar.

The employee turned to Zhu Yunqi, waiting for her response.

Zhu Yunqi’s mind wasn’t on the coffee. “The same as hers.”

After the employee left, Shi Li struggled to process what Zhu Yunqi had just said.

It’s not what she had imagined.

Shouldn’t Zhu Yunqi have coolly said, “Take this money and get out of Wen Yue’s life forever”?

Why was she telling her to continue being with Wen Yue? Was this some new kind of sarcasm popular on the StarNet?

For the first time, Shi Li felt her brain capacity was overloaded.

She first answered Zhu Yunqi’s second question: “The breakup is about eighty percent complete. I know Wen Yue is getting engaged, and I’m not really interested in being a mistress.”

The remaining twenty percent was because Wen Yue adamantly refused to admit they had broken up. She relentlessly spammed Shi Li’s communicator with messages, trying to win her back and convince her to willingly be her true love after she got married.

Since the two of them had several mutual friends from college, Shi Li held a slight hope that things could be salvaged and hadn’t blocked Wen Yue.

Zhu Yunqi breathed a sigh of relief and muttered to herself, “It’s good that it’s not completely over.”

Shi Li widened her eyes slightly. “What?”

Zhu Yunqi’s cold gray eyes swept over her. “Nothing.”

The communicator on her wrist vibrated with a message alert. Zhu Yunqi opened her communicator, which was set to private mode so the projected message screen couldn’t be seen by others.

Zhu Jingshan: Mother and Mom are here, at the villa in Pushkin District.

Zhu Jingshan was the illegitimate daughter of her mother and another Omega, and Zhu Yunqi’s older sister.

Zhu Yunqi said to Shi Li: “Hold on, I need to reply to a message.”

She quickly typed: I’ll be there later.

Zhu Jingshan: Don’t be too late. I can’t handle them on my own.

Zhu Yunqi: I’ll try.

Closing the message, Zhu Yunqi rubbed her brow. Her long eyebrows were slightly furrowed. In the depths of her gray eyes, a storm seemed to brew, yet all that remained was a silent, desolate plain.

Their coffees were served.

Zhu Yunqi took a small sip. It was very sweet, so sweet she could barely taste the coffee’s original bitterness. Her drink had also been given an excessive amount of sugar.

It was almost cloying.

However, the sweetness on her tongue did indeed slightly ease the heavy mood caused by the arrival of her mother and her other mom.

Zhu Yunqi continued their conversation with Shi Li.

“For personal reasons, I don’t want to get engaged to Wen Yue. But for certain reasons, the engagement cannot be called off by me; it must be proposed by the Wen family. Miss Shi, after careful consideration, I believe you are the person most likely to succeed in getting Wen Yue to proactively call off the engagement with me. That’s why I came to see you today.”

“Of course, I won’t force you. As you can see, this is a transaction that requires mutual agreement to take effect.”

What a “personal reason” and “certain reasons”, Shi Li thought, which means nothing at all.

But it wasn’t hard to understand. There were always some convoluted things between powerful families that ordinary people couldn’t comprehend.

Saying this, Zhu Yunqi pushed the black card toward Shi Li again.

“This is the payment for your services, a down payment. If you succeed, there will be an additional billion as a final payment. Regardless of the outcome, the down payment is non-refundable.”

No guaranteed results, a non-refundable down payment, a massive final payment… Zhu Yunqi’s terms were so lenient that she was practically the most generous “client-mom” Shi Li had ever met. How was this any different from having no conditions at all? As long as she agreed now and pretended to get back with Wen Yue, a huge amount of money would be deposited into her account.

What’s more, a billion dollars was an astronomical amount that 99.99% of people couldn’t refuse.

It would be a lie to say she wasn’t tempted.

But Shi Li didn’t believe such a good thing would happen to her. After all, she had never been the lucky type.

Shi Li said: “Wen Yue told me that this was a family arrangement and she couldn’t resist.”

Zhu Yunqi: “Whether you can make her determined to resist depends on your ability, Miss Shi.”

She seemed very certain that Shi Li would accept. “You can ask me any questions you have. I’ll tell you what I can.”

But the reason I’m most curious about is the one you can’t tell me, Shi Li thought. Without a clear reason, she couldn’t guess Zhu Yunqi’s motives, even though in the face of a billion dollars, all motives seemed insignificant.

But both her knowledge from books and her life experience reminded her that high returns always come with high risks.

And she just so happened not to be a desperado.

Shi Li smiled. Her apple-colored lipstick made her skin look as white as snow.

“I haven’t agreed yet, Miss Zhu. But I do have a question.”

Zhu Yunqi gestured for her to ask.

Shi Li asked frankly: “Are you a scammer?”

Zhu Yunqi: “…”

Did she look like a scammer? What part of her from head to toe screamed scam? She even came to talk to Shi Li in person, showing complete sincerity!

She thought she was about to succeed, but instead, the other person saw her as a scammer.

The cold and aloof expression she had maintained since entering the cafe finally broke for a moment.

Zhu Yunqi had a faint smile on her lips and gritted her teeth. “I’m not. Do you want to see my ID?”

“No, I don’t.”

Under the table, Shi Li pinched her fingers.

After calming down from the lingering warmth of the billion dollars, Shi Li realized again that the woman sitting across from her was an Alpha of at least S-class, one of the top five percent of the most powerful humans in the Federation. It was best not to anger them.

She wasn’t asking Zhu Yunqi if she was a scammer because she genuinely thought she was a fraud. Firstly, the engagement between the Zhu and Wen families hadn’t been made public, so very few people knew about it. Secondly, just by standing there, it was hard to associate Zhu Yunqi with a scammer. Her appearance perfectly matched all of Shi Li’s imaginations about the mysterious second daughter of the Zhu Holdings family on the StarNet. Plus, she did look a little bit like the Zhu family’s eldest daughter.

Shi Li was more trying to remind herself not to impulsively agree to a temptation.

Shi Li didn’t take the card on the table. She stood up.

“Miss Zhu, this is too much money. I need to think about it carefully.”

This was the truth.

Zhu Yunqi leaned back in her chair, her head slightly raised to look at Shi Li. Her sharp jawline was incredibly defined. Her elbows rested lazily on the chair’s armrests, and her long legs were crossed. She made a simple wooden chair look like a throne.

Shi Li couldn’t tell if she was happy or angry.

But she could tell from Zhu Yunqi’s posture that she was confident of victory.

After a moment, Zhu Yunqi said, “Take your time.”

Saying that, she tore a heart-shaped note from the table and quickly wrote a string of numbers.

“This is my private communicator number. Contact me whenever you’ve decided.”

“Just one thing, time is limited. Don’t make me wait too long.”

Under Zhu Yunqi’s gaze, Shi Li put the note in the innermost layer of her bag, indicating that she would make a decision and call her as soon as possible.

The two of them left the cafe together.

Zhu Yunqi had driven there and her car was parked in a nearby lot. Shi Li walked to a public transit stop to wait for the bus.

Because of Zhu Yunqi’s unexpected appearance, she had been delayed for a while. Shi Li checked the time; it was 2:30 p.m.

The sky was already beginning to cloud over.

A gust of wind blew by, and Shi Li felt the back of her neck heating up slightly.

When she left home this morning, the gland on her neck was already slightly swollen and red. To prevent any accidents, Shi Li had put on an inhibitor patch beforehand.

In the cafe, her nerves had been on high alert, and she had temporarily forgotten about the abnormality in her gland.

Shi Li touched her gland through her clothes. The situation was probably a bit worse than this morning.

Regardless of whether it was going to hail in the evening, even if it was going to rain particle cannons, she had to go to the hospital. Pheromone stabilizers were injected once a month, and today was the day for her check-up and treatment. With her gland acting up, Shi Li didn’t dare to delay until tomorrow.

Shi Li silently calculated the time needed for each step: the shuttle to Star City General Hospital had just passed five minutes ago; the next one would be in fifteen minutes; the maglev shuttle from Sunset Rose Cafe to Star City General Hospital would take twenty-five minutes, meaning she would arrive at around 3:10 p.m.; the trip from the hospital to her rented apartment would take thirty minutes. If she didn’t want to get caught in the maglev shutdown caused by the hail, she had to finish her treatment by at least 5:20 p.m…

A discreet, twilight-gray sports car stopped in front of her.

The window rolled down, revealing a perfectly sculpted profile.

Zhu Yunqi tilted her head and asked: “Where are you going?”

She paused, then added: “Miss Shi, I’m heading that way anyway.”

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