Jiang Yuan checked the time; it was already eleven-thirty. Estimating that Xie Chengnan was about to return, he struggled into his clothes, slipped on his slippers, and padded downstairs.
Jason was in the kitchen preparing lunch, with Freesia standing beside him as a real-time supervisor. 【Add less salt. Excessive intake leads to osteoporosis and increases the risk of hypertension and heart disease.】
Jason resisted with all his might: 【Salt-baked chicken without salt has no soul!】
Freesia raised a mechanical arm and gave him a sharp rap on the head, declaring dictatorially: 【Shut up.】
Jiang Yuan, who knew the internal workings of their programming, was speechless. He hadn't expected Jason to be into that type of personality...
The sound of bells approaching finally caught the attention of the two small robots.
Jason turned around, looking aggrieved. 【Yuan...】
Freesia greeted him happily: 【Mama! Are you feeling better?】
Jiang Yuan reached out to pat Freesia’s head. "I'm fine." He then crouched down and asked the two robots, "Do you know how to undo a buckle?" He pointed a finger at the collar around his neck, looking helpless.
Freesia leaned in to look. 【Mama, there is a keyhole here.】
"A key?" Jiang Yuan was stunned.
Jason seemed to search through Xie Chengnan’s shopping history and explained: 【The set purchased by South includes one pair of cat ears, one cat collar with a bell, one cat tail with a [plug], and one collar key.】
Jiang Yuan: "..." He had wondered why the collar hadn't seemed difficult to put on last night, yet he couldn't get it off today. It turned out the thing required a key... The problem was, where had he thrown the key?
Before he could finish processing his confusion, he heard Freesia ask: 【Mama, why is everyone in the livestream saying that Papa really knows how to play?】
Jiang Yuan: "???"
Jiang Yuan: "!!!"
The young master was horrified. "Isn't the livestreaming time over?!"
Freesia decisively sold out her teammate: 【Jason said he wanted to show the netizens his exquisite culinary skills, so he extended the broadcast today.】
Jiang Yuan silently pulled out his phone and logged into the livestream room. He immediately saw a frame of himself crouching sideways in front of Freesia, looking at his phone.
Since he hadn't planned on going out, he was only wearing a loose, low-collared silk pajama set. The black collar on his neck and several crimson hickeys were completely unobstructed, exposed vividly before the eyes of millions of viewers.
Jiang Yuan: "..."
When Xie Chengnan returned, he found the atmosphere at home was not quite right.
His young boyfriend was sitting on the sofa with his arms crossed and an expressionless face. Opposite him, by the TV wall, Jason was facing the wall, pitifully reciting a self-reflection. Freesia, who usually clung to Jiang Yuan, was staying quiet and still like a quail. The only sound in the living room was Jason’s soul-weary voice.
"What happened to him?" Xie Chengnan casually draped his coat over the back of a chair. He was about to lean down for a kiss when a hand covered his mouth and pushed him away.
Jiang Yuan’s tone was chilly. "Where is the key?"
Xie Chengnan: "..."
"Ahem." The guilty CEO rubbed his nose. "It's in my pocket."
Having seen through his plan, the young master held out his palm and beckoned with two fingers. "Hand it over." As he spoke, he commanded Jason by the wall, "Speak louder, or the netizens won't hear you clearly."
Little Jason, terrified, increased his volume by another five percent.
Though he didn't know exactly what had transpired, the CEO, who was very adept at reading his young lover's moods, sensed a crisis. He quickly and obediently helped unlock the collar, apologizing as he did so, "Baby... I was wrong..."
Jiang Yuan rolled his eyes. With a swift movement, he snapped the collar around Xie Chengnan’s neck instead. After fastening it, he stepped back to admire his boyfriend’s new look and nodded with satisfaction. He patted Xie Chengnan’s cheek twice and squinted with a smile. "Good boy~ Let's eat."
The CEO, suddenly finding the roles reversed: "..."
The successful young master even thoughtfully straightened the collar of the shirt that was being pressed down by the leather band, praising him, "It suits you quite well."
The older man gave him an unreadable look and chuckled softly. "As long as you like it."
Jiang Yuan had been waiting to see him look embarrassed, but the man calmly finished his meal, calmly led him back to the bedroom, and calmly began to undress.
"What are you doing?" Jiang Yuan finally realized the plot was deviating.
Looking at the loosely hanging tie, the gradually opening white shirt, the beautiful lines of chest and abdominal muscles, all paired with that erotic leather collar, the young master unconsciously swallowed his saliva.
The man curled one side of his mouth and asked unhurriedly, "Does Master not like it?"
Dazzled by beauty, the young master was dazed and coaxed onto the bed once again. The older man intentionally lowered his voice, whispering in his ear the entire time.
"Does Master like this pressure?"
"Does Master want it faster?"
"Does Master like it when the kitten touches here?"
"Master sounds so lovely."
...
Afterward, the young master, who had supposedly "taken charge" but now suffered from a sore backside, coldly tossed the collar into the trash. He never wanted to raise a "cat" again.
Xie Chengnan leaned against the headboard, watching his boyfriend, whose face was flushed with the afterglow of passion despite his cold expression. His lips remained curved in a pleasant smile.
Jiang Yuan turned away to ignore him, but the shameless older man pulled him into his arms to coax him. "Baby..."
"Shut up." Jiang Yuan had seen through him. Every time this man apologized, he ended up sleeping with him. The man didn't lose out at all; instead, Jiang Yuan was the one losing everything—likely including the health of his kidneys.
"Ahem." The CEO changed the subject to serious business. "The internet is speculating about your identity. Is it really okay?"
Jiang Yuan knew what he was worried about and reassured him, "I'll be careful."
Xie Chengnan pursed his lips and remained silent. After a long moment, he sighed helplessly. "Why the sudden desire to go public?"
He had originally thought Jiang Yuan just wanted to build momentum for Onion Live, but if that were the only goal, there were other, safer ways to achieve it.
Exposing his identity as the heir to a conglomerate was equivalent to telling criminals that he was a prime target. From now on, Jiang Yuan would no longer be able to enter or leave public places freely; he would need bodyguards even to go to school. While this lifestyle might be the norm for many wealthy families, for Jiang Yuan, it meant sacrificing his existing freedom.
Jiang Yuan didn't explain. He simply winked mischievously and kept him in suspense. "The time isn't right yet. You'll know when it is."
Xie Chengnan didn't press further. He reached out to flick Jiang Yuan's nose, looking utterly resigned.
A moment later, he frowned in thought. "Can we increase Jason's monitoring level for you? Otherwise, I'm always a bit uneasy."
Xie Chengnan asked this with some uncertainty.
Increasing the monitoring level was equivalent to Jiang Yuan laying his privacy bare before him. As long as Jiang Yuan agreed, Xie Chengnan could check his location at any time, browse his emails and messages at will, and even remotely activate the camera and microphone, turning the phone into a listening device.
This form of having one's private territory completely invaded by another person was something Jiang Yuan likely wouldn't want.
"You don't have to force yourself—" Before Xie Chengnan could finish, Jiang Yuan interrupted him. He nodded and smiled, "Sure." He didn't look forced at all.
Xie Chengnan was momentarily speechless. "Baby... do you know what this means?"
"I know." Jiang Yuan looked up and kissed his chin. "I trust you."
That single sentence represented one hundred percent trust. Xie Chengnan couldn't help but pull him tightly into his arms, letting out a satisfied sigh.
The two began to kiss slowly. Their lips and tongues intertwined without much lust, filled instead with tenderness and the joy of mutual understanding.
When the kiss ended, Jiang Yuan suddenly said, "Actually... there are two more things I didn't tell you yesterday..."
"Hmm?" Xie Chengnan immediately became alert. "What else did that guy do?"
Jiang Yuan squeezed his hand. "Jiang Kunbo wants me to get engaged to Qiao Song."
Xie Chengnan’s brows knit together in disbelief.
"That's not the main point." Jiang Yuan glanced at Xie Chengnan, deciding to tell him the matter that concerned him more. "Jiang Kunbo opposes me being with you. His attitude makes me suspect... that what happened to your family... might be related to him."
After saying this, Jiang Yuan unconsciously bit his lower lip. He was nervous, carefully observing Xie Chengnan’s expression, wondering if he would be angry, disgusted, or if he would... stop liking him.
Xie Chengnan, however, only froze for a moment. He reached out to rescue Jiang Yuan's lip from his teeth, saying gently, "Don't bite. Doesn't it hurt?"
The reaction was so calm that Jiang Yuan felt a bit dazed.
Seeing his stunned look, Xie Chengnan chuckled softly and explained, "I suspected this shortly after I returned to the country. That industrial land in the south was originally purchased by my grandfather. Back then, to settle debts, it was sold at a low price to an outside company. The legal representative of that company was named Wei Ying."
Jiang Yuan was puzzled. "The name Wei Ying sounds familiar."
Xie Chengnan told him, "Wei Ying is Li Yan’s mother."
Jiang Yuan was silent for a while. "And then? I remember that land is now under the Jiang Corporation's name."
Xie Chengnan nodded. "The following year, the Jiang Corporation acquired Wei Ying’s company. Naturally, the land then belonged to the Jiangs."
Jiang Yuan understood after a moment of thought. Even if the land was sold at a low price, the amount involved was definitely not something a small company could produce all at once. Jiang Kunbo must have embezzled a sum of money to purchase the land for Wei Ying; it was even possible that Jiang Kunbo was the one directing everything from behind her.
As long as Wei Ying mortgaged the land to the bank after the transaction, Jiang Kunbo could return the funds to the Jiang Corporation. Back then, accounting was still done manually; as long as the records were cleaned up for a short-term inflow and outflow, no one would discover he had embezzled funds.
The next year, the Jiang Corporation acquired Wei Ying’s company. Because of the land's value, the acquisition price wouldn't have been low. That difference in price naturally went into the pockets of Li Yan’s family or Jiang Kunbo himself.
Regardless of the reason the Xie family fell into hardship, Jiang Kunbo’s actions of refusing to help and kicking them while they were down were beyond doubt.
Jiang Yuan realized that the time Jiang Kunbo and Li Yan had acknowledged each other was much earlier than he had admitted. It was even likely that Wei Ying’s company had belonged to Jiang Kunbo all along. Jiang Kunbo and Li Yan weren't just a one-night stand; they had maintained a long-term kept-mistress relationship.
Had his mother developed depression back then because she had found out something...?
Xie Chengnan didn't know that Jiang Yuan had thought so much in such a short time. Seeing his poor complexion, he gently advised, "It’s all things from over a decade ago. There might be some misunderstanding in between."
Jiang Yuan felt a bitterness in his mouth. "Since you already knew this was related to Jiang Kunbo... why do you still... toward me..."
Xie Chengnan sighed and pulled him into his arms. "Baby, to me, those past events have nothing to do with you. You are just you, and the fact that I like you is enough."
Jiang Yuan hugged him back tightly, but the heart he had held in suspense couldn't quite settle. He had a premonition that he had overlooked some very important detail, and this old affair from ten years ago was likely the missing answer he had been seeking.
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