My cousin-in-law helped me achieve my ambitions.

Yang Tian's tense face relaxed at his absurd reasoning. She gave him a reproachful look and gently pushed his arm: "What time is it? Stop being so cheeky! Okay, I'm going to work."

After saying that, she waved to him and turned to walk towards the office building.

Su Ming watched her retreating figure, then raised his voice and called out to her, "Remember, if anything happens, you must tell me!"

Yang Tian hummed in agreement, then, without turning her head, shuffled through the glass doors of the office building. Her figure flashed behind the revolving door and disappeared into the gleaming reflection of the glass.

Su Ming watched her enter the building before turning his gaze away and slowly walking towards the warehouse receiving team. As he pushed open the door and draped his coat over the back of a chair, he saw Tian Jing sitting behind the desk by the window with a stern face, one hand supporting her forehead and the other resting on the table, her posture as stiff as a headmaster.

Su Ming forced a smile and nodded in greeting, "Sister Jing, thank you for your hard work. How's the morning's material collection going? Did the suppliers cause any delays?"

"It's alright, don't worry about things at the company." Tian Jing glanced at him disdainfully, deliberately supporting herself on her lower back with her hand, pretending to have a sore back and weak legs. She slowly stood up from the chair, sighed, and said in a sour tone, as if she had just been pulled out of a jar of vinegar: "I'm not tired, I'm fine. But you, three times a night, you'll probably need a long time to recover, right? I think your legs are weak."

Su Ming was speechless. He opened his mouth, but didn't know how to respond. He shook his head awkwardly, picked up the teacup on the table to take a sip of water, but found it empty, so he put it down sheepishly.

But Tian Jing wasn't going to let him off the hook. She walked around from behind her desk, leaned close to Su Ming, tilted her head slightly, and whispered in a voice only the two of them could hear, "Tell me the truth, besides those three times last night, did you and Yang Tian continue doing 'that' this morning?"

Su Ming was utterly speechless. He looked at Tian Jing with a pained expression, almost pleading, "Sister Jing, why are you interested in this? It's inappropriate for a woman like you to ask such a question, isn't it?"

Tian Jing gave him a push, her face hardening, but her eyes sparkled, showing no sign of her true, determined anger: "Don't change the subject! I'm just asking you, is it true or not?"

Su Ming blushed, lowered her head, and whispered, "No."

Tian Jing, however, was somewhat skeptical. She tilted her head curiously to examine him, her gaze sweeping from his face to his neck, and then to his noticeably weak knees, as if trying to find evidence to expose him in the smallest details of his body: "Really not?"

"Really not." Su Ming nodded seriously, his expression a mix of amusement and helplessness. "I only slept for three or four hours last night, and this morning..." He wanted to say, "I was woken up by your phone call again," but he swallowed the words back and changed his words to, "I went back to sleep this morning and didn't wake up until after nine o'clock. Then Zhao Fang called... and then I checked out of the hotel and came to the company."

Tian Jing seemed to reluctantly believe him, snorting under her nose. She reached out and lightly pinched his arm, scolding him, "You better be serious. If you dare do this again, I really won't want to talk to you anymore. Do you hear me?"

After saying that, she straightened her back and walked away from Su Ming. The sound of her high heels on the floor was crisp and rhythmic, like a series of warning drumbeats. As she walked out of the office door, she turned back and glared at him quickly before turning into the warehouse corridor.

As Su Ming watched the beautiful woman's departing figure, he sat in his chair, feeling both warm and sorrowful. It was like spilling a bowl of honey mixed with bitterness, a bittersweet experience that left him both amused and exasperated.

Just as he was staring absently at the doorway, his phone suddenly rang. He took it out and saw it was Yang Tian calling. He answered immediately, and before he could even speak, Yang Tian burst into tears. The crying was urgent and full of grievance, like a dam that had been holding back all morning finally being broken by the last tear.

"Su Ming... I've been marked absent without leave... Manager Zhao even gave me a minor demerit... What should I do...?"

Su Ming's fingers tightened suddenly, making a slight creaking sound as he gripped the phone case. He gritted his teeth, a vein throbbing on his forehead, and muttered under his breath, "That old hag, I'll teach her a lesson!"

He straightened up, switched the phone to his other ear, and spoke in a steady, powerful voice, as solid as a clenched fist: "Yang Tian, ​​where are you? Don't cry. Wait for me in the office. I'm coming over now to find your manager. I want to see what makes her so arrogant!" Yang Tian responded with a sob on the other end of the line.

Su Ming hung up the phone, grabbed his coat from the back of his chair, and strode out. The door to the receiving team's office slammed shut behind him, the echo reverberating twice between the steel frames of the warehouse, causing the overhead light bulb to sway slightly.

Su Ming was about to get up to find Zhao Fang when he bumped into someone as soon as he opened the door to the receiving team's office. He instinctively took a half step back and looked up to see Lin Shumei. She wasn't wearing her work uniform today; instead, she wore a simple light blue shirt and dark trousers. Her long hair was loosely tied in a bun at the back of her head, with a few stray strands falling beside her cheeks. She looked capable yet possessed an indescribable gentleness.

Lin Shumei was startled by his impulsive manner, and seeing his angry face and the dark cloud hanging over his brows, she asked curiously, "What's wrong with you? What happened? You look so pale."

Su Ming opened his mouth, about to tell her the truth, but Lin Shumei first pressed her hand down and quickly looked around. The warehouse area was relatively quiet in the afternoon, with forklifts going in and out of the aisles in the distance, and several porters unloading goods on the platform.

She looked away, gave him a wink, and whispered, "Come with me to the decommissioned warehouse."

Su Ming knew that this beauty was definitely going to teach him how to handle urgent matters, so he suppressed his anger, nodded, and followed her quickly toward the abandoned warehouse in the corner of the warehouse.

The two entered the scrap yard, and the iron door creaked shut behind them. Lin Shumei stopped beside an old shelf against the wall, turned around, placed her hands on Su Ming's shoulders, tilted her head slightly, and looked at him seriously: "Tell me, what's making you so anxious? I've known you for so long, and I've never seen you look so upset."

Su Ming looked at her, hesitated for a second, and then decided to tell the truth. He recounted everything from how Yang Tian had been marked absent from work by Zhao Fang and given an additional minor demerit, to taking her sister-in-law to the hospital last night, to Zhao Fang's angry phone call this morning, and then to Yang Tian's tearful phone call just now. Towards the end, his voice became low and heavy, as if he were pressing down hard on a wad of soaked cotton.

After listening, Lin Shumei shook her head with a wry smile, her eyes filled with both heartache and sigh. She sighed softly, her voice low and gentle: "It seems you still care more about Yang Tian!"