The Heiress's Game

Gu Yunjin was covered in sweat when she got off the treadmill.

She picked up a towel draped over the armrest and wiped her neck. Her phone screen lit up; it was a message from Zhou Ji.

As she rubbed the sweat from the back of her neck with a towel, she opened the message. After reading it, the corners of her mouth curved slightly—not a smile, but a kind of satisfaction after confirmation.

Julie's hand is fine. The wound required six stitches on the side of her palm. After it heals, the scar will be hidden below the base of her thumb and forefinger, and will not be noticeable unless you look closely.

The doctor said it wouldn't affect nerve and tendon function, and I shouldn't hold a pen for three months, but I can draw normally after recovery.

Gu Yunjin read the message twice to make sure she hadn't missed a single word, and then replied to Zhou Ji: "Cooperate well with the insurance side, and make sure the hype is strong."

After replying, she draped the towel over her shoulder and walked out of the running area.

The corridor was quiet, the night was deep outside the window, and everyone else in the old house was already asleep.

The huge insurance policy on Julie's hand was arranged by Zhou Ji at Gu Yunjin's request.

At that time, she was simply following her habit of doing projects overseas—locking every kind of irreversible professional risk into financial instruments.

I never imagined that this step could have such a wonderful use.

A huge insurance policy, coupled with an image of a painter being slapped into a pile of broken glass and having his hand cut, and the media will write the story themselves without her having to push it.

But what pleased her even more wasn't the insurance detail. It was Julie.

Julie never asked her "what's next?" from beginning to end.

From the very first day she received Gu Zhenxing's information, this Chinese-American girl played every card at the perfect time.

The image of a talented woman was created by herself; the boundaries of her friendship with someone of a different age were drawn by herself; her silence when she was cyberbullied, only posting a color palette, was something she chose to endure; and her speech at the art museum, "Outstanding women are always slandered," was entirely improvised.

In the end, Ningweier slapped her—Gu Yunjin hadn't taught her how to provoke Ningweier, nor had she given her a script.

Julie simply extracted Ningville's weakness from the anonymous information she provided and then precisely exploited it.

Zhou Ji made the right choice this time.

Gu Yunjin threw the towel into the laundry basket and walked to the windowsill.

The asparagus fern stood quietly green, its delicate leaves casting shadows on the wall in the moonlight.

She reached out and touched a leaf, feeling a slight coolness on her fingertip, which reminded her of how her mother, Su Wanning, used to squat in front of this pot of asparagus fern and water it a long time ago.

As Su Wanning watered the plants, she said, "Jin'er, remember this: there are two kinds of people in this world."

Some people have scripts written for them, while others write their own. You should be the latter.

"Mom," Gu Yunjin said softly, pulling her fingers away from the leaf, "I can write scripts now."

Just as Julie's fire subsided, news began to pour in from Clearwater Bay.

First came a lawyer's letter, notifying Ning Limei to move out of the Clearwater Bay villa within thirty days, on the grounds that "the property owner has decided to reclaim the property."

The application for the transfer of ownership of the courtyard house was then halted by Gu's legal department on the grounds that "the approval process needs to be re-verified."

The Cullinan's keys were taken away by the driver's team leader, who said it was "needed for the group's vehicle allocation."

The final blow came from the finance department—Ning Limei and Ning Weier's monthly allowances were frozen, and all their supplementary black cards were deactivated.

The era of Lady Qingshui Bay is coming to a complete end. Everything she gained through twenty-three years of quiet dedication has been returned in less than a month.

Gu Yunjin stood by the window, looking at the dark night outside. She felt no schadenfreude, not even a sense of pleasure.

She was only thinking about one thing—Gu Zhenxing was so cold-hearted that he had even broken through the bottom line she had initially estimated.

She thought he would at least leave her a courtyard house, after all, it was something he had promised himself.

But Gu Zhenxing didn't. When he determined that someone had betrayed his trust, he cut ties more cleanly and decisively than anyone else, with a cleanness that allowed no room for imperfection.

If it were just Ningweier causing trouble, given Gu Zhenxing's suspicious nature, even if Ning Limei explained or cried, he might still waver.

After all, it's been twenty-three years, and Clearwater Bay was the golden house he chose himself.

Ningville's two friends—Li Minmin and Susan—stood out too much.

It was so conspicuous that she never intended to actually use them to hang banners in the first place.

Those two girls were merely pawns she placed on the chessboard, evidence deliberately left for the Gu family's investigation team to uncover.

They were found to have contacted the person who made the banner, and it was also found that they canceled the order on the day of the incident. That's enough.

Because this kind of "motivated, planned, but temporarily stopped" behavior pattern is more consistent than any direct evidence with the behavioral pattern of a spoiled rich girl who acts impulsively, then becomes afraid and regretful.

Ningweier was exactly that kind of person, and all of Ning Limei's explanations seemed pale and powerless in the face of Ningweier's personality.

Gu Zhenxing wouldn't believe her.

Even if Ningweier doesn't cancel, Gu Yunjin will arrange for his subordinates to notify his two friends to cancel.

She didn't need the banner hung by the mentally ill person to have a direct connection with Ningweier. She only needed Ningweier to have had that thought and that action, so that when the Gu family investigated, they could find a clear clue pointing to Ningweier.

The remaining elements—the patient with proof of mental illness, the sabotaged surveillance footage, and a dark blue luxury car whose color is only remembered, not the license plate—are all present.

—It's another layer of smoke, enough to make suspicious people feel that something is wrong, but they can never find the thread that can overturn the whole thing.

After all the calculations, Ningweier is still the most suspicious, and that's enough.

True and false, false and true.