Chapter 7

Chapter 7

At two in the morning, I pried open the ventilation window in the dressing room.

It sounds pathetic. In truth, it was pathetic. I was wearing the white sleep robe meant for tomorrow’s morning robe photos, the wound on my leg covered with a hastily slapped-on piece of gauze. With a restoration knife in hand, I inched forward through the narrow ventilation crawlspace beneath the ceiling.

Fortunately, the Shen Family Mansion had been renovated, and there was an access hatch between the dressing room and the bride’s lounge. Fortunately, when I was little, I had lived with my grandmother in an old house and knew that many places that looked sealed shut actually had gaps.

And even more fortunately, everyone in the Shen Family saw me as livestock waiting for slaughter.

Once people underestimated you, countless opportunities appeared.

I crawled into the dressing room, first turning off the motion-sensor light, then opening the equipment case the livestream team had left behind. The main control computer hadn’t been shut down. The password was stuck to the side of the monitor, reading: “wedding anniversary.” I entered tomorrow’s date and got in on the first try.

The Shen Family guarded themselves against outsiders as if they were defending a fortress, yet they had no suspicion at all when it came to their own respectability.

I backed up all the nursing records, medical files, voice recorder contents, and old photos I’d taken from the West Building onto the computer, then set up a scheduled stream. Tomorrow morning at 10:28, around the time of the wedding bows, every file would be simultaneously projected onto the ceremony hall’s big screen and pushed to the wedding livestream backend.

I didn’t expect one livestream to send the Shen Family to prison.

But as long as the guests, the media, and their business partners all saw it at the same time, Xu Lingyi would no longer be able to dispose of me quietly. What she cared about most was the Shen Family’s reputation, so I would turn that reputation into her cage.

After finishing all that, I used the computer to send Zhou Yan an email.

Zhou Yan was my senior from university. He was now a lawyer specializing in cultural heritage. Three years ago, when Shen Jianwei was pursuing me, Zhou Yan had warned me, “When wealthy families donate old objects, half of it is charity, and the other half is laundering their stories. Don’t get fooled by someone just because he knows how to write love letters.”

Back then, I thought he had a vicious tongue.

Thinking about it now, he had simply seen earlier than I did that there were far too many bloodstains scrubbed clean in the Shen Family’s story.

I made the subject line very direct:

“I may be illegally detained in the Shen Family Mansion. Please bring the police and media to the wedding venue tomorrow morning at ten.”

In the body of the email, I attached backup copies of the evidence and the mansion’s location. Then I added one more line:

“If I do not contact you of my own accord tomorrow, please do not believe any message of safety sent in my name.”

After the email was sent successfully, I let out a long breath.

But before I could shut down the computer, an internal message popped up in the lower right corner of the screen.

“Mianmian, are you in the dressing room?”

It was Shen Jianwei.

A chill ran down my back. Then I realized the computer was connected to the wedding’s internal system, and he had probably seen the main control login record.

I didn’t reply.

Another message popped up.

“I won’t stop you. What do you need me to do?”

I stared at that line, my heart in chaos.

Reason told me I could not trust him again. But another calm voice reminded me that tomorrow’s trap was too big. I might not be able to hold it together alone. Shen Jianwei was the Yangyin, an indispensable piece in Xu Lingyi’s scheme. If he took even one wrong step, every plan would fall apart.

I replied, “At the wedding, follow your mother’s arrangements until I speak.”

He answered quickly. “All right.”

I continued typing. “If you betray me, I’ll send you in with them.”

This time, a long while passed before he replied.

“As you should.”

I closed the computer and suddenly wanted to cry, yet felt I had no right to.

The cruelest thing about being an adult was that you could not forget someone had hurt you just because they were pitiful; nor could you pretend they had never loved you just because they had hurt you.

The fact that both things could be true at once was what hurt the most.

By the time I returned to the bride’s lounge through the ventilation duct, it was already four in the morning.

The bodyguards were still outside the door. From the end of the corridor came the muffled sounds of servants moving floral arrangements. Dawn was near. In the mirror, my face was pale, my hair a mess, and my sleep robe was smeared with dust. I looked nothing like the “young madam of the Shen Family” from tomorrow’s promotional video.

I sat down at the vanity, unfolded the thin sheet of paper my grandmother had left behind, and read that sentence again.

“The Shen Family believes in fate, so use fate to frighten them. The Shen Family loves its name, so expose them before everyone.”

I folded the thin paper and tucked it inside the bodice of my wedding dress.

Then I picked up an eyebrow pencil and wrote the three names I would say tomorrow on the mirror.

Shen Jianwei.

Shen Mingche.

Xu Lingyi.

After I finished writing, I stared at myself in the mirror and said softly, “Lin Zhaomian, don’t be afraid.”

The person in the mirror looked back at me, eyes terribly red, but she did not retreat.