Open Moves, Hidden Gambits

Xiao Huiqing was Lu Jiaming’s caged bird for three years. He endured it all so he could get closer to the truth behind his family’s ruin. But on the night he was finally about to escape, a carefully staged kidnapping sent him right back into that man’s grasp. Lu Jiaming dragged him out of a filthy back alley, crushing not only the bones of those thugs, but also the wings Xiao Huiqing had just begun to spread in an attempt to flee.

“Xiao Huiqing, you schemed so hard to get away from me, only to end up in the hands of these scumbags?”

“Try that again, and I’ll chain you to the bedpost. You won’t be going anywhere.”

One is a rising business star with a deep-rooted need for control; the other, a revenge-seeker who has borne humiliation in silence. In a relationship that began as a scheme, each believes he is the one moving the pieces, unaware that he has long since fallen into the other’s game. As hatred and dependence become tangled, as truth and lies tear at each other until they’re impossible to distinguish, they finally realize that some moves, once made, last a lifetime.

[Tags] Urban Romance | Deeply Angsty Love | Equally Matched Rivals | Secrets Kept from Each Other | The Chase for Love | Happy Ending

[Reader Reviews]

“Lu Jiaming is the worst at sweet talk of any male lead I’ve ever met, but he’s also the kind I wouldn’t trade for anyone, even if they showered me with sweet nothings.”

“Every time Xiao Huiqing struggles, it feels like a knife in my heart. Every choice he makes hurts me too.”

“After finishing it, all I can say is: They deserve it. They both deserve it.”

“It’s not simply sweet or angsty. There are thorns in the sweetness and sugar hidden in the pain. I finished it with a heart full of tenderness.”

It’s a long story. Thank you for being willing to stay with them until the end.

The second installment in the “Jingang Series”: Lu Jiaming’s story