Tender Affection

Only after breaking up did Li Tang learn that her artwork had been plagiarized.

Her ex-boyfriend had stolen her ideas and given them to his new girlfriend.

The plagiarist found great success at a London gallery.

Li Tang's series was mistaken for imitations and ignored by everyone.

She flew to the gallery in London, but found no justice there. Instead, she was thrown out, humiliated.

On a cold, rainy winter night, Li Tang learned to hate someone for the first time.

A few days later, a friend took her to an art exhibition. By a side entrance to the venue, her friend nudged her.

"Look at that man... I think he's the real owner behind that gallery. Why don't you go talk to him?"

Li Tang looked over with her umbrella raised.

It was drizzling, traffic flowed past, and a young man descended the steps as a crowd waited for him with umbrellas.

Rain pattered on the umbrellas, obscuring the scene around him.

Through a gap in the crowd, she caught a fleeting glimpse.

The man was refined and elegant. He turned to speak to someone, and everything around him seemed to fall quiet.

Li Tang's gaze settled on him. "I'm not just going to talk to him. I'm going to make him mine!"

Rain and dampness seeped into her hair. Her makeup had run, leaving her face haggard yet beautiful, and she gripped her umbrella tightly.

She said bitterly, "Then I'll dump him hard. He deserves it for teaming up with that plagiarizing thief to bully me."

She made her vow in the bone-chilling cold of November.

By March the following year, her masterpiece was hanging in a renowned gallery.

In May, her third painting sold for an astronomical price, putting her at the top of London's rising artists.

The thief was publicly exposed on a winter night.

With her revenge complete, she sent her breakup text, too.

That night, when she got home, the man she'd dumped was waiting for her.

Fog hung in the air, and bodyguards stood scattered in the distance.

He sat in his car, still elegant and distinguished, with the same aloof, chaste air he always had. It was hard to reconcile with the way he held her at home, overcome with desire, as if he were a different person.

His voice came with the winter wind, edged with anger.

"I just came to ask you one thing. We've been together for almost a year. Did you seriously not know that I'm not the owner of that lousy gallery?"

He looked at her through the hazy fog and streetlights. "I helped you get revenge, supported you behind the scenes, and spoiled you, and you're breaking up with me?"

Li Tang: "..."

A talented charmer who doesn't know she's captivating x an elegant, privileged, abstinent tycoon with power and influence

The blurb may be revised.

Theme: Sincerity deserves sincerity.