The Cousin Refuses

Please add my new novel, Late Spring, to your reading list!

Su Buchi is a young relative who depends on the marquis's household for a place to live. Everyone says she's sweet and sensible. Only Yu Xun sees her differently. To him, Su Buchi is a smooth-talking social climber who wants nothing but to attach herself to the powerful.

Yet this very social climber slowly takes over his heart...

Bonus Scene 1

Amid the falling snow, he stood tall and elegant, radiating refinement.

Su Buchi reacted at once. This must be Yu Xun, the Marquis of Wu'an. She lowered her eyes and stepped forward to curtsy. "Greetings, Fourth Brother."

She was the niece of the Fourth Madam, and apart from the Fourth Branch, she had little connection to the rest of the Yu family. But to get closer to them, Su Buchi addressed everyone the way Yu Mingsi did.

A faint plum-blossom fragrance drifted through the snow. The young woman's eyes were bright and lively, and her smooth, jade-like skin seemed to glow.

Yu Xun glanced at her coolly. His voice revealed no emotion. "Miss Su, there's no need to be so formal."

Su Buchi froze, as if someone had slapped her hard across the face. What was that supposed to mean? She'd gone out of her way to cozy up to him, and he wouldn't even acknowledge their family connection. Could anything be more humiliating?

Bonus Scene 2

Yu Xun suddenly grabbed Su Buchi by her slender ankle and dragged her toward him.

She cried out and struggled desperately to escape his grip. "No! Let go of me! Yu Xun, don't make me hate you!"

Against his overwhelming strength, her efforts were laughable. Yu Xun restrained her effortlessly and brushed his thin lips against the soft flesh by her ear as he said cruelly, "Cousin, I want you to hate me now!"

Su Buchi still left, so resolutely that she didn't even spare him a glance. Yu Xun couldn't let her go, couldn't forget her, couldn't bear it. He was almost driven mad.

Upcoming novel: Late Spring

Cui Lingyi's first encounter with Shen Xu, Duke of Su, began with a murder. She had just pushed down the husband who had constantly beaten and humiliated her, but Shen Xu happened to witness it.

Her heart was dead. She thought she might as well jump down too and give her life in exchange to the Fang family.

But Shen Xu casually lifted her chin with his folding fan, intrigued. "How interesting. If you want to live, you'll have to obey me from now on."

The Duke of Su was handsome and frail, plagued by illness, yet ruthless and formidable. Everyone at court feared him.

Cui Lingyi no longer remembered how she'd felt when she bargained with him. In the end, she agreed to do three things for Shen Xu, after which they would have nothing more to do with each other.

The first thing he asked Cui Lingyi to do was return to the capital.

Returning two years later to the place that had broken her heart, Cui Lingyi never expected that the first person she'd see would be Xie Chiyu.

She was a young relative of the Xie family and had lived with them for five years. She had also loved Xie Chiyu for five years. In her youthful innocence, she had done all sorts of foolish things for him.

At last, in the summer of her fifth year, beneath a starry sky and the long moon, they confessed their feelings to each other.

Cui Lingyi was overjoyed, thinking she had finally made it through the clouds to see the moon. But before long, she heard that Xie Chiyu was about to become engaged to a girl from the Luo family.

Unable to believe it, she hurried to see him. In Shouhui Hall, she heard Xie Chiyu tell Madam Xie with her own ears, "Lingyi is getting on in years. The Fang family has come to ask for her hand, so why not marry her off to them?"

In an instant, she felt as though she'd fallen into an icy abyss.

The past was gone, never to return. All she wanted now was to finish those three tasks as quickly as possible and leave the capital.

But this time, the drunken Xie Chiyu stopped her, looking almost crazed. "Ashan, I regret it."

Core theme: Understanding and compassion matter most.