Wedding Vows [Marriage Before Love]

The next book will be another marriage-first, love-later story, titled Waiting for the Right Moment. Its blurb appears below this one. Please add it to your reading list~

Before meeting Yan Shuwen, Yu Zhi had never imagined she would impulsively marry a man she had met only a few times.

The first time she saw him was downstairs from her office building.

That night, the cool light from the office ceiling fell across his face, casting deep shadows over his striking profile. He was aloof and refined.

It was a rainy night, the air misty and damp, carrying a hint of chill.

She crouched in the rain, with no will to move forward, as if she had lost all her strength and every means of escape.

Raindrops fell on her hair and back. Water had no weight, yet that night each drop seemed to sting.

In the city center, late at night, passersby hurried along.

He walked over slowly and held an umbrella over her.

The second time she saw him was aboard a river cruise ship.

At her grandmother's request, she had gone on a blind date, and she knew her grandmother had turned her marriage into a bargaining chip in a deal with someone else.

That night, she accidentally trespassed into his territory.

She also learned that his family was pressuring him to marry. Not knowing where she found the courage, she stopped him and asked quietly, "Yan Shuwen, would you consider me?"

She wanted to trade marriage to him for her freedom.

Yan Shuwen, founder of Guanghe Capital, is a major figure in the medical device industry, worth hundreds of millions. Yet he has a face that seems untouched by the world, and a temperament as detached as a pine tree, like a mountain spring or a white lotus in a pond: beautiful to behold, but not to be sullied.

Yu Zhi had thought her marriage to Yan Shuwen would be just like him: peaceful and restrained, their relationship as insipid as water.

But one night, when she happened to run into a suitor, he, usually so pure and elegant, threw her onto the bed.

The sunset glow reflected on his finely sculpted face. He rolled up his sleeves, revealing a lean wrist, and leisurely loosened his tie as he walked toward her.

His gaze darkened. Bending close to her ear, he said, "Be good in a minute."

[Winter, 2019. Yijiang was colder than usual, as if foreshadowing a future where she would never see the light of day. She crawled through the darkness, trapped and unable to escape.]

[She had thought this winter would be like all the others: bitter, dull, and tiresome. But at winter's end, when spring quietly arrived, love and a future came at the same time.]

A sensitive, resilient good girl x a refined scoundrel

Blurb for Waiting for the Right Moment

The hero schemes his way to the top / marriage first, love later / the second male lead tries desperately to win her back, but fails

Note: The male lead is Jiang Shiyu!

1.

Song Sui was brought to the Xu family and adopted when she was ten.

Back then, she was thin and small, sensitive and gentle, and lived cautiously.

As a child, whenever she was bullied, she would hide in an abandoned factory and sit on the moss-covered stone steps, clutching the hem of her skirt.

Until one day, beneath the setting sun, Xu Shiqin climbed the steps and, backlit, took her hand.

"Hide behind me from now on. They won't dare bully you."

Someone stood up to protect her when she was at her most insecure.

From then on, someone lived in her heart, and stayed there for eighteen years.

2.

Song Sui treasured her love for him, careful not to let it show, and tried her best to keep up with him.

From No. 3 Middle School to the Provincial Experimental School, from insecure to radiant, she spent eighteen years, through countless dawns and dusks, and six thousand days and nights, trying to get closer to him.

One day, her diary, filled with a young girl's secret thoughts, was made public, and the whole city was in an uproar.

Afterward, at a banquet, a group of rich young men gathered together. Someone asked Xu Shiqin what he thought about it.

Xu Shiqin sat on the sofa, the glowing tip of his cigarette flickering in the dim banquet hall. His eyes were half-lidded, his tone lazy and casual. "She still hasn't realized where she stands."

The group burst into laughter.

Song Sui's heart died.

At a charity gala, amid a torrential downpour, she stood beneath the eaves, her hair and the hem of her skirt soaked by the rain.

A Maybach rolled slowly through the rain and mist. Trembling, she stepped in front of it.

The window slowly rolled down, revealing half the man's silhouetted face, his striking profile cast in deep shadow. Jiang Shiyu turned slightly to look at her.

Summoning all her courage, Song Sui said, "Jiang Shiyu, will you marry me?"

Later, on a snowy night,

Xu Shiqin stood outside a villa in Nancheng, eyes red, knocking on the door in utter disarray. Every moment away from Song Sui had filled him with regret.

When the door opened, he hurriedly lowered his head and pleaded, "Sui Sui, will you come back with me?"

Jiang Shiyu leaned against the wall, looking down at the man before him, who was practically on his knees. He calmly straightened his cuff links, which had been pulled loose. "Mr. Xu, she is now..."

"My wife."

The door closed. Song Sui looked up at him, her autumn eyes misty. "Who was that?"

Jiang Shiyu replied offhandedly, "A salesman."

He stepped closer and wrapped an arm around her waist, his gaze growing deeper. Leaning by her ear, he said, "Sui Sui, you have quite a lot of strength. You even pulled off my cuff links."

Song Sui pouted playfully. "Couldn't you be a little gentler?"

Jiang Shiyu chuckled, his breath brushing her pale neck. He whispered, "Then next time, you can be on top..."

3.

Later, while tidying the study, Song Sui found a dusty box tucked into a corner of the bookshelf.

Inside were countless train tickets for trips between the capital and Jiangyi. At the very bottom lay a love letter the boy had never sent.

She opened it. It was Jiang Shiyu, at seventeen, confessing his feelings for Song Sui, then fifteen.

It turned out that during the years when she had been an insecure, sensitive girl, someone else had also carried his love carefully in his heart, loving her for many, many years.

Reader's guide:

1. The title comes from a poem.

2. Both leads are sexually inexperienced; happy ending; a sweet, slice-of-life romance~

3. Marriage first, love later; the male lead falls first.

4. A writing exercise, focused on romance, and not long.

5. The blurb was first finalized on January 9, 2025, and revised on January 21, 2025. Screenshots have been saved as proof on Weibo.

Theme: Become a better version of yourself.