A Trap of Springtime Longing

[My next book, Temperature Gap, opens October 13. The blurb is at the very bottom.]

▲ Reunited after a breakup | Unrequited love becomes mutual | The golden boy

▲ Lazy troublemaker x gentle and reserved

▲ Chi Yu x Cen Xi

Chi Yu was a wild and unruly man.

Cen Xi had heard all sorts of juicy stories about him from her high school deskmate.

She had also once accidentally witnessed a girl from their school boldly confessing her feelings to him.

He merely gave a lazy sneer. "You like me? Try getting the highest score in your grade first."

The confession ended with the girl crying as she ran away.

Cen Xi had been crouching in a corner behind the door until her legs went numb. Just as she was about to use the wall to get up, an expensive pair of sneakers appeared in front of her.

With a mischievous look, Chi Yu reached down to offer his hand and said carelessly, "Well, well. Even the top student likes eavesdropping?"

At S University, no one would ever connect Cen Xi and Chi Yu.

Chi Yu was a rich young master, carefree and debauched. More girls wanted to date him than there were designer sneakers in his collection.

Cen Xi was a quiet girl from the south, as calm as water. Her grades and her temper were both excellent, and she had the highest scholarship.

But no one knew that outside the dim stairwell, crowds surged past.

Inside, Chi Yu held Cen Xi in his arms on the lectern, leaving one soft, lingering kiss after another on the girl's eyelids and ears.

Laughter came from outside. Cen Xi trembled with nerves, and Chi Yu turned her face toward him, his voice hoarse. "Baby, can we kiss a little longer?"

After they broke up and met again, Cen Xi thought she was handling things well.

As a good ex, she hadn't let any inappropriate feelings show.

But she couldn't help it when someone on the other side of the table kept deliberately failing to cooperate.

Unable to take it any longer, Cen Xi barged into someone's office. "What exactly are you trying to do?"

Chi Yu seemed much more mature and steady than before. Leaning against the sofa, he lazily loosened his tie and drawled,

"Miss Cen, didn't you say we weren't close?"

Cen Xi answered coolly, "You're welcome. Keeping my distance from my ex is the least I can do."

The man laughed in exasperation and gave a slight tug at the corner of his lips. "Cen Xi, is your heart made of stone?"

She turned to leave.

Before she could reach the doorknob, she was suddenly pulled into a familiar embrace that smelled of mint.

Chi Yu held her so tightly she could barely breathe, as though he wanted to press her deep into his bones and swallow her whole.

Cen Xi asked quietly, "Didn't we agree that we'd act like the other was dead, and whoever broke their word would be a dog?"

Chi Yu gave a mocking laugh. "Yeah, I regret it. I'm a dog."

Every night when I close my eyes, all I remember are your eyes., Louis Aragon

Temperature Gap blurb:

[The heir to an old-money family x a pampered, high-maintenance beauty]

[Powerful, influential, and sternly paternal x proud, dazzling heiress from a bankrupt family]

Older man / ten-year age gap / intense push and pull / an old flame reignites / Daddy

On Christmas Eve, Hong Kong media flashed an urgent report: "Mr. Xi meets a young beauty in secret late at night. Is he robbing the cradle?"

The accompanying photo, secretly taken in a parking lot, was blurry, but it was possible to make out the cane that Xi Mingxuan kept close at hand.

Before long, the "young beauty" seen walking home intimately with him was revealed to be Shi Jiuyuan, the infamous ninth young lady of the Shi family.

The Xi family was the foremost of the five great families in Hong Kong's New Territories, while the Shi family had long since fallen into decline.

Xi Mingxuan became the undisputed head of the Xi family at the age of twenty-six. During his five years in power, he accomplished a great deal and contributed generously to charity, earning universal praise.

He was a true moon in the heavens, flawless as jade.

No one believed he would have anything to do with Shi Jiuyuan.

Until the Xi Group's airline suddenly announced that its newly built port would be named Nineteen Harbor, celebrating Mr. Xi's marriage to Miss Shi.

The news shocked all of Hong Kong.

Shi Jiuyuan remembered the first time she met Xi Mingxuan. It was a winter night, on the day the season turned.

It was her eighteenth birthday party, but someone had spilled wine all over her. After cursing them out, still seething, she ran to the flower bed to sulk alone.

Xi Mingxuan arrived with an unhurried voice and the tap of his cane.

"White peonies are beautiful, but if you stare at them too long, you'll catch a chill. Go, fetch Miss Jiu a wrap."

A gray cashmere scarf that smelled faintly of tobacco fell across her shoulders, covering her bare skin. Shi Jiuyuan ignored it and let it slip to the ground.

She recognized the man before her. He was a distinguished guest her grandfather had begged to attend, and she was supposed to call him "Uncle Xi."

After looking at her for a few seconds, this Uncle Xi handed his cane to his assistant and crouched in front of her himself, gentlemanly wiping the wine from her ankle with his cashmere scarf.

Shi Jiuyuan instinctively pulled away, but his cool, warm palm soon held her in place.

"Since you call me Uncle, I should take care of you," he said.

Later, the Shi family declared bankruptcy. It was raining in Hong Kong that day.

Shi Jiuyuan was dancing in a thin slip dress at a party, with a young star beside her wiping away her sweat and pouring her drinks.

In the time it took for one song to play, everyone's gaze changed.

Sympathy, or perhaps gloating.

Everyone wanted to see how Hong Kong's most noble and dazzling white peony would wither, step by step.

A bold man offered her his room key. "Miss Jiu, don't be sad..."

Shi Jiuyuan turned her head to let her companion light her cigarette, then gave the man a casual glance.

A bodyguard in black immediately stepped forward and twisted the man's arm.

Screams rang through the ballroom, and everyone stopped moving.

Miss Shi leisurely held her cigarette and scolded the bodyguard with a tilt of her head. "You've been with me so long, and you're still so rough."

"My apologies, Miss Shi. Mr. Xi ordered me to put your safety first."

The photo of her companion lighting her cigarette eventually made the papers.

Late that night, Shi Jiuyuan lay in the bathtub, sat on the bathroom counter, and leaned against the floor-to-ceiling window, crying until she was hoarse.

The man stroked her long hair, pressed her down, lowered his eyes, and told her to try.

When Shi Jiuyuan heard his encouraging "good girl," she tried.

Afterward, she lay in his arms, touched the corner of her mouth, and glared at him with red-rimmed eyes. "Uncle Xi, is this how you take care of me?"

Xi Mingxuan loved to stroke the crown of her head and leave a tender kiss there.

He lowered his eyes to gaze at her, his look almost tangible, his tone gentle and restrained. "Xiao Jiu, this is your punishment for misbehaving today."

Theme: Love people well.