Biting Through the Fog

[Main story complete] [Polite psycho x clear-eyed, sensitive heroine]

When Xu Wu saw Xie Peishen again, she had a new boyfriend by her side.

She had just returned from abroad and was attending someone else’s wedding banquet with her boyfriend.

Xu Wu greeted him respectfully. “Hello, Brother Peishen.”

Xie Peishen nodded. “Mm.”

In everyone’s eyes, there was a clear distance between them. They seemed quite cold toward each other.

After the banquet, in a shadowy corner of the underground parking garage, Xie Peishen, who had just been showered with compliments, cornered her. Lowering his eyes, he whispered against her ear, “Wu Wu, you finally decided to come back?”

Meanwhile, her boyfriend searched everywhere for her, but couldn’t find her.

-

Xu Wu moved into the Xie family home when she was fifteen.

Her mother introduced the Xie family’s only son, Xie Peishen, as someone who was not only widely renowned but also modest, courteous, and easy to get along with.

But during the two years after Xu Wu started university, in the secluded pavilions and hidden corners of the Xie family’s old estate, he tormented her in all sorts of vile ways.

“Be good. Are you coming back to the old estate with me, or should I go to your place?”

“You saw for yourself. I have a boyfriend.”

Xie Peishen gave a faint laugh. “That’s fine. Then we’ll let him watch us kiss.”

-

Xu Wu had a diary that accidentally fell into Xie Peishen’s hands.

It showed him that there was another version of their story, one he’d never known about. In that version, he was the one being played.

So on their wedding night, he took her hand and wrote beside the words in her diary that contradicted his own: [Wu and Peishen are destined to be together. From this day forward, we will stay by each other’s side for the rest of our lives.]

Reader advisory:

| One-on-one romance, familiar faces, intense push and pull, both sides fighting to win

| True love, happy ending. Major content warning: neither lead is perfect! The male lead is extremely possessive!

| Includes an age gap / class difference / faux siblings / mild coercion

Please add my upcoming book of the same genre, Drenching the Moonlight, to your reading list. Find it in my author profile. Blurb:

Lu Nanyue was adopted by the Cheng family and supported through her education. Although she now has a career of her own, she offers to go to the Cheng home every weekend to help with odd jobs as a way of repaying their kindness.

The Cheng family’s only young master, Cheng Zhifei, is the sort of heir everyone says was born with the world at his feet. He’s admired by all and blessed with talent.

He’s a good person, thoughtful and polite.

Lu Nanyue always feels she hasn’t done enough. After the regular housekeeper finishes cleaning, she personally goes around and checks everything again.

One day, after finishing up in someone else’s room, Lu Nanyue runs into Cheng Zhifei. His eyes darken as he looks at her.

He simply tells her, “From now on, you only need to clean my room.”

-

The Cheng elders treat Lu Nanyue like their own daughter and want to bring their families even closer, so they tacitly promise her to Zhou Yu, Cheng Zhifei’s cousin on his mother’s side.

Lu Nanyue has always been prepared for it. Zhou Yu is easy to get along with, and she expects to marry him before long and spend the rest of her life with him.

Then one day, while home on a break and tidying Cheng Zhifei’s room, she is cornered by him. With his family downstairs, chatting happily, he calls her by name: “Lu Nanyue, give me a chance.”

Lu Nanyue remembers their first meeting. He was polite and proper, dressed in a white shirt and black pants, and brought her a cup of hot tea to warm her hands. He even took the initiative to call her “big sister.”

At some point, he stopped calling her that.

“Don’t be silly. Besides, you should be calling me your big sister.” She thinks he’s just fooling around.

Cheng Zhifei smiles, takes off his glasses, and sets them on the table. Then he leans close, his gaze tender as he looks at Lu Nanyue. “Sorry. I can’t bring myself to call you that anymore, not since I realized I was in love with you.”

Later, those hands that used to polish his glasses steal kisses from her lips and caress her face when no one is around.

Theme: Grow toward the sunlight