Snowfall in the South of the Capital

During the best years of their relationship, Wen Yanchu took Xie Wanyan everywhere with him. The two were always together, and their relationship had become an unspoken secret among Jingzhou's upper crust.

Back then, Xie Wanyan was sweet and sensible. If he said yes, she never said no.

So when he told her he was going to marry someone else, he never expected her reaction to be so extreme.

She gave up everything he'd secured for her in Jingzhou: her job, resources, and connections.

Xie Wanyan left without looking back.

He was left feeling like a piece of trash she'd casually thrown away, something she simply didn't want anymore.

*

That day, cigarette butt after cigarette butt piled up at Wen Yanchu's feet, their scarlet glow mocking his arrogance.

Amid the haze of smoke, Wen Yanchu suddenly realized that over the years, her wings really had grown strong.

"If you're so capable, then don't ever come back to Jingzhou." He issued his final ultimatum, still unwilling to back down.

Xie Wanyan forced a smile and said breezily, "Don't worry, Mr. Wen. Even if Jingzhou had a major case that absolutely required me, I still wouldn't come back."

But later, after dropping hints here and there, he finally brought a major case with a generous fee to her.

Xie Wanyan never imagined that the reason she'd set foot in Jingzhou again would be to handle the division of assets in Wen Yanchu's divorce.

*

After ending his marriage of convenience, Mr. Wen finally swallowed his pride, asking only for a chance to win back his ex.

"Anyone looks beautiful beneath a cherry tree, and anyone can make romance out of a bouquet of roses."

She didn't have to be with him.

Only now did Xie Wanyan understand that, so she wouldn't accept Wen Yanchu's roses again.

After a dinner with her law firm, before Xie Wanyan could make out the person waiting outside her door, a pair of strong hands pinned her against the stairwell wall.

The lights were dazzling, making her head spin. Someone eagerly kissed her, and was quickly rewarded with a slap.

Wen Yanchu turned his head, looking wronged. "I've never given roses to anyone else. Only you."

- The garden was fenced in, too. No one else had ever stood beneath the cherry tree, not from beginning to end. -

Reader notes:

1. The male lead's first marriage is only a marriage of convenience.

2. Both the male lead and second male lead are pure in body and mind.

3. Neither lead is perfect. In the later chapters, the heroine keeps taking revenge on the hero, turning love into hate, with a love that becomes a sea of bitter resentment.

4. The heroine will neither marry nor have children.

5. The groveling-to-win-her-back plot turns into a dog-training diary.

6. Original title: Snowfall in Jingnan

Currently serializing Mustard and Milkshake. Please add it to your favorites!

○ Radiant, resilient designer vs. sharp-tongued top lawyer

○ Aloof, smug man falls from his pedestal | Marriage before love | Bickering couple | Rivals in love

Blurb:

The year Lu Yisu graduated from university, her family went bankrupt and was buried in debt.

Before she could even go home and cry in her father's arms, the father she'd depended on since childhood announced that he'd arranged a marriage for her.

He planned to use the generous bride price from the other party to get through the crisis, "selling" his daughter off as the wife of a notorious rich playboy.

Lu Yisu resisted with all her might, but in the end she had no choice but to marry.

Only, she didn't marry that spoiled heir. Instead, she married Qiao Xingtin, the legal counsel who worked part-time for her father's company, and a top lawyer in his own right.

According to her father, Qiao was the one who had intercepted the marriage proposal she'd originally been promised.

Top lawyer Qiao Xingtin graduated from one of the country's top law schools, with an impeccable academic record and scholarship after scholarship.

At twenty-nine, he's a senior partner at Mingde Hengzheng, one of the country's top law firms.

People in the industry describe him with eight words: "Strict with himself, harsh with others."

So, even though he has a strikingly handsome face, not a single single woman at his firm dares show interest in him.

He chalked up his decision to marry Lu Yisu to a rare moment of compassion.

That's why he stepped in and took her out of the disastrous marriage she'd been promised.

Compared with that licentious playboy, who'd been involved in a death and slept with both men and women, at least Qiao could be called a gentleman.

Of course, marrying her also meant he could stop enduring his family's monthly pressure to get married.

It suited them both, a mutually beneficial arrangement, and nothing more.

When they first married, the young heiress, used to living in a villa, moved into Qiao Xingtin's spacious Beijing apartment. She looked around, reasonably pleased, then heard the man say in a quiet voice:

"The bride price I paid your family nearly wiped out all the savings I've built up since I started working. So we're probably going to live rather frugally from now on."

Miss Lu, who'd believed her father when he said Qiao Xingtin loved her deeply and would love her until death: "..."

Theme: A healthy, equal view of love