I Have No Obligation to Be a Gold Digger

Older financial tycoon daddy top x green-tea gold-digger social butterfly bottom

At a prestigious arts university already filled with dazzling talent, Yu Qingnian is the unattainable beauty everyone looks up to. Luxury cars take turns picking him up, and every understated item he wears is the height of luxury. Barely into his twenties, he has already won so many international awards that he can hardly keep track, earning the envy and admiration of countless people. He is like the most dazzling diamond glittering at the top of a pyramid. Of course, some people have called him a poser because everything he owns, right down to a tissue box, is a luxury brand.

But there is one thing everyone agrees on: he must have a great dad.

That's right, he does. Except this particular dad happens to be his sugar daddy.

The campus heartthrob who outshines everyone, the piano prodigy who made a name for himself at a young age, the refined dreamboat adored by countless girls: at home, he is a very different person.

By the floor-to-ceiling windows of a riverside apartment at night, Yu Qingnian lay sprawled helplessly on the white carpet, his fingers still twitching as they unconsciously clutched the cuff of the man's suit trousers. The man scooped him up and settled him on Lu Zhao's lap. After catching his breath, Yu Qingnian swung his feet and said, "I've spent all my allowance for this month. Give me another three hundred thousand."

"It's only the fifth. What did you buy?" Lu Zhao asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Lu Zhao! I've been with you since I was eighteen, and now you interrogate me over a little money? Love follows the money. Does that mean you don't love me anymore?"

Lu Zhao pinched his full cheek and said nothing.

Yu Qingnian hugged his arm and gave it a little shake. "You can't like anyone else. I can't live without you..."

"Then answer me this: why did you sell the bag I bought you again?" Lu Zhao pulled a box from behind the sofa. Inside was the very bag Yu Qingnian had just sold.

The next morning, Yu Qingnian tugged at the tie around his wrist and thought, "I have to escape this controlling freak who loves spying on people! Even if he buys me a hundred more bags, I won't give in."

With graduation approaching, Yu Qingnian finally worked hard enough to get an offer from a music conservatory overseas, but Lu Zhao didn't seem willing to let him leave the country.

Lately, rumors had been going around Haicheng that the person Lu had never forgotten, his one true love, was coming back to China. Yu Qingnian thought, "This is the perfect chance to get away!"

So he gave up trying to be reasonable and started making outrageous demands, throwing bigger and bigger tantrums each time. He stopped bothering with the tender, thoughtful act of a little lover and did whatever he pleased. Strangely, Lu Zhao showed no sign of kicking him out. Instead, he became even more attentive.

At the welcome-back banquet, Yu Qingnian discovered that this frail, long-lost love was the scheming man who had bought his secondhand bag and deliberately exposed the whole thing to Lu Zhao.

He wasn't in such a hurry to break up anymore.

So the long-lost love is back in the country! An old flame is back on the scene! If I don't pretend to be a pitiful little white flower who's madly in love with you, and rake in a huge breakup settlement before I go abroad to study, then I'm not Yu Qingnian!

*** Reader notice: Both the top and bottom have ex-boyfriends, but neither has slept with them.

Coming soon: The Ex Syndrome

[Powerful, controlling top x touch-starved, pampered, prickly sweetheart bottom]

The first time Ye Zhiyang asked for a breakup, he'd beaten up Gu Xiuyan's younger brother all by himself. Afterward, while being comforted, he cried that his hand hurt and sobbed, "If you can only have one good little brother, are you picking him or me?" Gu Xiuyan hadn't chosen him within 0.01 seconds.

The second time Ye Zhiyang asked for a breakup, he'd snuck out in the middle of the night to dance at a male-model bar. Gu Xiuyan caught him and brought him home to discipline him. As the tall man removed his watch and advanced on him, Ye Zhiyang fell onto the bed and threw up his arms. "I'm grown up now! I don't want to live like this anymore, with you controlling everything from my hair color to the shape of my shoelaces!"

The 1,001st time Ye Zhiyang asked for a breakup was on the eve of Valentine's Day. By then, their disagreements had piled up so high that they argued almost every day.

Gu Xiuyan's eyes darkened. A thorn from the rose stem had pierced his finger and drawn blood, but he still didn't let go. His jaw tensed, though he asked in a deliberately casual voice, "You don't like the gift, or do you think I'm controlling you too much again?"

"I just think it's exhausting." Ye Zhiyang stared into his blazing eyes. "I feel like I can't breathe when I'm with you. Let me go."

At first, asking for a breakup had been a way to throw a tantrum. Later, it became a way to make demands. Ye Zhiyang had said he wanted to break up and be free a thousand times. Gu Xiuyan would comfort him, kiss him, hold him, see what he truly wanted, buy him toys, cars, and villas, and promise he could have anything as long as he didn't say they were breaking up.

But he never expected Gu Xiuyan to agree when he said it for the 1,001st time.

Gu Xiuyan turned and walked away without a trace of hesitation, leaving him with nothing but a cold back and a door he could never knock open again.

They met again years later, after Ye Zhiyang had gone abroad, at a friend's wedding. Gu Xiuyan wore an expensive suit and had the air of a mature professional, but his expression was cold, like snow that had never melted. Since they hadn't parted on good terms, Ye Zhiyang didn't dare look up at him.

Seeing them, the adults teased, "When he was little, Xiao Yang used to say he wanted to marry Brother Xiuyan. Why are you so distant now?"

Gu Lin beside him asked quietly, "I wouldn't let you be my sister-in-law back then, so you cracked my head open. What about now? Still can't get my brother out of your mind?"

"I don't!" Ye Zhiyang denied it at once, instinctively raising a hand to punch him. "Besides, he's my brother."

In the past, if Gu Xiuyan had seen him getting all cozy with someone else right in front of him, he would have said, "Daring to wag your tail at someone else? I see you've been having it too easy."

But now all Ye Zhiyang got was a cold, indifferent glance.

The enormous contrast made Ye Zhiyang's heart clench.

As they raised their glasses to celebrate, his fingers brushed Gu Xiuyan's as if by accident. His touch-starved condition flared up at once, surging like a wildfire and leaving him unable even to stand.

His long-suppressed condition had encountered its true trigger and cure. Overwhelmed by an uncontrollable craving, he kept pressing himself against Gu Xiuyan.

"I knew it. You're still the best to me, Big Brother... Could I touch your abs again?"

Ye Zhiyang buried his face in Gu Xiuyan's palm and spread his fingers, reaching down. The maddening craving finally eased a little.

Gu Xiuyan held a cigarette between two fingers, its tip glowing and fading as he blew a smoke ring. His dark eyes rested on the person lying across his thighs, thanking him, and his lips curled into a cold smile.

The child he'd raised with his own hands had abandoned him and left. Just as Gu Xiuyan was trying to move on, he came back. Gu Xiuyan didn't know whether love or hatred had won out, but one thing was certain.

He lifted the other's chin with the fingers holding his cigarette and said calmly, "Given our relationship now, a simple thank-you isn't enough."

Theme: Money isn't the most important thing.