Please Queue Up to Break Off the Engagement

Among the lawyers in Jiangzhou who handle marriages for wealthy families, I charge the most. Breaking off an engagement starts at five hundred thousand, and clients line up from the east side of the city to the west.

Only one person came with a one-yuan coin.

Lu Tingzhou. Three years ago, on the day of our wedding, I walked out through the back door of his hotel, stuffed my wedding dress into a trash can and my veil into my bag, then sat by the river for four hours. The reason was Clause Seven of the prenuptial agreement. I had only read as far as Subsection Five.

Three years later, he pushed a one-yuan coin in front of me. "You owe me for this one."

The engagement he wanted to break came with a three-hundred-million penalty. The position he wanted to give up had originally been mine.

I took the money. That afternoon, his fiancee called.

"Attorney Wen, I'll pay more."

"How much more?"

"Enough to make sure he never forgets me for the rest of his life."

Fine.

I took both sides. On the left, I would help him break off the engagement; on the right, I would help her get a public clarification. I sat in two chairs at the negotiating table, bidding against myself. By the end, even I wanted to see how much he was really willing to pay.

The law firm's rent was eighteen thousand a month, my assistant's salary was six thousand, and the transmission in my 2014 Golf had been repaired three times. I worked out everyone's accounts, except for those three years of my own.

I never turned to Subsection Six of Clause Seven back then. This time, someone laid out the agreement and read it aloud, page by page. I stayed seated. I didn't leave.