Surrounded by Wolves
Come here?
Every hair on Jiang Wu’s body stood on end.
Where?
She gripped her phone and instinctively looked straight ahead.
Behind her, she could still hear the murmurs of the reporters. “He hardly ever appears at public events.”
“With a face like that, yet he chooses to stay behind the scenes…” One reporter clicked his tongue in admiration.
“He’s got money and power. He doesn’t care about being in the spotlight.”
“Look, what’s that on his hand? A wedding ring?”
“He seems to have worn a ring all along, for five or six years now.”
“It doesn’t look like the one before. Wait, let me adjust my camera so I can see more clearly.”
Huo Qingzhi stood right where the spotlights were focused. As if he knew exactly what she was thinking, he sent another message. [Go backstage.]
The piercing sensation of having her thoughts seen right through made Jiang Wu’s scalp go numb.
On the big screen, Huo Qingzhi put down his phone and looked in her direction.
Jiang Wu hurriedly averted her gaze and quietly rose from her seat at the back.
She could feel the reporters behind her turning to look. Their gazes seemed to scorch her back, leaving it burning hot.
Jiang Wu maintained an outward calm appearance as she slipped around the side, choosing a discreet passageway to the backstage area of the press conference.
Whatever the case, this was her own family’s turf. It was perfectly natural for her to go wherever she pleased.
The reporters soon turned their attention back to the man on the big screen.
Huo Qingzhi appeared equally composed on the surface.
He finished arranging his documents and briefly instructed his assistant on the arrangements for the upcoming press conference.
His every movement was composed and unhurried.
It was the effortless ease of someone who had long been accustomed to wielding power, accompanied by a cool detachment that kept others at arm’s length.
Their family’s bodyguards were stationed backstage to protect everyone’s privacy.
Jiang Wu had no idea what had suddenly gotten into him.
Full of confusion, she made her way through the discreet corridor and arrived at the backstage lounge.
The moment she reached for the door handle, she heard footsteps approaching from behind.
They were steady and measured, each step carrying a solid weight that echoed through the quiet backstage corridor.
Jiang Wu turned around. Huo Qingzhi was walking over unhurriedly, his expression unreadable.
“You wanted to…”
Before Jiang Wu could finish, the man behind her pushed her straight into the lounge.
With a bang, the lounge door slammed shut!
A bodyguard on patrol happened to pass by and instinctively went on alert.
But after confirming that the figure he’d just seen was his superior, he thought nothing more of it.
Meanwhile, inside the lounge, the very same superior whom the bodyguards regarded as noble and cold-hearted was pinning their young lady against the door, kissing her with desperate intensity.
The sudden kiss left Jiang Wu’s mind completely blank for a moment.
Her breathing caught slightly.
She was pressed against the door, the man’s muscular forearm, its veins standing out prominently, gripping her neck.
Controlling her lifeline, devouring her fiercely.
It had all happened too suddenly.
Her heart lurched, and wave after wave of electric tingles ran down her spine layer by layer.
The sensation was so intense that it shot straight to her head. She instinctively tried to resist, only to make the door behind her rattle.
She knew there were people outside and didn’t dare move again.
All she could do was endure the overwhelming intensity he was subjecting her to, far more than she could bear in such a short span of time.
Her nerves taut, she forced herself to take it.
Huo Qingzhi had never kissed her with such intensity, never gone this far.
Every time she moved, he pressed harder, as though he wanted to brand every part of her, leaving his mark deep within her.
No matter what she said in public, he was going to make sure she understood exactly what their relationship was.
Who was supposed to be standing by her side.
And who was just a brother!
Only when he finally pulled back slightly, leaving Jiang Wu gasping for breath, did she feel his kisses move lower.
He pulled apart the ribbon bow at the collar of her blouse.
His cool fingertips began undoing her buttons as well, exposing to him a side of herself no outsider would ever get to see.
Jiang Wu’s nerves were stretched taut, and somehow, the word slipped out before she could stop herself. “Brother.”
Perhaps in a setting like this, that was the only relationship they could claim to have.
But he only kissed her harder.
He pressed a fierce kiss against a spot that could be concealed beneath her clothes. Only then did Jiang Wu realize what he was doing.
He was leaving love bites on her.
“No, you can’t. I…” Jiang Wu turned her head to avoid him, but he only left more marks.
He was practically like a madman.
Knowing no one outside could be allowed to notice anything unusual, he made an absolute mess of her beneath her clothes instead.
Ten minutes later, with only three minutes remaining before the press conference was due to begin, every media camera was pointed toward the main podium and the VIP passageway through which Huo Qingzhi was about to emerge.
Representatives from the participating companies had all taken their seats.
Among the few scattered empty seats was Jiang Wu’s.
A stir broke out somewhere.
The reporters, sharp as ever, found its source first. Their cameras swung toward the source, and a flurry of shutter clicks followed.
Every lens captured the same striking face: sharply defined features, a handsome, mature appearance, and an air of cool composure.
He emerged surrounded by bodyguards and a group of senior executives. His noble air came naturally to him.
Huo Qingzhi stepped onto the stage and casually picked up the prepared speech for the day.
One media outlet repeatedly zoomed in on the footage to get a closer look at his hands. But when they examined his fingers more carefully, they discovered that the ring they’d spotted earlier was gone.
Meanwhile, Jiang Wu emerged from the exit of the secluded passageway, the wedding ring that should have been on Huo Qingzhi’s hand clenched in her palm.
She even overheard someone nearby whispering, “The ring on his hand is gone.”
Soon, Huo Qingzhi began speaking.
His deep, resonant voice drew the reporters’ attention away from everything else.
No one gave the missing ring another thought.
Jiang Wu’s heart was pounding.
Not just because of the ring hidden in her palm, but also because of the mottled traces of the love bites he’d left on her today, beneath her proper shirt.
They were scattered messily across places no one could see.
Fortunately, everyone’s attention was on Huo Qingzhi at that moment.
When Jiang Wu returned to her seat, practically no one thought anything of it.
She barely listened to a single word of the entire press conference. The heat still lingering in her body had yet to subside.
Beyond that, there was the fact that she’d been thoroughly disheveled backstage by the very man she’d just called just my brother in front of all these reporters.
Huo Qingzhi carried a contradictory rationality.
He had left the ring with her to match what she’d said, ensuring that outsiders wouldn’t notice anything unusual, to keep up the role of brother in public.
But behind closed doors, he became a man on the verge of being driven mad by his own rationality, utterly out of control.
It was as though the more clearly he understood what he was supposed to do, the more deeply he suppressed himself, until that repression had become terminally ill, beyond saving.
But while the media paid no attention to Jiang Wu, someone else certainly did.
Huo Yingli was seated not far behind her.
He had seen everything clearly: the scene of Jiang Wu and Huo Qingzhi leaving one after the other, then reappearing one after the other.
He remained unusually quiet. Although neither of them seemed to have done anything out of the ordinary on the surface, Huo Yingli couldn’t shake the feeling that something between them was becoming increasingly strange.
That ring…
What ring?
What exactly had happened during the time Huo Qingzhi had accompanied Jiang Wu to Beijing?
As the thought crossed his mind, Huo Yingli instinctively looked toward Huo Lingyi, who was seated in the row ahead.
Huo Lingyi had his back to him. His side profile was sharply defined, his jawline clean and distinct, as he stared fixedly at Huo Qingzhi onstage.
No telling what he was thinking.
Apart from the media, no one was paying much attention to the content of the press conference.
They already knew all about it.
It was nothing more than an announcement of Hengyu’s positioning and future development plans following its official unveiling.
Huo Tingjun would manage all Hengyu’s affairs as the highest decision-maker. This was another major bargaining chip that Huo Tingjun had secured for himself.
After Huo Qingzhi finished speaking, Huo Tingjun took over.
The financial news outlets seized the opportunity to make their own interpretations.
Words like uncle and nephew fighting for power, the older fox knows best, and the newly appointed chairman reduced to nothing more than a figurehead were thrown around.
None of that mattered to them.
After all, negative and controversial stories were precisely what brought media outlets traffic.
But Huo Tingjun was happy to hear it.
Beneath the countless camera flashes, he carried himself with all the authority and bearing of a veteran board member who had spent years at the top of the corporate hierarchy.
He certainly had the presence of someone in charge.
His words were forceful and commanding, drawing rounds of applause from time to time.
After the press conference ended, quite a few corporate representatives came forward to greet Huo Tingjun.
One congratulation after another made his smile spread so broadly that the corners of his eyes crinkled, as though he had already taken the group’s highest seat for himself.
By comparison, Huo Qingzhi’s side was considerably quieter.
Perhaps it was his usual habit of keeping people at arm’s length that made him difficult to approach in the first place.
For now, he simply stood there, organizing the things in his hands. For some reason, the atmosphere around him seemed particularly heavy.
Huo Tingjun could understand it, though. Losing power was bound to leave a bitter taste.
Huo Qingzhi was still young, after all. His experience and credentials were somewhat lacking. He shouldn’t have been sitting in that highest position to begin with.
The higher one climbed, the harder the fall.
And if he ever came crashing down, it would be a painful lesson.
Huo Tingjun had already gained so much. All he needed now was one opportunity to bring Huo Qingzhi down.
The press conference came to an end.
The attending representatives and media personnel wrapped up their respective activities and began leaving.
The once-bustling conference hall quickly grew quiet.
After seeing off the last of his business partners, Huo Tingjun headed downstairs as well.
By now, most of the cars had already left the parking lot.
He got into his car and spotted Huo Qingzhi’s car driving past in the distance.
After a brief silence, Huo Tingjun watched the car disappear before suddenly asking, “Has anything been happening on his side lately?”
“Huo Qingzhi is still the same as before. Nothing out of the ordinary.”
” And apart from the businesses that are already running smoothly, he hasn’t taken on anything new, so there’s nothing we can use against him.”
Huo Tingjun thought about it and found that made sense.
All the group’s newer and more promising business ventures were currently in his hands.
Feeling rather pleased with himself, Huo Tingjun clicked his tongue and said, “If we can’t find anything to use against him in business, then let’s look into his private life.”
“His private life…” The assistant in the front passenger seat looked a little troubled. “His routine is very regular. He goes to work and then straight home. These days, he hardly even attends business dinners.”
Huo Qingzhi had always maintained a strict schedule and imposed rigid rules on himself.
Huo Tingjun was a man himself. He knew perfectly well what kinds of things men were likely to get into trouble over.
“Didn’t you hear all those reporters privately discussing Huo Qingzhi at today’s press conference?”
“Someone who looks that good and has a little power in his hands is bound to attract more attention when it comes to romantic scandals.”
“I refuse to believe that a young man in his prime has gone all these years without a woman.”
“Look into it.”
Even a little scandal involving women could be blown out of proportion, damaging Huo Qingzhi’s reputation.
“Yes, sir.”
~~
At the press conference, Jiang Wu had made contact with several cultural media outlets.
One of them was the young reporter who had interviewed her about her professional work before the event.
This was Jiang Wu’s first time voluntarily appearing in front of the media since the paternity test controversy.
She really admired that young reporter, who, with so much gossip on offer, had respected both her profession and her own media’s mainstream content.
It also let Jiang Wu, in her first interview afterward, answer the questions she truly wanted to answer.
The reporter was somewhat flattered by the unexpected favor.
Truthfully, she hadn’t expected Jiang Wu to agree to an interview in the first place. She had simply rushed forward to give it a try.
Her media company primarily focused on cultural subjects, including intangible cultural heritage, historical relics, and other distinctive cultural content.
Over the past two years, they had also received support for several projects.
But compared with the other media outlets, Junyu Media was still just a small company.
To have landed an opportunity with someone like Jiang Wu meant not only gaining access to the Hong Kong Museum, but also getting a foot in the door with Hengyu. It was practically a windfall from heaven.
Jiang Wu took the business cards from the other media companies as well, then returned to the Hong Kong Museum to hand over her assignment.
The museum would screen the media companies for future collaborations and arrange the publicity campaign.
Shan Lan walked into the office with an approval form in hand. “We’ve tentatively decided that Jiang Wu will host the publicity event.”
“Huh?” Jiang Wu hadn’t expected that at all.
Shan Lan handed her the form. “What? You don’t want to?”
Jiang Wu thought to herself that certainly wasn’t what you said before.
Just six months ago, the Hong Kong Museum had treated every bit of news about her like a potential crisis.
“For an event like this, if I’m the host, aren’t you worried the media might focus more on my personal affairs instead of the event itself?”
Shan Lan urged her to fill out the form. “You’re the one who contacted the media outlets. You know what they’re likely to focus on, don’t you?”
Jiang Wu supposed that was true.
Beside them, Bu Yu was watching the interview footage from the press conference. “Actually, I think your interview went perfectly normally this time. They didn’t ask any ridiculous or inappropriate questions either.”
The press conference had been livestreamed. Afterward, various media outlets would edit selected clips into separate news segments for release.
Jiang Wu’s interview was one of them.
“We’re all keeping an eye on things for you,” Bu Yu added, then she remarked, “They only asked a couple of questions about your brothers.”
Jiang Wu’s hand paused over the form.
That familiar feeling of having to conceal things in front of the media washed over her again.
She couldn’t help thinking about how strangely her brothers had been acting lately.
And about that kiss in the backstage lounge, where her big brother had pinned her down, away from the cameras, kissing her with reckless, almost debauched abandon.
The kiss marks beneath her blouse still hadn’t faded.
The wedding ring was still in her pocket, too.
Someone else in the office chimed in, “Exactly, our museum needs a public face, too.”
Jiang Wu quickly pulled herself together, finished signing the form, and handed it to Shan Lan.
With the remaining time, she put together a brief script based on the publicity event’s schedule.
By the time work ended, Jiang Wu left the museum with her script in hand.
She spotted Huo Yingli’s car parked outside.
Huo Yingli was leaning against it. When he saw her emerge, the corners of his lips lifted slightly. He straightened and walked over.
“Come on, let’s get dinner?”
Jiang Wu was a little surprised. “You’re free today?”
“Yes, I’m free today.” As he spoke, he reached out and took her handbag without giving her a chance to refuse. “Unlike me, Big Brother and Third Brother aren’t nearly so free. They’re still busy with the new company.”
Jiang Wu understood. “Then where are they eating? At the office?”
“Mm.”
Sitting in the passenger seat, Jiang Wu suggested, “Should we get something for them and drop it off?”
Huo Yingli laughed. “The group has dedicated nutritionists. They won’t starve.”
“Right now, my only job is to feed you.”
With that, Huo Yingli started the car and drove her to a French restaurant.
When it came to food and fun, Huo Yingli was an expert. He always managed to find new and interesting things that opened Jiang Wu’s eyes.
By the time they finished dinner and Huo Yingli drove her home, it was already past nine.
The car stopped outside the Kowloon Tong residence.
Jiang Wu said casually, “I’ll head inside, then. You should go home and get some rest, too.”
She had only halfway opened the car door when Huo Yingli stopped her. “Won’t you invite me in for a while?”
His voice was low and gentle, yet there was an indescribable hint of intimacy in it, especially in the stillness of the late night.
“I’m going to bed, Brother,” Jiang Wu said, deliberately using the familial form of address. “If you come in, I don’t think you’ll enjoy yourself much either.”
“Another day.” With that, she closed the car door. “Go home.”
Huo Yingli found himself wondering what would happen if he simply stopped holding back and went inside anyway.
Would she be frightened?
She had even started calling him Brother.
He could tell that the Brother in that gentle refusal meant she was a little afraid.
Huo Yingli watched until she entered the house.
Was he really that obvious now?
Was he even as obvious as Huo Qingzhi?
Meanwhile, in the home theater on the second floor of the Kowloon Tong villa, all the lights were off.
Standing by the sofa near the floor-to-ceiling windows, Huo Qingzhi watched his wife being driven home by his own younger brother.
Even after Jiang Wu had gone inside, his brother still couldn’t bring himself to leave.
Huo Qingzhi withdrew his gaze. Under the room’s starry ceiling, the champagne glass in his hand sent ripples of light dancing across its surface.
The shifting, unpredictable reflections settled in his eyes.
When Jiang Wu returned from outside, she noticed Huo Qingzhi’s jacket hanging up and other signs that he’d come home.
But she couldn’t find him.
Assuming he was in a meeting or occupied with work, Jiang Wu decided to take a relaxing shower first.
By the time she came out, Huo Qingzhi still hadn’t appeared.
Finding that strange, she went from room to room looking for him.
She even checked Binging’s little cat villa. Eventually, she made her way to the home theater at the far end of the second-floor hallway.
Jiang Wu pushed open the door. The room was pitch-black; only the enormous projection screen was illuminated with constant shifting light.
A man sat inside with his back to her, staring intently at the screen.
Puzzled, Jiang Wu walked in. The moment she crossed the threshold, the darkness seemed to swallow her slender figure whole.
She had no idea of the danger she was walking into.
The video on the screen had just finished playing, leaving a brief interval of darkness before the next loop began.
“Why are you in here?”
She received no answer.
Huo Qingzhi still held his glass, his fingertips idly stirring the ice cubes inside as he waited for the screen to come alive again.
A moment later, the screen lit up again.
The instant Jiang Wu recognized what was playing, a cold sweat broke out across her back.
It was her interview earlier that day. The beginning had been cut off, leaving only the latter half.
It started with the question, “May I ask whether Chairman Huo accompanied you to Beijing specifically for your sake?”
to her saying, “They’re only my brothers.”
A two-minute interview.
When it ended, the screen went dark. A few seconds later, it began playing again.
“May I ask whether Chairman Huo accompanied you to Beijing specifically for your sake?”
And Huo Qingzhi had been sitting here the entire time, watching the same interview, over and over again, almost as though he were deliberately torturing himself.
Every light in the room was extinguished.
No matter what Jiang Wu asked, he didn’t react.
He simply kept watching the footage, again and again.
The sight made her scalp crawl. She finally walked over and picked up the remote, intending to turn it off.
Before she could press the button, he caught her wrist. With a gentle tug, he pulled her off balance and into his lap.
Huo Qingzhi calmly took the remote from her hand.
The next instant, he threw it into a corner!
The sharp crack as it struck the floor made Jiang Wu’s nerves jump.
The interview continued playing on the screen.
She could still hear her own voice.
“Our relationship is the same as it has always been.”
“They’re only my brothers.”
Huo Qingzhi stared straight at her.
Jiang Wu felt her skin prickle. “Don’t be like this. You’re scaring me.”
Huo Qingzhi brushed the hair away from her ear and supported the back of her neck. “What are you afraid of?”
“Isn’t our relationship the same as it has always been?”
His fingers slid down the side of Jiang Wu’s neck before slipping beneath the neckline of her nightdress, nudging aside one of its thin shoulder straps.
His fingertips, still chilled from the ice water, grazed her skin, making her feel a faint, ticklish shiver.
“I’m only your brother.”
Jiang Wu’s lashes fluttered. Her voice came out slightly breathless and soft. “That was an interview.”
Almost like she was coaxing him.
“Then tell me. What am I?”
Jiang Wu was at a loss for words. She had a vague idea of what Huo Qingzhi was trying to coax her into saying. But she simply couldn’t bring herself to say it.
The silence made the atmosphere increasingly strange and oppressive.
When the screen went dark once more, the darkness and his suddenly unrestrained kisses swallowed her together.
Jiang Wu was pressed down onto the sofa and heard the metallic sound of chains. Then her wrists were brought together, one over the other, followed by a sharp click.
A pair of fluffy handcuffs snapped around them!
Jiang Wu panicked. “You…”
“Don’t be afraid.” Huo Qingzhi’s voice was still gentle, even as he held the chain connecting the cuffs and tugged at it.
His words, however, sounded like those of a demon who had lost his mind. “After all, our relationship is the same as it has always been, isn’t it?”
As he spoke, he fastened her hands to one corner of the sofa, leaving her completely exposed before his eyes.
He knelt in front of her and began undoing his shirt buttons, one by one.
Jiang Wu was in a position where she couldn’t hide herself at all.
Her hands were restrained, leaving her unable to move. Before her was the imposing figure of a tall man looking down at her.
Then, without the slightest hesitation, he began undoing the buttons of his shirt… followed by his belt.
In a hoarse voice, he asked her, “Can you call me Brother again?”
The sheer force of his possessiveness made Jiang Wu instinctively try to shift away.
With her handcuffs still tethered to the sofa, she braced herself against it and tried to pull herself farther up.
“You… you’re such a pervert… Ah!”
Before she could finish, Huo Qingzhi had already pinned her down against the sofa.
He pressed in behind her, his solid forearm crossing her front as he gripped her shoulder, holding her firmly in place.
It had been a long time since Jiang Wu had endured anything like this. Her body instinctively struggled to recoil from the frightening object.
He held down her repeatedly shifting hips, pressing into her inch by inch.
His hand also remained on her lower abdomen, as though trying to feel for something, to make sure he was in the right place.
On the sofa, all that could be seen were Jiang Wu’s knees rubbing restlessly against the cushions and her toes curling up tightly, over and over.
The interview playing on the enormous screen mingled with her faint, muffled sobs.
Huo Qingzhi was like a madman. He pressed close to her ear and demanded, “Say it!”
“Why aren’t you calling me Brother anymore?”
His fingers slipped between her teeth, prying them open. “Did you call Huo Yingli Brother when you were with him tonight?”
Bringing up her Second Brother at a time like this was strange.
Jiang Wu found it difficult to separate what he was doing to her now from her Second Brother. After all, her relationship with the two of them had once been exactly the same.
Yet Huo Qingzhi continued, “You called him that just now, so call me that now.”
Jiang Wu turned her head, but she still couldn’t escape the force of his mouth against hers.
He was relentless from every direction.
His voice was hoarse and ghostly, almost like a demon whispering in her ear. “Would you mistake me for me?”
Soon, physiological tears welled up in her eyes, blurring the light and shadow before her eyes.
The large screen was shaken so badly that it showed a double image.
Then a second time.
A third.
The moisture gathered more heavily at the corners of her eyes, finally forming tears. But they were quickly shaken loose.
The man became increasingly unrestrained.
He knew perfectly well that what he was doing to her was utterly unreasonable. But he couldn’t control himself.
Huo Qingzhi felt that he was far too sick now.
So sick that he had lost all reason, desperately wanting to hear a second answer from her, one that was different from the answer she’d given in the interview.
His long fingers roughly rubbed at the corners of her reddened eyes. His breathing was ragged, and he repeated, self-destructively, “He’s only a brother.”
Jiang Wu’s legs kicked harder and harder, and when she lost her sense of security, she’d still whimper out, “Brother…”
It felt like fireworks were exploding all over his body.
He buried deep in her neck, his thin lips grinding her earlobe, his tone growing increasingly harsh. “Did those two treat you like this?”
“Bb, we’re all your good… brothers.”