Chapter 288 - Blowing the Lid off Our Cohabitation (2/2)
“Is that enough proof to show that the both of us have been together for the whole night?” Ah Sha blinked back at the officers. Redness crept up the male officer’s face once again. “Yes. Yes, of course.”
The female officer was interrupted mid-sentence by the ringing of her phone. She picked it up and pressed the receiver to her ear. The officer seemed annoyed at whatever that she had been told over the phone. She hung up and said, “Pardon us for the interruption.”
“What is it?” Asked the male officer.
“That was Chief Chen. There are no signs of Mei Jing at the other apartment building as well.”
An Ru was staying on the 28th floor. Mei Jing couldn’t have grown wings and flown up there, could she now?
“Officer,” Wan Qingsi called out at the male officer. “Can you tell me what happened to An Ru? She’s a celebrity that our company represents, after all.”
“Oh, sure,” the officer said. The officer seemed rather traumatized by his knowledge of what happened. “She lost her voice. And she’s… she’s disfigured.”
In the hospital, An Ru was kicking up a tremendous fuss. She couldn’t yell or speak (she had lost her voice), so she opted for smashing everything within her reach to pieces. Once she had calmed down, she pulled out her phone and logged on to her Weibo to make a post. She even took a photo of her bandaged face and posted it on Weibo.
Meanwhile, Ah Sha returned to the movie set to continue the filming. After dropping her off at the set, Wan Qingsi returned to the company. He didn’t even make it into the building before he was surrounded by a huge crowd of reporters.
“President Wan, An Ru claimed on Weibo that it was Mei Jing who had disfigured her. Are you planning to get justice for An Ru?”
“President Wan, will Stars Entertainment terminate its contract with Mei Jing if she really turns out to be the perpetrator?”
Qi Xiu ran out from inside the building to hold back the reporters. Wan Qingsi stepped onto the landing and faced the sea of reporters. “Mei Jing was with me the whole night. There was no way she could’ve gone to An Ru’s place.”
That declaration drove the reporters into a state of frenzy. No wonder they hadn’t been able to figure out where Mei Jing was staying; the two of them had been staying at the same place this whole time.
“The police have already approached us regarding this matter, and we’ve reached an understanding,” Wan Qingsi said. “Mei Jing is still in the middle the movie’s filming.” There was a pregnant pause. “With that, I hope I’ve made myself clear.” Wan Qingsi turned around and walked into the elevator.
After completing the laborious task of sending the reporters away, Qi Xiu rushed into Wan Qingsi’s office all sweaty and exhausted. “Couldn’t you have picked a better time to reveal your cohabitation to the public? Do you want to work me to death?”
“Bring the contract the An Ru. We’ll be ending our contract with her.”
“Seriously?” Qi Xiu shook his head ruefully. “We’ve invested quite a sum on her, though. We didn’t even have the chance to earn back our investment!”
Wan Qingsi glanced at Qi Xiu. “She can’t even speak now, let alone sing.”
“But the public would accuse us of being cowards who pour salt on An Ru’s wounds instead of being supportive of her. Her fans would rebuke us for being unethical. The whole thing might even negatively impact Mei Jing.”
Qi Xiu knew that Mei Jing was right at the top of Wan Qingsi’s list of priorities right now. Bringing in Mei Jing was the only way he could convince Wan Qingsi to drop the idea.
“She can’t do her job in the state that she’s in, right? Why don’t we just let her be for now?”
Wan Qingsi pondered Qi Xiu’s suggestion briefly before nodding.
An Ru’s post on Weibo had soon garnered her a lot of support from her fans; on the other hand, Mei Jing’s official Weibo account was filled with nasty messages from angry An Ru’s fans. Zhou Na rushed back to the company for a five-minute meeting with Qi Xiu. After that, they both went on Weibo and began repairing the damage done to Mei Jing’s PR.
In an interview with the reporters, the police released a statement saying that Mei Jing had nothing to do with the assault on An Ru.
Qi Xiu had even released two lengthy videos containing the video surveillance footages of Wan Qingsi’s apartment building. Amidst the fiasco, an observant netizen realized that: news flash, Wan Qingsi and Mei Jing had been staying together all this while! This time around, a lot of people began turning their attention towards this new piece of gossip; An Ru’s accident soon fell by the wayside.
At the hospital, An Ru had seen the shift in the public’s attention as well. She cried hard, but no sound came out. The bandaged on her face, on the other hand, was drenched with her tears. The wetness stung, making her skin itchy and painful at the same time. At one point, she felt an urge to scratch the skin off her own face.
Tang Yue reblogged the surveillance videos on her own Weibo. She even included several emoticons in support of Mei Jing. After that, she tossed her phone aside.
“I don’t understand why you’re taking her side, Sister Yue. She’s living with the boss now, you know?” Xiao Zhao passed a cup of coffee to Tang Yue. “I really don’t get the boss at all. You’re so much better than her, but why did the boss…”
“Stop with that nonsense.” Tang Yue glared. “The boss is just my senior. The man I want is Second Young Master Wen.”
Xiao Zhao dared not say anything else after that. Deep down, however, she was grumbling to herself. “That Second Young Master Wen has been missing for nearly half a year,” she thought. “You can’t even be sure if he still remembers you…”
“An Ru is done for. It doesn’t matter whether or not her voice is recoverable. Stars Entertainment will never use her again,” Tang Yue said with a lazy drawl and she cast a glance at Depp, who was now engaged in an animated conversation with Ah Sha. A wave of uneasiness rose to her throat.
Depp’s attitude towards her was polite; cordial, at best. But with Ah Sha, Depp always seemed so enthusiastic, as if they were close friends.
After a moment of thought, Xiao Zhao seemed to have picked up what it was that Tang Yue was insinuating. “She tried to frame Mei Jing. The boss will most likely end the contract with her.”
“How do you know she’s framing Mei Jing? She might be telling the truth for all we know!” Tang Yue took a sip of coffee. “An Ru isn’t a fool. She didn’t have to frame Mei Jing and suffer the wrath of Stars Entertainment. She must’ve had a good for doing so.”
“Ah!” Xiao Zhao covered her mouth in disbelief. “Are you saying that Mei Jing really is the culprit?”
Tang Yue didn’t answer. She closed her eyes and rested her mind. Xiao Zhao dared not asked any more questions after that. She draped a sweater on her shoulder and stood quietly to one side.
“The attack is most likely Wan Qingsi’s doing,” Tang Yue thought.
That year at Caesar Academy, a boy was hospitalized by Wan Qingsi after he made a comment about Ah Sha not being related to the Ying family by blood. The injury that the boy suffered was so great that it took him more than half a year to recover. Apparently, the boy’s family went into bankruptcy as well. Everyone knew the lengths Wan Qingsi would go through for Ah Sha’s sake.
“What a fool.” Once again, Tang Yue regarded An Ru with nothing but disdain. She wasn’t sure if Wan Qingsi’s feelings for Mei Jing were real. But at least for now, it was clear that Wan Qingsi was very protective of her. Heck, he even went as far as living together with her. And yet An Ru had the balls to frame Mei Jing. That woman really had a death wish.
The next day, An Ru’s disfigurement as well as Wan Qingsi’s cohabitation with Mei Jing were all over the newspapers. Even the Hong Kong press had dedicated an entire page to it. After breakfast, Lin Musheng caught a glimpse of the newspaper. Suddenly, his eyes shone brightly.
“Long Hu, call the old man!”