"My surname is Li Mingyou. I have been studying at Imperial College for several years. I have a four-year-old son and an old mother at home. My first wife passed away in childbirth. To be honest, a widower like me has no extravagant hope that a girl will marry me. I'm afraid of the matchmaker. I deliberately omitted some omissions when passing the message in the middle, girl, don’t think I’m verbose.”
"It doesn't matter, the matchmaker has told me."
Seeing that Li You's attitude was very sincere, Shen Yinxiao also explained: "I am a little old and my father is in poor health. If anyone gets married to me in the future, they will inevitably have to take care of my parents with me. I will tell you in advance." Know. "
Li You smiled with relief: "It's natural for a husband and wife to take care of both parents together. Girls don't have to worry."
Shen Yinxiao didn't expect him to be so easy to talk to.
"Ms. Shen."
Shen Yinxiao was stunned for a moment. Li You stretched out his hand and waved it in front of her eyes. She came back to her senses and asked, "What's wrong?"
"The hairpin is loose."
Shen Yinxiao raised her hand and touched her bun. She had just packed it up in a hurry in the car and the hairpin ring was not inserted properly. She took out the hairpin and inserted it into her hair again. The tassel on the hairpin caught a strand of hair and pulled it. Pulling, her hair got stuck and her scalp hurt. She didn't pay attention and made a hissing sound.
She blushed.
A pair of hands stretched out.
Li You looked calm, stood up and took her hand away, holding the tassel on the hairpin, and patiently peeled off the hair wrapped around the tassel.
Li You's warm breath brushed against her forehead and cheeks.
"alright."
"Thank you."
"Too polite."
Li You suddenly raised his eyes to the second floor and said softly: "That person seems to have been looking at us."
Shen Yinxiao's heart skipped a beat and turned to look.
Wei Cheng was leaning against the railing, lazily looking down at the two of them.
Seeing her turn back, their eyes met in the air, and the man raised the corners of his lips coldly and sneered.
That gaze seemed to have a scorching temperature, but also seemed to be cold and hard ice. It swept across the two of them slowly, making Shen Yinxiao's scalp feel numb for a moment.
"Who does Madam Shen know?" Li You asked probingly.
"I..." Shen Yinxiao didn't know how to reply. Suddenly Wei Cheng put his arm around the woman beside him and turned his gaze back.
In an instant, all her thoughts were washed away. She should have known it a long time ago. Wei Cheng was not a good man who kept his integrity. In the past, he could not wait to press on her every day and ask for her without any satisfaction, regardless of day or night. Sometimes he was even so bold that Climb over the wall in the middle of the night to find her.
Now that she is getting married, he naturally wants to find a new love to warm his bed.
He had really never regarded her as a girl from a good family, the number one in the Xinhuan brothel, but in his eyes, was she the same as the girl from Cuihua House?
There was a dense pain in my heart.
Shen Yinxiao forced out a smile: "I don't know him."
She had mixed feelings in her heart, and she tried not to look at the intimate pair of figures upstairs, but bitter ripples kept rising in her heart, as if she had suddenly been dug out, feeling bitter and empty.
After drinking tea, Li You carefully packed two boxes of snacks and asked her to take them back to her parents.
Wei Cheng didn't know when he left.
The uncomfortable feeling at the tea shop just now has slowly passed. There are only a few pedestrians on the road, and Shen Yinxiao is walking slowly alone.
She suddenly felt that Li You was pretty good too.
Gentle, meticulous, and a scholar, he also has a son, and the task of carrying on the family lineage will not fall on her in the future.
As long as he is good to her and her parents, she doesn't mind being a stepmother and is willing to raise the child as her own.
Li You is more suitable for her than Wei Cheng.
What's more, Wei Cheng is destined to leave Youzhou.
The Dayin royal family, which lasted for more than six hundred years, has long since declined. Today, the powerful minister Dong Yan has all the power in the court. The young emperor is trapped in the palace and is helpless. This is the time for powerful heroes from all over the country to show off their talents.
A son of a powerful family like Wei Cheng is destined not to stay in the small Youzhou for the rest of his life. Once he leaves, he will be as free and at ease as a dragon entering the world.
She was destined to be different from him. For the rest of her life, she could see the end at a glance. She would marry an honest man, earn a moderate amount of money, and provide for her parents in this remote town until the end of her life. But Wei Cheng had a bright future.
Soon she arrived at the door of her house. She came back to her senses and pinched her palm in annoyance.
She and Wei Cheng were done for good, and she could no longer think about him all the time.
After standing at the door for a while, she raised her hand and opened the door.
First, she poured herself a glass of water. The warm water warmed her cold limbs. She put the snacks on the table and shouted: "Mom, dad, Li You bought some snacks and asked me to give them to you." bring back."
It was already approaching dusk. She groped for the fold and lit a candle.
"Is it possible that I have already gone out and the lamp is not lit?" she said to herself.
As soon as he finished speaking, when he turned around with the candle, the slumped and crouched figures of Shen's father and Shen's mother were exposed to the weak flames.
Sad and gloomy.
She was startled, carefully placed the candle on the table, stood up and helped the two of them.
Father Shen shook his head desperately and sat on the ground unable to get up: "I deserve to die, I deserve to die..."
Mother Shen burst into tears when she heard the sound: "Stop talking about it, old man."
"What happened?" Shen Yinxiao's heart suddenly sank.
Mother Shen shed tears, her old muddy eyes full of hesitation and despair about the future. Her hand holding Shen Yinxiao trembled slightly, and her voice trembled, "Yinxiao, your father has been deceived."
Shen Yinxiao's heart fell to the bottom. In just a moment, she realized that the twenty taels at noon were probably gone.
"Speak carefully." She swallowed and forced them to help them get up calmly.
Father Shen was so ashamed that he lowered his head and said nothing.
Mother Shen had no choice but to say: "Today your father took the money to sign fingerprints with someone, but the person sat down and raised the price by fifty taels. Your father said that he should go home to raise money, but the person said that he would not sign it now and would rent it immediately. Fortunately, a kind person passed by and said that he was willing to lend your father fifty taels, so your father borrowed it. Unexpectedly, your father signed the contract and gave the money. The neighbor there said that the house your father was interested in, It’s a haunted house! People have died! The houses next door have all moved out! Where will there be business from now on? We might as well go out and sell it with a cart!”
"If that's the case, it's okay. If the business is bad, you will make less money. As time goes by, the reputation of the haunted house will fade away. It's okay if you don't say anything and have strange powers."
Shen Yinxiao poured some water for them, "It's just such a coincidence that I happened to be short of money and happened to have a loan passing by."
She was a little worried, "Where are the loan documents? Show them to me."
Mother Shen quickly took out the paperwork from the cabinet and gave it to her. Seeing Shen Yinxiao's face slowly darkening, Mother Shen and Father Shen felt a little uneasy and asked eagerly: "Are you okay?"
Shen Yinxiao's hands and feet were cold.
Father Shen and Mother Shen didn't know a few Chinese characters. They only knew a few numbers above. The paperwork was written in black and white, which clearly showed multiple times of interest. The principal of fifty taels was limited to them being able to pay off within one year. The principal and interest would add up to enough for one year after maturity. There are one hundred and fifty taels.
She played the piano and sang songs day and night, but she couldn't save enough money.
If she cannot afford to pay back the debt when it is due, the only remaining house in the family will also have to be used to repay the debt. If the house is not enough, she may not be able to escape the debt.
"Who asked you to sign it?"
"That man seemed gentle and polite. He even helped me argue with the owner of the shop. He was not a bad person." Father Shen explained.
Shen Yinxiao almost laughed angrily: "They colluded to deceive you into collecting usury money. If you pay it back after one year, we will have to pay back one hundred and fifty taels. How can we not have one hundred and fifty taels? Let's not even mention it." My mother and I were about to be sold our house to pay off our debts. These people knew our family’s situation and colluded to destroy us.”
Mother Shen's body softened and she sat down on the ground.
Father Shen was stunned and shook his head.
Mother Shen suddenly remembered something: "Then let's pay it back quickly. If it's early, there won't be so much usury money."
"It's written above that you only need to pay it back in one year. If you pay it back now, they don't want it. Even if they want it, they still want one hundred and fifty taels."
"Then what should we do..." Mother Shen's face turned pale and she muttered to herself.
"It's all you! Okay, I have to rent some kind of shop! How can we live like this?" Shen's mother cried and beat Shen's father, and Shen's father was helpless and allowed her to push him.
"Yin Xiao, dad remembers that there was a young master before who helped you and paid for our family's medicine. Why don't you ask him for help? What about Li You? He should be willing to help us too, right? "
Shen's mother heard this and said bitterly: "You have done something wrong and you still want your daughter to take advantage of it! Can the man who went to Cuihua Building be a good person? You just let your daughter do it for money, what do you think of it?" Like this! Li You just met him once, and you asked Yin Xiao to go find someone to borrow money? Do you know that Yin Xiao is going to get married!"
Father Shen's face turned red.
Shen Yinxiao calmed down.
"Stop arguing, I understand."
