“You absolute fool!” Baoxia’s voice, sharp as broken ceramic, cut through the perfumed air of the bridal suite. Her hand, usually so demure, was a blur as she slapped two yellowed documents onto the polished mahogany dressing table. “These prove it! You, Peizhi, were swapped at birth. You are not a Ling. You are a no-name, a peasant’s brat, and this marriage, this life, it’s all mine!”
Peizhi, draped in the silken folds of her bridal gown, merely tilted her head. Her reflection in the ornate mirror showed an unblemished face, framed by a delicate cloud of dark hair, a faint, almost imperceptible smile playing on her lips. She hadn't even flinched when the documents hit the wood. Ling Yao, her supposed fiancé, stood rigid by the doorway, his finely tailored suit looking suddenly too tight, his eyes darting between the two women.
Baoxia’s chest heaved under the lace of her bridesmaid dress. Her triumph glittered, cold and hard, in her gaze. “My mother confessed everything. The nurses, the bribes, the desperate switch when I was born weak and sickly, while you… you were robust. They thought I wouldn’t survive the Ling household’s expectations. But I did! And now, I claim what’s mine. The Ling name, Ling Yao… it all belongs to me.” She pointed a trembling finger at Peizhi. “You are no one.”
Peizhi reached up, her movements slow, deliberate, like a cat stretching in a sunbeam. Her fingers brushed the intricate pearl embroidery of her veil. “Is that so?” Her voice was soft, almost a whisper, yet it filled the sudden silence in the room more completely than Baoxia’s histrionics.
Ling Yao finally found his voice, a strangled cough. “Baoxia, what madness is this? These papers…”
“Are legitimate!” Baoxia shrieked, snatching them up and thrusting them towards him. “A birth certificate from the Zhaoping General Hospital, a nurse’s sworn affidavit! Look! Peizhi Ling was born Peizhi Chen! You were betrothed to a ghost!”
Peizhi’s smile widened, a genuinely pleased expression, as if Baoxia had just handed her a particularly delightful pastry. She lifted her left hand, the brilliant jade-and-diamond engagement ring sparkling under the suite’s crystal chandelier. “Oh, dear. How terribly inconvenient.” She slid the ring off her finger. The gold felt warm against her skin for a moment, then cold as it left. She placed it carefully on the dressing table, next to the abandoned birth certificates.
Baoxia’s mouth opened, then snapped shut. This wasn’t the sobbing, distraught reaction she’d anticipated. This was… serene.
Peizhi turned from the mirror, her silk-clad arm sweeping towards the door. “Then, by all means, cousin. The Ling name, its considerable expectations, and its rather temperamental fiancé are all yours.” She walked towards a small, embroidered travel bag on the velvet ottoman, ignoring Ling Yao’s bewildered stare and Baoxia’s gaping jaw.
“You’re… you’re just leaving?” Ling Yao managed, disbelief painting his features.
Peizhi paused, plucking a single, ivory silk cushion from the bag. “Well, I can hardly marry you now, can I? It would be quite rude to my cousin, wouldn’t it?” She gave them a small, sweet bow. “Do enjoy your wedding, then.”
With that, she glided past them, the heavy train of her satin skirt whispering across the polished floor. The door clicked shut softly behind her, leaving Baoxia and Ling Yao in stunned silence, the scent of expensive lilies suddenly stifling.
Outside, the balmy afternoon had turned into a sudden, torrential downpour, the kind that swept in from the Canglan Sea with no warning. Peizhi pulled the bridal veil over her head like a hood, shielding her hair from the deluge. The intricate lace became a soggy, clinging mess. She didn't care. The cool spray on her face felt invigorating after the stuffy suite.
A hulking figure stood beneath the dripping eaves of the grand hall, his broad shoulders hunched, the rough fabric of his shipyard foreman’s jacket plastered to him by the rain. Soot-stained, smelling faintly of brine and molten metal, Gongze looked like a storm cloud made flesh. He was the man Baoxia had been engaged to before she'd discovered the identity swap, the man she’d coldly, brutally abandoned just this morning in her rush to claim Ling Yao.
He watched Peizhi approach, his dark eyes, usually so sharp and intimidating, holding a raw, quiet desolation. His hands, calloused and powerful, were clenched at his sides. He looked utterly lost.
Peizhi stopped a respectful distance from him, the silk cushion clutched to her chest. “Foreman Gongze,” she said, her voice barely audible over the drumming rain. “You’ve just been cast aside. I’ve just been cast aside. Perhaps we can be cast aside together?”
Gongze’s head snapped up. His eyes, dark as polished obsidian, searched hers, trying to decipher the impossible lightness in her tone.
“I have a proposal,” Peizhi continued, ignoring the water running down her face. “Marry me. In return, I ask for only one thing.”
He remained silent, his gaze unwavering, expectant. His mouth hung slightly open, stunned.
“A velvet chaise lounge,” Peizhi stated, her requirements clear and unwavering. “A long, plush, utterly useless velvet chaise lounge. And a guarantee of twelve hours of undisturbed sleep a day.”
Gongze stared at her, then slowly, a corner of his mouth twitched, a minuscule movement that transformed his face from storm cloud to something akin to a wary, amused bear. He reached out a hand, his fingers cautious as they brushed a stray lock of wet hair from her face. He didn’t say a word.
Instead, he scooped her up. Her bridal gown, heavy and sodden, was no impediment. She was featherweight in his grip. He carried her away from the grand hall, past the gaping faces of the wealthy banquet guests who had gathered, drawn by the commotion. He carried her through the pouring rain, her single silk cushion still clutched in her hand, towards a battered, soot-stained truck, the only vehicle that dared to brave the puddles of the Ling estate driveway.
The Zhaoping Shipyard Quarters were a stark contrast to the opulence she’d left behind. Grimy, practical, reeking of coal smoke and the distant clang of metal, they stood as a monument to relentless labor. Gongze’s small apartment was spartan, but meticulously tidy. He set her down gently by a sturdy wooden table, the silk pillow still in her grip.
“I’ll… find a blanket,” he rumbled, his voice rougher now, as if he hadn’t used it in days. He turned towards a plain chest in the corner.
Peizhi, still dripping, her elaborate gown a ruin, surveyed the room. Her gaze fell on a tarnished copper-bound chest near the door. It was an old dowry box, one she recognised from her bloodline’s less distinguished side, the one Baoxia had declared beneath her and left behind. A loose clasp had sprung open during the move, and a single, heavy leather-bound volume had slipped halfway out.
Dusty, embossed with a faded, intricate pattern, it was the hidden ledger of the Ling family’s crippling, unacknowledged debts. The one that was meant to be her burden. The one her supposed father had been trying to foist on her unsuspecting husband. Peizhi’s serene smile returned, deeper and more genuine than before. Her eyes followed the line of the ledger, then glanced towards the empty spot where Baoxia’s name would now sit in the family registry. “Oh,” she whispered, the rain still clinging to her lashes, “she took the poison too.”