My Dad is My Mom's Mortal Enemy

Chapter 9

Shao ChengZe had just finished a stifling meeting and was in an extremely bad mood. Facing such an outrageous issue, he should have just hung up the phone.

"I'm on planet Earth," he heard himself reply.

Cheng LiQi breathed a small sigh of relief, "That's great, I'm on planet Earth too."

They were both on planet Earth. Even if they were far apart, they could still meet if they got on a plane.

Shao ChengZe bent his fingers to massage his temples, leaning back in his chair with his long legs crossed on the desk. Listening to the delight in her voice, he found himself wanting to let this inexplicable phone call continue.

Cheng LiQi had a line of questions waiting in her mouth. She had so many things she wanted to know.

"I'm six this year. How old are you?"

"Thirty."

Oh~~ He's the same age as big uncle, two years older than mom.

Cheng LiQi continued asking, "Where are you now?"

Shao ChengZe habitually took the initiative and asked back instead of answering, "Where are you now?"

Cheng LiQi replied, "I'm on the set of the TV series I'm filming."

Shao ChengZe figured she must be some child actor.

There was a knock on the door, and Shao ChengZe said to Cheng LiQi, "I have to get back to work now, so I have to hang up."

Afraid that he would hang up, Cheng LiQi hurriedly called out to hold him back, "Shao ChengZe."

Shao ChengZe was startled. Few people called him by his full name. The one who called him like this the most, only that one.

Forcefully, angrily, and very occasionally, dragging out her voice coquettishly.

The tender voice pulled him back from his memories. "You haven't answered my question yet, where are you now?"

Shao ChengZe patiently answered, "Do you know Shao Corporation?"

"No, I don't," Cheng LiQi had not heard of this name before, "Is that where you work?"

"Yes."

"Okay, I got it. You work at Shao Corporation. Then...can I call you again in the future?"

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Shao ChengZe had never known he could attract little girls to like him. In the past, little girls would only hide far away at the sight of him. This little girl actually wanted to call him again. Could it be that his voice was more likable than his face?

"You can call at night." He casually said a sentence. Anyway, she didn't have his number. Even if she did, whether or not he would pick up her call would depend entirely on his mood. He couldn't possibly be free enough to chat idly with a little girl on the phone.

"Then get back to work quickly. I'll call you tonight."

When mom was at work, she was always very busy too. She couldn't disturb his work.

"Mm."

"Bye Shao ChengZe." Cheng LiQi softly bid him farewell.

"Bye." Shao ChengZe was about to hang up.

Cheng LiQi added, "You have to wait for my call, don't go to bed early. I'll call you at eight."

"...Okay."

"I'm hanging up now."

"..Okay."

Shao ChengZe felt like he had just gone through an elaborate ceremonial leave-taking with this phone call.

When KONG YiChun heard the "come in" after knocking, she entered to see her boss spacing out and staring at his phone. KONG YiChun found it a bit strange. Her boss had been spacing out more frequently lately. That day he was holding something purple in his hand spacing out. He had put it away too quickly for KONG YiChun to make out what it was. In hindsight, it should have been a hair clip. She suspected that her boss had a woman.

Of course these were just her suspicions. Other than Miss SHEN, she had never seen any other women around her boss. And Miss SHEN was Young Master Shao's mother's goddaughter, effectively Young Master Shao's sister. She had also inadvertently overheard this when sending the drunk Miss SHEN home that day. No one had paid any attention to Young Master Shao's mother, so no one knew about their relationship.

Regarding Young Master Shao's family background, KONG YiChun had found out the gist of it during her time at the company. Young Master Shao's family background was not a secret at Shao Corporation. When work pressure was high, they would gather together and gossip quietly about their boss's personal affairs. This was one of the ways these pitiful office workers relaxed.

The Shao family relationships were quite complicated. Old Chairman Shao YunZheng, Young Master Shao's grandfather, had two wives.

His first wife Yin ManQing built Shao Corporation together with Old Chairman Shao. Unfortunately she died in a car accident not long after giving birth to a son, Young Master Shao's father, Shao ZhangKe.

Old Chairman Shao's second wife, Wu JingYao, was his secretary at the time. She married into the family a year after Yin ManQing's death. She quickly became pregnant and gave birth to a son, Young Master Shao's second uncle Shao ZhangTing.

Young Master Shao's father, Shao ZhangKe, had poor health since childhood. Rumor was he also did not have a good father-son relationship with Old Chairman Shao. Because of marriage matters, he had directly fallen out with Old Chairman Shao. He refused the arranged marriage set up by Old Chairman Shao, insisting on marrying the nurse who had taken care of him, Young Master Shao's mother. Old Chairman Shao was so angry that he threatened to sever their father-son relationship. Shao ZhangKe directly announced publicly that he no longer had any ties to the Shao family. He brought his new bride to settle down in Jiangnan, completely leaving the Shao family after that.

When Young Master Shao was seventeen, his father passed away. That was also the year he returned to the Shao family. However, he only stayed at the Shao family for a few years before Old Chairman Shao sent him abroad. When he came back, it was as the new Shao Corporation CEO, fully taking over the corporation. Shao ZhangTing and his son Shao JingYun were completely defeated in this power struggle, now only in charge of the peripheral Shao Jewelry business. To say they were banished was not an exaggeration.

In the short month since Young Master Shao took over, Shao Corporation had taken several drastic actions, laying off whoever needed laying off, withdrawing whatever needed withdrawing, reducing whatever needed reducing. For a time, everyone in Shao Corporation felt insecure about their jobs.

The Board was split into two factions. Shao ZhangTing's faction, the majority, said these painful reform measures were tantamount to destroying Shao Corporation. The other faction believed that in recent years, Shao Corporation's development had stagnated due to cumbersome internal procedures and overly diversified business segments, not to mention all the useless people occupying positions through nepotism who did nothing but create trouble. Young Master Shao's actions were merely to unload the burdens weighing the massive Shao liner down so that it could embark on a new course.

Outside gossip could be sensational, but no outside opinions could prevent Young Master Shao from continuing to implement his policies.

Last week, Young Master Shao directly removed his step grandmother's brother Wu JingFeng from his position in the corporation. Old Chairman Shao publicly berated Young Master Shao during the meeting, and Young Master Shao talked back directly. Old Chairman Shao was so angry that he flipped the water glass on the table. Everyone began speculating that Young Master Shao's tenure in this position probably wouldn't last long. No one at Shao dared to disagree with Old Chairman Shao's opinions.

But ever since that flare up, Old Chairman Shao had not publicly stated any opinions about Young Master Shao's actions, which in such circumstances represented acquiescence. Everyone suddenly realized that Young Master Shao was personally brought back by Old Chairman Shao, meaning that Old Chairman Shao was on Young Master Shao's side. Perhaps that scene between grandfather and grandson at the meeting was an act, to show everyone that Old Chairman Shao could not control Young Master Shao, so the people Young Master Shao removed were finalized decisions that would not be invited back.

In recent years, relying on his step grandmother's status, Wu JingFeng's side of the family lorded over Shao Corporation arrogantly, pulling factions and bullying others, causing all kinds of trouble. With Shao ZhangTing and his son covering for them, even if things reached Old Chairman Shao, Young Master Shao's step grandmother would shed a few tears and the matter would be dropped. In the last two years, quite a few middle management backbone members who did real work for the corporation chose to resign, saying on their way out that if the Wu family kept this up, Shao Corporation's decline wasn't far off.

Perhaps Old Chairman Shao wanted to purge the Wu family people from the corporation but couldn't bear to be the bad guy in front of the Wu family, so he had his grandson go on the offensive. After all, Young Master Shao and his second uncle, as well as the Wu family, never did get along. Rumor was it was his second uncle and the Wu family working together who had Young Master Shao sent abroad back then. Now Young Master Shao dealing with the Wu family could be considered fair and square.

Whether it was an act or not, KONG YiChun didn't know. She only knew that Young Master Shao really did not listen to Old Chairman Shao, and that grandfather and grandson really did not get along. Old Chairman Shao's calls to Young Master Shao all went through her. Of those, nine out of ten Young Master Shao would not take, and for the remaining half call it depended entirely on his mood - if his mood was good he wouldn't take it, if he was in a bad mood then he would, only to get into a loud argument.

KONG YiChun didn't know what had happened between grandfather and grandson, she only felt that these wealthy families, despite appearances that outsiders envied, were actually full of tangled interests and thorns without the slightest trace of familial love.

Even this Young Master Shao himself, KONG YiChun couldn't detect a shred of human touch to him. Other than laughing once at the airport that time, all other times he was either cold-faced, stiff-faced, or black-faced. Times like this spacing out with a numb expression were truly rare.

"Young Master Shao," KONG YiChun spoke up.

Shao ChengZe came back to his senses, taking his legs off the desk. He asked casually, "Secretary KONG, I remember you already have a child?"

"Yes."

"Is your child a boy or girl?"

...KONG YiChun didn't know why her boss would suddenly care about her child, but since her boss was rarely in such a gentle mood, she answered truthfully, "A girl."

"How old is she now?"

"Five."

"Do girls this age ask a lot of questions?"

It wasn't asking a lot of questions, but asking endless endless questions. Why drink water, why sleep, why go to school, the only why she didn't ask was why eat, because her little girl was a glutton. Her nickname was Fat Girl. Thankfully she was a glutton, at least when eating she could shut her mouth a bit, otherwise KONG YiChun felt she really would be driven crazy by her endless questions.

KONG YiChun couldn't complain to her boss about her own daughter, so she thought of a more tactful way to say it. "Very curious, wants to know a little about everything."

Not only was She curious and fearless, she was also able to chat with a stranger she had never met for so long on the phone. She must have taken after one of her parents. At such a young age, she could speak so well. Her upbringing must have been good. Asking him questions about himself first before asking anything else. But it was not good to be like this either. In case the person she met was a bad person, she would have sold all her secrets.

Shao ChengZe felt he was rather free today. Not only did he take a strange call, he was also worrying about things that were none of his business. He pulled back his thoughts and asked Kong YiChuan, "What did you want to see me for?"

It took Kong YiChuan a few seconds to react before she realized who the boss was referring to. Cheng's second miss, the old boss of LanChuan Hotel.

YiSheng was a major customer of LanChuan. But the hotel under Shao's managed to snatch this major customer, and it was done with Shao's consent, in a not very upright way. Kong YiChuan thought Shao, as the new boss, was just trying to make some big moves, not only internally in the group, but also externally.

This move broke the balance of non-aggression between the Cheng and Shao families over the years. It was equivalent to declaring war on the Chengs. So when she heard from YiSheng that second miss Cheng was going to YiSheng's auction, she immediately reported it to Shao. Just in case second miss Cheng was really going to disrupt the scene, they could be prepared.

When she reported it to Shao, Shao did not react much, only responded rather coldly, "I see." Then added, "Keep an eye on the auction."

She thought the boss had forgotten about it. After all it was not a huge matter, and he had been busy and swamped recently. She did not expect him to still remember clearly which day the auction was. She could only say the boss had a really good memory.

She replied, "Miss Cheng did not go to the auction."

Shao just nodded slightly, and said nothing more. Kong YiChuan saw he had no other instructions, so she left.

At noon, Shao ChengZe received a call from Shen XiWen. He was reluctant to take the call. He had just finished a call with his mother. His mother could speak continuously for half an hour in one breath on the phone, and did not even need him to respond. She could naturally switch topics after finishing one. His father once said that even professional storytellers probably could not beat his mother. Her son did not inherit her gift of gab. Shen XiWen as a goddaughter, was better than her godmother. He had just finished listening to a storytelling session, and just wanted to eat in peace. He did not want to listen to another story immediately after.

Even so, he still answered the call.

Shen XiWen's mother and his mother were sworn sisters. When Shen XiWen was in high school, her parents fell ill and passed away one after another. So his mother brought Shen XiWen home, and treated her like her own daughter. Also, when he was away from home all these years, it was Shen XiWen who accompanied his mother. In his mother's heart, Shen XiWen's position was probably more important than his.

"Did you call me?" was the first thing Shen XiWen asked.

Shao ChengZe was distracted by the little auntie, and forgot what he wanted to say. He repeated that she did not need to go to Shao JingYun's dinner.

After saying that, when he was about to hang up, Shen XiWen stopped him. "The little auntie who helped me answer the phone seemed to like you a lot. She kept asking me all kinds of questions about you, and even asked for your number from me. Seeing that you rarely get a little girl to like you, I gave her your number."

Shao rubbed his brow. It was too late now that she had given his number.

"Don't do this again in the future."

Just as he was about to hang up, Shen XiWen spoke again. "She is Shen ChuQi's classmate, and also his best friend. If she calls you, you have to be nice and talk to her properly."

"Who is Shen ChuQi?"

"My son. Biological. He is six this year. Congratulations Uncle Shao, you need to prepare six years worth of red packets."

Shao ChengZe felt it was absurd, but from Shen XiWen's tone she did not seem to be joking. "....When did you have a son?"

"Anyway I just have one now." Shen XiWen wanted to brush it off.

Shao ChengZe's brow furrowed tightly. "So where has your son been all these years?"

"Where could he be? Not with me. We agreed back then that I would be responsible for giving birth, and he would be responsible for raising the child."

"....Fooling around!"

Shen XiWen felt guilty. "I will explain it to godmother myself. Don't say otherwise in front of her."

"You had better explain the situation clearly to her as soon as possible."

Shen XiWen was still not very satisfied with his reaction. "I suddenly have a son out of nowhere, and you don't seem surprised at all."

"With your personality, I won't be surprised by anything you do."

....

Shen XiWen changed the subject.

"Do you know whose daughter the little auntie is?"

"I don't know."

He did not care whose daughter the little auntie was. Right now he only cared who the father of her son was. Six years old. Shao ChengZe calculated - there was a year when his mother said she was busy shooting a drama, and was gone for more than half a year without allowing visits, only video calls, not even coming back for New Year. If she really had a son, it must have happened that year.

Shao ChengZe tapped his finger heavily on the table, again and again. For this kind of scum who got a girl pregnant before marriage, should he break one of his legs, or break both?

On the phone, Shen XiWen slowly said, "She is Cheng JinLan's daughter."