Bai Ye Qing hung around the corridors, listening to gossip and finally realized why his father had called. Bai Yu worked hard and rarely called his family. Except for dinner where nothing about business was discussed, Bai Ye Qing rarely received a call from his father. About work, at that.

  It was no meeting. All the higher-ups were in a meeting, questioning Bai Wenxi. It was somewhat of a trial before the jury decided if Wenxi would be confirmed as the executive authority in the company.

  Bai Ye Qing's heart dropped to his stomach. There had been no talk of this before. Or had he not paid attention while the others spoke.

  He could feel the eyes of the others and the whispers. He could imagine them saying that he was the useless son who got nothing while his elder brother worked hard and got such a high position despite being so young.

  Yes, his hard-working brother. Working days on end, sometimes not coming home. Only sleeping on the weekends.

  He clenched his fist together and locked himself in his office. The phone call from Jia Ai came in the perfect moment.

  "Baby, what are you doing?" she asked in that sweet and innocent voice of hers.

  Bai Ye Qing cleared his throat. "In my office," he said gruffly.

  "I am on my lunch break. This new department is so hard to work for," she sighed. "Patients are always screaming and demanding," she said.

  Bai Ye Qing scrunched up his brow and wondered why he needed to listen to this nonsense. He had enough on his mind to begin with but now he also needed to listen to this woman ramble about how hard her professional life was.

  He hummed now and then, never really paying attention until the golden question was asked.

  "Is something wrong?" she asked.

  Bai Ye Qing finally relaxed and he went into a play by play of what happened, keeping behind some of the details that made him look bad. But overall, the story stood like this: his brother was evil and didn't want him to do well in life because he wanted full control of the company. Now, he was in a meeting that would put him in ultimate authority while Bai Ye Qing would be thrown out of the company.

  Jia Ai sucked in a breath. "Does this mean… you won't have a job?" she asked. "What if he tells your father?" she said.

  "He said he wouldn't. But maybe his just heart will waver," he snorted.

  "Can't you convince him otherwise?" she asked. "He's your older brother. He wouldn't want to ruin you, would he?"

  Bai Ye Qing thought about it. "What he is willing to do will ruin me in the end. If he throws me out, I won't be able to raise my head in the company or to people I know from this moment on." He gripped the paperweight tightly in his hand.

  "And you can't convince him?" she asked again.

  He thought about it for a second. "He's a goody two shoes. He will never waver. I can only stop him from doing it today," he said softly. He wondered if the email to HR would be sent out the moment he came out.

  There was a way.

  "You… I'll call you later."

  And the plan went like this: suddenly, highly inflammable products caught on fire. Bai Wenxi spent rest of the day and the better part of the next few days on-site, trying to figure out what to do. There was a massive loss in this case.

  Bai Ye Qing studied how to kill without being detected. He was considered an expert at the end of the first day. He called Jia Ai and told her that he needed a muscle relaxant. A powerful muscle relaxant.

  She didn't ask him much and he didn't say anything either. There was a tacit understanding in this scenario.

  The fire was stopped and his brother finally came home after a few days. In the dead of the night, Bai Ye Qing slid into the room. His brother never locked his door, so it was an easy task. His brother was on the bed, sleeping soundly while the laptop screen was illuminated.

  The shot was given. Enough to slowly stop the heart. Wenxi wouldn't wake up.

  Bai Ye Qing's eyes flickered to the screen and he saw the proposal his brother was working on. It was damage control. His eyes glittered as he sprinted to his room and brought his pendrive. The file was transferred to his device and as his brother took his last breath, Bai Ye Qing sat in his room, excited for what the future would hold.

  At this time, Yun Qian Meng was at the back of his mind. He hadn't really known about the matter.

  The next morning when Bai Wenxi didn't come down, his mother went to look. He was dead but still taken to the hospital.

  The doctors said his heart… just stopped beating. There was no suspicion. No one had broken into the home, the family was a close-knit unit, and the police dismissed the matter. Things like this happened every day and doctors knew that.

  No one demanded an autopsy. Bai Ye Qing tried to persuade his family to cremate his brother's body, but his father wanted a physical spot he could visit his elder son. Bai Wenxi was buried.

  The father who never paid attention to him visited the grave every weekend. Usually alone.

  Bai Ye Qing snapped out of his reminiscence. He only had one option.

  He called Jia Ai. "Baby, do you have a minute to talk?" he asked. It was late in the night already and Jia Ai was on night shift.

  "I have a few moments. I am at the nurse station. Why?" she asked.

  Bai Ye Qing heard giggling and teasing in the background. Everyone was asking Jia Ai if it was her boyfriend. This woman…… prematurely flaunting her relationship……