"He has been more of a father to me than you have been in my twenty-five years of life. What does that make you, Mr. Yun?" she countered.

  She didn't allow herself to be frustrated or angry.

  The older man was silent for a second. "What have I ever done to make you hate me? Why are you making me the bad person?" he asked.

  "Because you are a bad person and a bad father. You have never once looked at me and spent time with me. When I think back to my childhood, I do not have one good memory of you. You never read me stories or encouraged me on my achievements."

  "Because I was busy earning money," he said.

  "You had enough money already. When you had a child, you should have thought about raising it, too. I am not your property because you donated your sperm. I deserved to be given love. But you did nothing of the sort. And you still ask me why I hate you?" she questioned calmly.

  "And what about you? What have you done for me?" Yun Sui Bo asked.

  Qian Meng laughed in disbelief. "When you told me to get married to someone I had no idea about, I said yes. I trusted you and you almost sixty years of experience in life. I didn't question it because I thought you had my interest at heart." She stopped and looked at Mo Qingchen.

  She saw him clench his jaw, but his eyes were trained on the road ahead.

  "But you didn't. I was wrong for trusting you and I thank the stars that I had the caution to check the person you had chosen for me." She snorted.

  "But… Mr, Yun, I thought about it a lot. There is no way you didn't know what kind of person Bai Ye Qing was. You deliberately set me up for failure. You wanted me to be miserable." And he still dared to ask why she disliked him.

  "You—"

  "You think you like your son? No. You are a selfish bastard who doesn't care about anything else but your pride. Everything you do is for yourself. Sometimes, I even pity your wife…" she trailed off. "And then I remember she is just as guilty as you are."

  "You are not going to have a good life—"

  "But that is not up to you to decide!" Qian Meng countered. She wouldn't allow him to put seeds of doubt in her head. "I decide what life I have. I will not let you make me miserable. I will not allow your shadow to ruin my prospect of happiness. You don't deserve that privilege," she swore.

  She saw Qingchen's lips lift into a smile. He lifted his hand off the gear and turned his palm up to silently ask for her to hold his hand.

  Qian Meng slid her hand forward and he threaded their fingers together and placed her hand on the gear.

  "Would you have been where you are… independent without me?" Yun Sui Bo asked.

  It was something fathers said all the time. It was a shameless tactic. As if because he worked hard to make money, he is somehow exempt from being a good father. Like he worked hard so her hard work doesn't count.

  "I didn't take a penny from you since I left home. You have not raised me or financially helped me to get me where I am. It was my hard work and my intelligence that helped me crawl up to the top. You have no hand in this. I didn't get handouts because I was your daughter," she told him. "Actually, it put me at a disadvantage. People despise you for your attitude. And I share your DNA. Therefore, people assume I am like you."

  He was silent for a while. "Are you going to cut all contact with me?" he asked.

  Qian Meng looked at her phone in shock. "Even if I try, will you stop contacting me?" she asked. "That woman in your house keeps buying shares of my company when the price dips. Will you stop her from doing that?" she pressed.

  "If you take better care of your company, the price of your shares won't dip, don't you think?"

  Qian Meng could almost hear the real meaning. 'Because you are a woman, you don't know how to handle a business. So, what if my wife is making money off of you?'

  "Is that what you really think?" she asked softly, testing the waters.

  "And don't refer to her like that. She is legally your mother. Show her respect…" He stopped to think how he would address the accusation. "What she does with her money is her own thoughts. It has nothing to do with me. Your company went public so that people had a stake in it, why are you grumbling now?"

  Insidious bastard.

  "First of all, share prices aren't the be-all and end-all of a business. It is a short-term fluctuation. The real value of a business lies in the growth, sales, the capital of the company and the workforce, and their contribution. Thirty years in business and you still don't know. What a shame." The quip was made.

  "I said all of this as a warning, Mr. Yun. Don't push me and manage your expectations from people. You are not the victim and the more you play it, the more disgusted people feel being around you." Her free hand went towards the red button to hang up.

  She had one more thing to say.

  "I don't want to destroy you, so please don't force my hand."

  She pressed the button.

  Qingchen looked at her, seemingly in deep thought.

  "What?" she asked, her voice low.

  "Why did you warn him?"

  She pressed her lips together. "I must be weak. Even though he is horrible, I can't forget that he is my father," she sighed.

  Qingchen shook his head. "You yearned for his affection for years. I understand you completely. You are not weak, you just loved your father even though he wasn't kind to you." He looked at her with apologetic eyes. "I'm sorry."

  Qian Meng shook her head. "Don't be sorry. You're almost the same. You loved your father until it turned into… something else." She leaned in and kissed his cheek. "It's okay. Let's never treat people the same way we were treated."

  And that was a promise both of them kept.