The golden crest with unreadable scriptures engraved on it was displayed majestically in front of the Ling mansion"s gate. It was too eye-catching that Xiulan stared at it for a long time while she waits for her cousin to welcome her. Her car was waiting outside and it seems that the security wouldn"t allow her to enter since they haven"t received any information that a relative will come today.
Xiulan was p.i.s.sed but she can"t blame them since they were only doing their job. Though, she felt another wave of irritation since this is quite embarra.s.sing. She was there to help the family yet they are already treating her like this.
She incredulously scoffed and leaned back angrily on her seat. To kill time, she looked at her surroundings. "Definitely, the Ling family are the masters of this small town." Xiulan subconsciously when she saw the vast land behind the tall gates.
The whole place was a mixture of a luxurious villa and a tidy farm. Xiulan guessed that it might somewhere from 8,0000 to 10,000 square foot land. It occupied almost everything that she can"t see other houses.
This town is only small and big houses are only a few. She was able to see the mayor"s house awhile ago but it couldn"t compare to the Ling family"s mansion. Almost all the businesses here are being controlled by the Ling family. But the major moneymaker is the old inn in the heart of the town.
She still can"t fathom why the Ling family didn"t want to enter the politics in this place. She a.s.sumes that it"ll be a landslide win for the Ling family. But as she remembers how reputation sensitive the Ling family was, she now understands why they don"t want to enter politics.
Xiulan waited for another hour before her cousin Ling Yuyin came into sight.
Her conservative cousin, Ling Yuyin, who"s pretty much a very reserved 38 years old professor in a state college in this town and married to a retired famous 80s singer was tasked to take care of Xiulan.
They are not close but they are also not hostile to each other. Due to their age gap, Yuyin was more familiar and close with the big sisters of Xiulan.
Yuyin has a five years old son and her husband has his own karaoke bar business in town. The life in the countryside is simple and if a person has a lot of money, making business here is very easy.
The Ling family might be controlling 70% of the businesses in this town but Yuyin"s husband didn"t use the Ling connection. Instead, he used his remaining popularity to have his own business here.
"Yuyin-jie, nice to see you that you are well." Xiulan went out of her car and greeted Yuyin who obviously has an apologetic expression plastered on her face. They hugged for awhile and Yuyin let her inside the mansion.
Apparently, Yuyin was still in the university and forgot about this day. She rushed back when the head maid told her that a Song relative came by to see them.
Since the Ling family is very secretive, even the mansion caretakers didn"t know that they will have an important guest today. They knew Xiulan very well since she"s almost like a celebrity now due to the noise that her name created back in S city.
Instead of riding her car to come inside the mansion, Yuyin dragged Xiulan to the garden to have some tea. It"ll take ten minutes to walk from the gates.
Xiulan didn"t mind walking that long but she was wearing heels that time so it was quite a struggle to walk whenever they encounter a bermudagra.s.s part of the pavement.
"Sorry, I forgot that you were coming today. Big brothers are not here and the elders were also still in Europe so no one was able to welcome you." Yuyin explained and eventually sighed deeply. "Let me be frank to you, little Xiulan. The elders are not here until the issue is resolved. You know how they want to run away from every problem that involves confrontation. They are cowards." Yuyin was actually really angry that they left such troublesome task to their niece.
Ever since the Ling family found out Xiulan"s capabilities in problem-solving, they pestered Qingge to ask her dutiful daughter to solve this problem. Quite shameless but they are like this to their relatives.
Ling family expects that relatives won"t expose the bad stuff to the public anyway. That"s why they continue to bully and manipulate the other relatives.
Xiulan"s mother - Qingge, who"s pretty much a dutiful daughter to the Ling family, would do anything to make the Ling family satisfied. She still has some guilty feeling inside her when she married someone the Ling family didn"t want for her.
Until this day, to satisfy them and remove all grievances, she did her very best to create a wonderful and talented family with the man they hated so to save face that she did the right thing.
Qingge, of course, didn"t want to use her daughter but since they were actually requesting for her, she can"t help but have a thick face and deploy her daughter to the Ling territory.
"It"s okay, Yuyin-jie. I understand the Ling elders" circ.u.mstances." Xiulan smiled at her big sister Yuyin.
Yuyin talked a lot more about what was happening in town and the status of the issue in the inn.
The garden they were heading to has a very large pavilion. The exterior and interior of the pavilion were very aesthetic. Xiulan can"t help but give some compliments.
When they finally sat on the comfortable lounge chairs inside the pavilion, Yuyin continued to give more updates.
"Drink some tea first before I continue. We walked a long way." Yuyin brightly smiled and she also sips some tea to relieve her thirst.
"May I ask why the elders don"t want to meddle in this issue? Why not hire an investigator?" Xiulan immediately asked after she drank a generous amount of tea. That long walk made her so thirsty.
Yuyin sips a few more teas before she starts her ramblings again. "Gosh, where do I start! The usual s.h.i.+t we have in the Ling family. The elders may be intimidating 24/7 but they are scared of bad publicity. Imagine, they are almost above 60 but still very fearful of bad gossips and scandals."
Xiulan frowned hearing this. She can"t believe that the elders were still like this after so many years living on this planet. Bad publicity is inevitable. It will always happen to anyone.
"So they were fine that someone is soliciting money instead of resolving it just because they are afraid of bad publicity? I thought this was just an exaggerated joke from mother." Xiulan scoffed and angrily bites on the banana bread served to her.
"Correct! Really childis.h.!.+" Yuyin loudly commented. "But since the culprit managed to steal 10 million yuan from us, the elders were alarmed and wanted this to be resolved immediately. The culprit is a long time confidant of the family so the elders were quite skeptical about how to handle this."
"Yes. I was informed." Xiulan muttered and nodded her head.
"To be honest, I am not sure how you will frame her but I heard from Aunt Qingge that you already have a plan." Yuyin probed and looked at her cousin"s pet.i.te demeanor. "A small woman but with incredible skills! I"m interested on how you will clear this up."
Xiulan sweetly smiled at Yuyin. "Thank you for the incredible support, Yuyin-jie. Just watch, I"ll put that woman behind bars in no time."
After their long chitchat, Xiulan left some of her belongings in the Ling family mansion and only took a few clothes inside a gym bag she could bring when she comes to the Ling family inn.
She decided to stay there for a whole week to monitor the culprit before she drops the entrapment. Bringing a lot of stuff could make everyone suspicious especially the culprit.
Little did she know that her husband already plotted everything and after three days, the drama will be resolved and after that, he could hog all the time with his wife.