Chapter 1: Stealing the Sister-in-Law

Summer of 2000.

In the outskirts where city and countryside met in East Ping District of River City, inside a house hastily built of red brick and sheets of iron.

Lu Fan was sitting across from a young woman. Between them stood a small tea table, and on it lay a black plastic bag.

The woman was in her thirties or forties. She was plainly beautiful, yet at the corners of her eyes lay crow’s feet that seemed far too old for her age. At that moment, her expression carried a trace of humiliation.

“Auntie, I know Uncle is bedridden right now and urgently needs a lot of money for surgery. I also know you are arranging your eldest daughter’s marriage and hoping to make up the sum through the bride price.”

“Now I’ve brought the money. What are you hesitating for?”

As he spoke, Lu Fan tapped the black plastic bag with his hand.

“Before I came, I also asked around. The families you’ve been arranging for your eldest daughter include one surnamed Zhang in town who sells meat, one man working as a carpenter with a construction crew in the city, and one clerk from the district government here in East Ping.”

“Among them, even the youngest is nearly thirty. Some are even divorced, and all of them are more than ten years older than your eldest daughter. If she marries into any of those families, she won’t have much in common with them.”

“I’m only seventeen this year, about the same age as your daughter. My father is the deputy chief of the street police station in Changle County, and my mother is the head of personnel at the county textile mill. We live on the public payroll, and our family is fairly comfortable.”

“If your girl marries me, I can’t promise her great wealth and splendor, but I can make sure she has fish and meat at every meal and never has to worry or struggle for a living.”

Lu Fan felt that by the time he reached this point, it was enough.

His age, his prospects, his family background, and the future he could offer—everything worth putting on the table had been put there. Now it was up to the other side.

After waiting for a while, the woman still said nothing.

A draft slipped through the room, bringing no coolness at all, but it lifted the cloth curtain to the inner room, where two small heads pressed together, appearing and disappearing in the gloom.

Lu Fan knew those were his future sister-in-law, Bai Lu, and his wife, Bai Shuang.

His father-in-law was the sort who liked taking shortcuts, fond of naming people after the seasons.

In his previous life, Bai Lu had not yet turned eighteen when she was married off—to the butcher surnamed Zhang from the nearby town. But on the very day of the wedding, the car bringing the bridal party was smashed flat by a dirt hauler.

Later, the Zhang family came to the Bai household and made a scene, claiming Bai Lu had brought death upon their son, and they demanded back the fifty thousand yuan bride price.

His father-in-law had no money for surgery and could only die helplessly.

His mother-in-law, this very woman before him, also lost her health and followed her husband not two years later.

Only Bai Lu was left to raise little Bai Shuang.

In that era, the outskirts where city met countryside were like one enormous village. Everyone knew everyone else, and the moment a rumor spread, the whole area would know. Because of that incident, Bai Lu never married.

When he married Bai Shuang, he had already gone through a failed marriage and was living a miserable life.

After university, his father had wanted him to enter the police system and take over the family line, but his own heart was set on the stars and the sea. He drifted in a great city for a few years, then returned to River City ready to make a grand breakthrough, only to end up ruined. Not only had he poured in every bit of savings he and his parents had, he also incurred heavy debts.

It was in those bleak, near-desperate days that he met Bai Shuang. Afterward, the two sisters stayed by his side, helping him slowly begin again from nothing, until they eventually amassed a fortune worth tens of millions.

In the past, Lu Fan had often thought that if only he could meet them earlier, he would surely help them escape such a cruel fate.

This morning, Lu Fan discovered that he had been reborn—and the timing happened to be just when Bai Lu was about to be married off.

So he acted without hesitation, withdrew every last cent of the family’s savings, brought it with him, and hurried over. It took him half a day to find the Bai family.

He did not know where his parents kept the bank certificates, nor the passwords, but his future self knew everything.

As for why he used this interception method to solve the Bai family’s difficulties instead of simply lending them the money, it was because he feared fifty thousand yuan might not be enough for Bai father’s surgery, and Bai mother would still turn her eyes toward Bai Lu.

He could hardly fault Bai mother for such conduct. After all, life and death were at stake. If his own father needed money to survive, he would sell even himself.

But there was also the question of initiative and passivity. Right now, Bai Lu could only passively accept her fate; the power of decision rested in Bai mother’s hands.

Looking at his young mother-in-law, Lu Fan could not help feeling a measure of resentment.

He knocked on the table and, for the first time, showed impatience.

“Auntie, is it a deal? If it is, let’s settle it now. If not, I’ll take the money and leave.”

The woman’s expression changed for the first time. She asked softly, “Child, where are your elders?”

“I’ll be of age in a few months. I can make my own decisions about family matters.”

“But there should at least be a matchmaker to bear witness.”

“Auntie, my uncle is still lying in the hospital. Wouldn’t it be better to take the money and have the surgery done sooner? It would be easy enough for me to find a matchmaker, but going back and forth would just waste time. What if Uncle’s condition gets worse?”

“Then when do you plan to marry Daniu?”

“There’s no rush. I’m not yet old enough. We can settle the engagement first, and when we are both of legal age, we’ll talk about the rest.”

Watching the boy stride out of the house, push the bicycle in the yard, and leave through the gate, Liu Yue’e still felt it was somewhat unreal.

That afternoon, after finishing her work, Liu Yue’e went to a small textile mill to pick up some cloth scraps. On her way back, she ran into the boy in an alley.

He stared at her for a while before asking, “Are you the mother of Bai Lu and Bai Shuang?”

She answered, “Yes.”

Then the boy followed her into the house and directly slapped fifty thousand yuan down on the little table.

And he said all those humiliating things.

Her family urgently needed money, but this was not the same as selling her daughter. She had also wanted to find a good match for her girl.

But in these times, families able to produce fifty thousand yuan at once as a bride price were far too rare.

She had spent a long time asking matchmakers before finding three families with some interest. It was only because her daughter was pretty that the other side was willing to keep talking. The matchmakers had gone back and forth several times, and the bride price had already been negotiated to more than forty thousand.

Who would have thought someone would bring fifty thousand yuan straight to the door today?

Looking at the money, Liu Yue’e felt a wave of relief, yet at the same time a piercing grievance.

The other side’s attitude made it clear he had come to buy a person with money.

Thinking of her husband still suffering in the hospital, she could not help wiping away her tears.

“Mom, did that bad man bully you? Don’t cry. I’ll go settle accounts with him.”

Bai Shuang, with her hair tied in twin pigtails, rushed out of the room in anger and hugged Liu Yue’e’s arm.

Liu Yue’e pulled her into her arms. Though her crying stopped, tears still flowed silently down her face.

“Bai Lu, from now on he’ll be your man.”

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