Seventh week of pregnancy. I started hating every breath of Shanghai air.
6 a.m., Tomson Riviera 88th floor, the plum-rain sky still grey and suffocating. I was kneeling over the toilet, puking until only bile came out, tears and snot mixing on my face.
Fu Juanzhou crouched beside me, holding my hair back, offering warm water and a towel like I was made of glass.
I snatched the cup, gulped twice, voice raw:
"Right now I can't even keep soy milk down, and you're acting like life's a fucking holiday."
He didn't argue, just carried me back to bed and slipped a pickled plum into my mouth.
One bite—sour enough to make my teeth ache—and the tears came again.
Not from the sourness.
From the sudden realisation that this was the first time in my life I was leaning on someone this weakly, too tired even to swear properly.
Phone buzzed.
Voice note from Tang Shi, three words:
"Sis, run."
Screenshot attached—
Gu Xinghe had opened a verified short position on Xueqiu:
"Short Fu Capital Fund IV, entry 6.8, target 0."
Comment:
"Once legacy assets trigger fertility risk, the GP loses her mind and valuation collapses.
I'm betting Lin Zhi breaks first."
My hand shook.
Fu Juanzhou saw it; his face went dark as the bottom of the Huangpu.
I laughed until my ribs hurt:
"Little bastard grew up, huh?
Using the kid in my belly as a short."
I threw the phone at him, voice ice-cold:
"Fu Juanzhou, didn't you swear your fund was bulletproof?
Two choices:
Make Gu Xinghe disappear from Shanghai today,
or I take the baby and run, let all you men go to zero together."
He didn't speak, just dialled a number, voice dragged out of hell:
"Blow up every off-market option, every piece of collateral, every mortgaged old mansion he has. One hour.
I want him kneeling outside Bund 18 by tonight."
I leaned against the headboard, staring at his back, and felt something hollow open inside me.
Not gratitude. Fear.
Fear that one day I'd actually swallow the words "I want all of you dead" for the little thing growing inside me.