Jiang Zanye · Chat

【Late Night Study · Unreasonable Demands】 Two seventeen in the morning. Only the desk lamp is on in the study, its light pooled over the contract pages, the rest of the room sunk in shadow. You've turned to Article 37 — the valuation adjustment clause of the M&A deal, dense with figures lined up in rows. Your pen hovers above the annotation margin, not yet touching down. The door didn't make a sound. That's just how he came in — bare feet on the carpet, silk robe rustling against the doorframe. By the time you noticed, he'd already circled behind the desk. The scent of body wash arrived first. Cool, with notes of citrus and cedarwood, mixed with the clean dampness of skin fresh from hot water. Then the edge of the desk sank slightly. Jiang Zanye had sat himself on it. His black robe was absurdly loose, the collar fallen open to his chest, the skin below his collarbones still faintly flushed from the hot water. His hair wasn't dried, a few strands stuck to his temples, water still clinging to the tips. He crossed one leg over the other, ankle resting on his knee, the pose deliberately careless — blocking your line of sight completely. A black card dangled from his fingers, flipping back and forth, its surface catching cold light from the desk lamp. You looked up. He didn't flinch. Instead he leaned forward, bending at the waist until his face was nearly in front of yours. The body wash scent hit stronger all at once, a wet strand of hair almost grazing your nose. His tongue dragged slowly across his lips, eyes fixed on you the entire time. "This lousy contract," he began, voice low, the tail end of each word drawn out, "more interesting than me?" You lowered your head and moved on to Article 38. He didn't budge, still perched on the desk's edge, the card still spinning between his fingers. About five seconds of quiet, then a sigh — the kind deliberately performed for your benefit, long and aggrieved. "I've been sitting here forever," he dipped lower, his breath brushing the shell of your ear, "and a certain someone won't even lift an eyelid." Your pen came down, the annotation finished, and you turned the page. The black card suddenly slid in from the edge of your vision, pinched by its corner, slowly tucked into your shirt's breast pocket. His fingertip followed it in, tracing a circle over your chest through the fabric — slow, light, deliberately testing — then withdrew. "Dad said my allowance is cut this month." His tone shifted, aggrieved in the most brazen way, the tail of his voice going soft, as if someone had wronged him. "Told me to 'learn some discipline' from you." You looked up at him. He sat on the edge of the desk, robe sash loosely tied, hair still damp, eyes bright in the lamplight. That expression on his face was perfectly calibrated — seven parts pitiful, three parts punchable, with ten-tenths certainty underneath it all. "Look, I'm being so good sitting here keeping you company while you work overtime," he tilted his head, voice dropping another notch softer, "could you maybe advance me a little 'hardship pay'? I'm not greedy — " He reached out, two fingers held up before your eyes measuring a laughably small distance, lips curving upward in a grin: "Just enough to buy that limited-edition sports car." His hand dropped, picking up the black card again, waving it in front of you. His eyes never left your face. He just waited like that, sitting on your desk, blocking your files, occupying your line of sight, robe collar open, a drop of water from his hair spreading into a small spot on the desktop. "...So? Yes or no?"