Chapter 89: I WANT TO KNOW WHERE MY SON IS

He walked out.

Tao followed.

The four men fell into position.

The boardroom door closed behind them with a quiet click.

Nobody spoke for a moment.

Then everyone started talking at once.

Xue Deyong sat in his chair and looked at the table.

"Father.." Jiaming said quietly beside him.

Deyong said nothing.

Outside in the corridor ShangYan walked to the elevator. Tao fell into step beside him.

"How did it feel?" Tao said.

ShangYan looked at the elevator doors. "Like collecting something that was always mine," he said.

ShangYan was already at the elevator when he heard footsteps behind him and turned around to find Xue Deyong had followed him out. The corridor was empty apart from Tao and the four men positioned behind him.

Their pheromones collided the moment they faced each other, Deyong’s aggressive and hot, the kind meant to establish dominance and make the other person yield. ShangYan had encountered that particular brand of Alpha aggression more times than he could count and it had never once worked on him, so he stood where he was and waited.

"You enjoyed that, didn’t you?" Deyong said.

"Enormously," ShangYan said.

Deyong’s expression darkened. "You have the shares on paper, but don’t mistake that for belonging here. This company was built by this family for thirty years before you decided to show your face. You who is an illegitimate child have no standing here."

ShangYan looked at him.

That word.

He had heard it his entire life in one form or another, wielded by people who thought it would make him shrink, and Xue Deyong was standing here using it like it was still sharp, like it had not been blunted by decades of him simply refusing to be diminished by it.

"Illegitimate," ShangYan said softly. "That’s the word you’re reaching for after twenty years? I expected more from you Deyong." He tilted his head.

"Tell me, does it bother you? Knowing that the son Father kept away turned out considerably better than the one he raised with everything he had?"

"Don’t flatter yourself," Deyong said, his pheromones surging harder, hot and relentless.

ShangYan felt it press against him and almost smiled.

The man was practically vibrating with fury and hadn’t even raised his voice yet. It was almost impressive.

"I’m not flattering myself," ShangYan said.

"I’m observing. You’ve had everything handed to you your entire life and you’re still standing in a corridor going after a man you spent twenty years pretending didn’t exist. What does that say about you, Deyong?"

"Get out of my building," Deyong said.

"It’s partially my building now," ShangYan said. "But I’ll go, I have things to do." He stepped toward the elevator. "Do consider dinner. I make excellent conversation."

The elevator opened and ShangYan stepped in without looking back, Tao and the four men following as the doors slid shut.

Deyong stood in the corridor alone, his pheromones still surging into empty air, and he became aware of this after a moment and stopped.

He had spent the last ten minutes exchanging words with a man who had not once raised his voice, not once shown any agitation, not once given him anything to hold onto.

Just that calm unhurried expression and words that found their mark every single time without effort.

Jiaming appeared at his shoulder from the boardroom doorway. "Father, we need to talk." he said quietly.

Deyong straightened his jacket and walked back to his office without a word.

The elevator descended in silence.

Tao stood beside him with his tablet and said nothing.

The four men were still, eyes forward, which was exactly how ShangYan preferred it when he needed to think.

Illegitimate child.

He almost laughed.

Twenty years and that was still the sharpest thing Deyong could produce.

Did he really think that word still had teeth?

ShangYan had heard it his entire life, had been defined by it, dismissed because of it, excluded because of it, and he had taken every single instance of it and used it as fuel.

That word was the reason he had built what he built, the reason he had become what he became. Deyong calling him illegitimate today was practically a compliment at this point.

But then he thought about Guiying and the almost laugh died completely.

Because Guiying had heard that same word inside those same walls from those same people, and he hadn’t had twenty years and an empire to absorb the impact of it.

He had had nothing. No protection, no way out, no older brother who knew he existed and could have stepped in sooner. Just that word and everything that came attached to it, day after day, for twenty three years, while Xue Deyong sat at the head of his table and told himself it was none of his business.

ShangYan wanted him to suffer for it. He wasn’t an impatient man, had never been, patience was practically a religion to him at this point, but the desire to make Deyong feel every single one of those twenty three years in full was something he was not inclined to suppress. The shares were the first piece. There were many more coming and he had already mapped out exactly how they would land.

Shen Zihao was a separate matter. The file on him was growing thicker by the day and what was in it made something cold and deliberate settle over ShangYan every time he opened it. That one was going to require very special attention.

The elevator reached the ground floor and the doors opened. ShangYan walked out into the lobby, the four men falling into position around him, Tao half a step behind.

"Tao," he said.

"Sir."

"Find me everything on Shen Zihao. Everything." His voice was warm and unhurried the way it always was. "And confirm Guiying’s location. I want to know where my son is."

"Already on it.." Tao said.

ShangYan got into the car and the door closed behind him.

Outside the city moved past the windows and he looked at it without really seeing it, his mind already on the next step and the one after that.

He had things to do.