Reborn in the 1970s — Married a Proud Rough Man

Chapter 93: Chapter 45: Mom, He Wants to Sleep with Me (3)

”Hmph!” Qin Mei sneered. ”Asking for a thousand yuan right off the bat. That’s quite an outrageous demand, Granny Liu. You’re too greedy, trying to strike it rich all at once. Do you really think that’s realistic? If you’d been like before, slowly turning up the heat and asking for a few dozen yuan, my mother-in-law might have just given it to you. You need to be smarter and stop listening to your daughter’s terrible ideas. There’s something wrong with her head.”

”Qin Mei, you’re the one with something wrong in your head!” Xu Chunyan glared at Qin Mei.

”So you’re saying it really was your idea to ask for a thousand?” Qin Mei asked, smiling sweetly at the fuming Xu Chunyan.

”You... No... Don’t talk nonsense! What do you mean, asking for a thousand? I don’t know what you’re talking about! My mom is my mom, and I’m me. My mom... No, wait. Qin Mei, stop trying to change the subject! Look at my brother! Is there any difference between him and an idiot? My brother is the only male heir of the Xu Family, he’s our hope! What’s wrong with my mom asking for a thousand? Compared to my brother, a thousand is nothing!” Xu Chunyan said.

Qin Mei glanced coldly at Xu Chunwang. ’This man is so disgusting, just looking at him feels like it’s polluting my eyes.’ ”Sister-in-law, I dislocated his jaw, I didn’t hit him on the head. If your brother is an idiot, don’t pin the blame on me. I’m not taking the fall for this.”

”Your brother is the idiot!” Xu Chunyan shot back.

”I don’t have a brother.” Qin Mei shrugged and held out her hands.

Jie Jingchen gazed at her. ’Indeed, she doesn’t have a brother.’

Mrs. Xie’s eyes crinkled with amusement. Watching Xu Chunyan and Liu Guihua get their comeuppance gave her a satisfying sense of vindication for past humiliations.

A calculating glint appeared in her eyes. Xu Chunyan sneered and asked, ”So, you admit to dislocating my brother’s jaw?”

”Sister-in-law, you don’t have to try so hard to trap me with my words. I’m the one who dislocated your brother’s jaw. As for why I did it, don’t you know perfectly well?” Qin Mei’s tone was flat.

Hearing Qin Mei’s ”don’t you know perfectly well?”, Jie Jingwei was instantly on alert. ’Jing Si’s wife is no simple woman. In their few clashes, his own wife was never her match.’

”Chunyan, let’s take your mom to the hospital,” Jie Jingwei said.

”What about the medical bills?” Xu Chunyan understood Jing Er’s signal but wasn’t ready to give up.

”I’ll pay.” The words seemed forced from between Jie Jingwei’s gritted teeth.

”No,” Liu Guihua disagreed. To her, her daughter and son-in-law’s money was as good as her own. ’How can they spend what’s mine?’

’Not only would I get no money, but my own family would have to foot the bill? Impossible.’

”I’ll pay the medical bills.” Mr. Xie’s head was throbbing. He just wanted to get rid of them quickly. Having witnessed Liu Guihua’s shameless tantrum, he suddenly understood why his wife had given her money every time she came to cause a scene over the years. His second son’s mother-in-law was truly a handful.

Liu Guihua was satisfied. Someone else was paying her medical bills. She glanced at her son, then said to Qiao Yanqiu, ”Your fourth daughter-in-law dislocated my son’s jaw. She admitted it herself. Now you should be willing to hand over the money.”

”A thousand is too much. I can’t give you that. The most I can give is a hundred,” Mrs. Xie compromised. She was exhausted by the whole ordeal and was willing to pay a hundred just to make them leave.

”No,” Liu Guihua refused flatly. ”A hundred is too little. Are you trying to shoo away a beggar?”

Xu Chunyan breathed a silent sigh of relief. ’Good, Mom didn’t back down. My plan was for a thousand, which would be five hundred for each of us after we split it. If we only get a hundred, will she even give me fifty?’

Mrs. Xie was so angry she laughed. ”Does your family use a hundred yuan to get rid of beggars?”

Liu Guihua was speechless. Forget a hundred yuan, she wouldn’t even part with one.

”One thousand, and I’ll put his jaw back in place,” Qin Mei spoke up.

”What?” Liu Guihua sputtered.

”What?” Xu Chunyan gasped.

The others also looked shocked. ’A thousand to reset a jaw? Is she robbing them?’

”Sister-in-law,” Jie Jingjue called out. ’He and Qin Mei had made a bet: if his mother backed down and offered a hundred, he’d win, and Qin Mei would owe him a hundred. If she had charged a hundred to fix Xu Chunwang’s jaw, that would have been barely acceptable. But a thousand was just too much.’

’Is she doing this on purpose so I’ll win?’

”One thousand, and I’ll put his jaw back in place,” Qin Mei repeated.

Everyone fell silent. Inside the room, even Shen Qing couldn’t help but steal a few more glances at Qin Mei. ’There’s a limit to taking advantage of a situation. A thousand is no small sum.’

”You’re the one who dislocated my son’s jaw.” Missing a front tooth, Liu Guihua’s words came out in a lisp. ”And now you want a thousand to fix it? You’ve got some nerve.”

”And why did I dislocate his jaw?” Qin Mei’s gaze sharpened as she stared at Liu Guihua.

Liu Guihua knew the reason, of course, but she was certain Qin Mei wouldn’t say it out loud in front of everyone. It would be disgraceful for all involved, especially for Qin Mei herself.

”Xiao Mei, why did you dislocate his jaw?” Mrs. Xie was playing backup for Qin Mei. She knew Qin Mei didn’t start trouble, but she wasn’t afraid of it either. Xu Chunwang must have done something to make her dislocate his jaw.

”Mom, he wanted to sleep with me,” Qin Mei said bluntly.

Everyone was speechless.

Jie Jingchen’s eye twitched. ’Xu Chunwang hadn’t been so blunt, but the meaning was the same. For her to say it so openly in public... she really had no regard for her own reputation.’

Mrs. Xie was stunned for a moment, then flew into a rage. ”What?”

”You were willing!” Xu Chunyan said, rushing to her brother’s defense.

Jie Jingwei tugged on her arm, signaling for her to stop making things worse.

”I was willing? Hmph!” Qin Mei sneered, her eyes flashing with cold contempt as she looked at Xu Chunyan. ”If I had been willing, would I have dislocated his jaw?” she demanded.

”But you clearly...”

”If I hadn’t played along, how could I have gotten close enough to make him lower his guard and dislocate his jaw when he least expected it?” Qin Mei cut Xu Chunyan off.

”This is outrageous! Outrageous!” Mrs. Xie trembled with rage. ”He tries to force himself on my daughter-in-law, gets his jaw dislocated by her, and then you have the gall to turn around and demand money from me? Do you really take me for a fool? The Xu family... you’re really something else.”

”Yan Qiu, calm down.” Mr. Xie put an arm around Mrs. Xie’s shoulder, trying to soothe her.

Qin Mei continued to fan the flames. Looking at Mrs. Xie, she said in an aggrieved tone, ”Mom, he said that since Jing Si hurt his back and is basically useless now, he can’t perform his husbandly duties. So he ’kindly’ offered to take his place. I couldn’t stand it, so I dislocated his jaw to shut him up. Was I wrong?”

Everyone was silent again. ’Kindly? His intentions were downright despicable.’

Jie Jingchen remained silent, a dark cloud hanging over him.

Standing by the window, Jie Jinghun looked at Jie Jingchen with pure sympathy. ’Hurt back, useless, can’t perform his husbandly duties... Every one of those phrases was a direct assault on a man’s pride.’

’The wife Jing Si married is really something else...’ He glanced sideways at his own wife. ’Marrying a woman as cold as ice is so much better.’

”Honey,” Mr. Xie said, looking worriedly at his wife.

He was furious that Jing Si had been humiliated, but he wasn’t worried. It was a fact that Jing Si had injured his back. The worst-case scenario was that he’d be unable to have children, but his life wasn’t in danger. He had many sons; it wasn’t essential for Jing Si to be the one to carry on the Jie family line. As long as Qin Mei didn’t mind and Jing Si didn’t develop an inferiority complex, there was no real problem.

What he worried about was his wife. Yan Qiu was beautiful and kindhearted. She was especially tolerant toward the children from his previous marriage. For the sake of family harmony, she had put up with her second daughter-in-law’s family, but her constant tolerance had only encouraged the Xu family to become more and more audacious.

Mr. Xie knew full well that tolerance had its limits, and his wife’s children were her bottom line. Once that line was crossed, the consequences would be severe.

Mrs. Xie’s red lips curved slightly into a chillingly sinister smile. She picked up her handbag from the side, her high heels clicking as she walked with an elegant stride.

”Yan Qiu,” Mr. Xie said, a sense of foreboding washing over him.

”Jie Jianguo, if you try to stop me today, we’re getting a divorce.” Mrs. Xie’s voice wasn’t loud, but it carried a solemn authority that was somehow more terrifying than a thunderous rage.

Hearing the word ”divorce,” the color drained from Mr. Xie’s face. His hand froze in mid-air, not daring to grab her.

Divorce. The word was devastatingly powerful. It didn’t just annihilate Mr. Xie, leaving him defenseless; it also caught everyone else completely off guard.