Marry by Relying on Favor: Chapter 150 - Shen Fu is a Flesh-and-Blood Ordinary Man; He Also Needs Worldly Love and Affection
Outside the floor-to-ceiling window, lightning flashed, and thunder roared as heavy rain poured down. Beside the villa, only a faint streetlamp silently illuminated the pitch-black night. From above, a particularly fragile figure could be seen swaying in the storm, as if she might collapse at any moment—no one knew how long she had been standing there.
Qu Bixin rose, draped in her robe, and switched on a floor lamp. The phone on the bedside table rang stubbornly again and again, the screen going dark and lighting up repeatedly.
She slowly turned and looked at the man sitting rigidly at the edge of the bed like a statue.
After a long while, Qu Bixin walked to the vanity and sat down. “In rain this heavy, she’ll get sick,” she said.
When her words fell, the master bedroom sank back into silence.
The phone stopped ringing too.
Shen Fu lifted his head, his gaze fixed on Qu Bixin’s figure. She lowered her head, idly flipping through the cosmetics on the table. She took out a lipstick and tried the shade, not even glancing at him from the corner of her eye.
This indifferent attitude was unlike before, when she would have stomped her feet and made a scene first.
She tried the red shade and had just pursed her lips when she heard movement behind her.
Shen Fu picked up his phone and walked out of the master bedroom.
Perhaps distracted by watching him, Qu Bixin accidentally drew the lipstick past the edge of her lips.
The red, like fresh blood, stood out sharply against her pale skin.
She grabbed tissues and wiped at it forcefully, again and again.
She nearly rubbed the skin on her cheek raw, smearing the lipstick even more.
She changed tissues until not a trace of color remained on her lips.
Crushing them in her hand, she threw them all into the trash can.
The bedroom door made a soft sound. When Qu Bixin was still dazed, she coldly saw Shen Fu reappear. He wore a robe; his hair, shoulders, and fabric were all dry—no sign of being soaked by rain.
Soon, her lashes lowered. She noticed his shoes were dry too.
Shen Fu had been gone only long enough to smoke a cigarette. When he returned, he said nothing, tidied the rumpled bed, and told her to come sleep.
The lights went out. Neither of them looked to see whether the woman outside the window was still there.
The rain gradually lessened. The streetlamp remained bright.
Raindrops blurred Shen Tingji’s vision. Her fingers were stiff and pale as she clutched her phone. No one knew how long she had stood in the night. She was undoubtedly miserable and fragile. Before she was taken away by a car, she had already developed a low fever, her consciousness growing hazy.
As her eyelids grew heavy and she collapsed, she saw a handsome man carrying the damp chill of the rainy night slowly approaching with an umbrella. Only half his profile was visible. Rain splashed straight onto the gray cuffs of his suit pants, yet it did not slow his steps.
Not him—
Not the man she had waited for all night but never came.
When she woke again, Shen Tingji was lying in a hospital ward on the third floor. She had been unconscious until dawn. Exhausted, she had no strength to rise. She had been changed into clean hospital clothes, though they looked oversized on her thin frame.
“You’re awake?”
A woman’s voice sounded beside her—not the man who had taken her away before she fainted.
Shen Tingji’s face was pale. After being fed medicine and water, she regained some strength.
The one who had brought her back from the rain was Wen Shuchen.
The one in the hospital room was He Qingchi.
Her gaze fixed toward the bedside. Her lips moved.
Though He Qingchi couldn’t read her mind, she knew what she wanted to ask. “Shen Fu called my husband and asked him to send you to the hospital.”
Something flickered in Shen Tingji’s eyes, but she was mute and couldn’t speak.
He Qingchi refilled a cup of warm water and set it aside. “Shen Fu has already decided to be with Qu Bixin.”
For so long, Shen Tingji had refused to accept this fact. She had naturally assumed Shen Fu owed her duty and responsibility.
She didn’t know how she had lost to Qu Bixin. How could she have lost?
“You think Shen Fu doesn’t deserve to be loved, don’t you?” He Qingchi voiced her thoughts.
Shen Tingji’s face grew even paler, her emotions agitated.
But He Qingchi continued, “Your parents were your brother’s mentors. They kindly raised two orphaned brothers, never expecting to nurture a venomous snake who would ruin your family and leave you disabled at such a young age.”
“So you hate Shen Fu and his brother. You hate them for making your life incomplete—so you couldn’t grow up like a normal girl, fall in love, have a happy family.”
That hatred hadn’t faded with time. Years ago, she had deliberately driven away the outstanding women around Shen Fu. She wanted him to remain alone with her forever, living in the shadow of the Shen family’s past.
Qu Bixin’s appearance had caught her off guard.
At first, she hadn’t taken the wealthy heiress seriously. A sweet-voiced, seemingly innocent flirt—how could she make Shen Fu devoted? He loved the Qu family’s money, the resources that could bring him into high society.
As an outsider, Shen Tingji watched Shen Fu toy with Qu Bixin, occasionally stirring trouble herself, successfully preventing the ill-fated couple from being together.
As long as Qu Bixin couldn’t accept her presence, Shen Fu couldn’t have both.
Everything had gone according to plan—until Shen Fu truly made his choice. To this day, Shen Tingji still didn’t understand how she had lost.
He Qingchi observed the shift in her emotions and said slowly, “Shen Fu treated you as a sister, even a daughter, for over a decade. He sold off assets to fund your surgeries, turned you from a disabled girl into an accomplished musician. He spent nearly all his savings from the first half of his life on you. Besides reminding him that this was atonement, what have you ever given him?”
Compared to Shen Tingji, who had enjoyed everything Shen Fu gave her since she was five—
Anything Qu Bixin had done for Shen Fu could completely defeat her.
He Qingchi smiled faintly. “Qu Bixin grew up vain and clique-minded. She relied on her innocent appearance to avoid punishment and had superficial feelings for most people. But her feelings for Shen Fu were real. Shen Fu is a flesh-and-blood ordinary man. He can feel who is sincere. He also needs worldly love.”
In the end, Shen Tingji had overlooked the fact that Shen Fu clawed his way up to his current position through sheer ruthlessness. Deep down, he needed warmth too. She had depended on him for years and always believed he was cold and heartless, incapable of love, only capable of using others.
Only now did she realize where she had lost.
“You had no childhood. Neither did Shen Fu,” He Qingchi said. “He treated you as family and bore his brother’s sins alone, caring for you day after day for ten years. No one taught him how to love—because you wouldn’t teach him.”
“—Qu Bixin would. She once loved Shen Fu sincerely and innocently, giving him the fullest kind of love.”
“If Shen Fu hadn’t fallen deeply, why would he keep finding excuses to entangle himself with her after forcing her into divorce?”
Shen Tingji raised her eyes with effort, staring at He Qingchi.
Her gaze seemed to ask: Are you here to plead for Qu Bixin? To make me let go?
He Qingchi smiled. “I have no obligation to help Qu Bixin.”
“Aren’t you… best friends?”
Shen Tingji struggled to write.
“Superficial.”
“……”
He Qingchi laughed softly. “Years ago, Qu Bixin once asked Shen Fu about Wen Shuchen for me. Consider this as repaying a favor. Miss Shen, if you keep this up, you really will lose everything.”
The words struck her heart.
Even after hating Shen Fu’s family for over a decade and avoiding her true feelings, she couldn’t deceive herself.
Growing up depending on each other had long made Shen Fu her blood-bound family.
But she refused to admit it—it would make her a joke.
“From what I know of Qu Bixin, she’s not some master manipulator. Precisely because of that, once she sets her sights on something, she goes all the way. She would never stay with Shen Fu just to atone for your family’s past. So whether you stand in the rain, fall sick, or hurt yourself—it has nothing to do with her. She won’t pity you, and she won’t let Shen Fu pity you either.”
After saying this, He Qingchi drank some water, giving Shen Tingji time to think.
Had Shen Fu shown up tonight?
No. At most, out of past affection, he had asked Wen Shuchen to take her away.
“Things don’t happen more than three times,” He Qingchi added. “My husband won’t be answering Shen Fu’s late-night calls anymore.”
A chill crept into Shen Tingji’s heart, along with helpless confusion.
She believed every word. He Qingchi was Mrs. Wen—the woman Wen Shuchen cherished most. Her words carried weight both outside and within the Wen family.
Simply put, she could influence Wen Shuchen’s every decision.
And Shen Fu relied on the Wen family to survive. Everything he had earned came through them.
To Shen Tingji, He Qingchi was effectively Shen Fu’s boss’s wife.
Her pale lips trembled.
“In the past, my husband seemed to look after you for a year? Don’t worry, I’m not jealous,” He Qingchi said lightly. “I’ve said enough. If you still refuse to let go, that’s no longer my concern.”
Left alone in the ward, Shen Tingji lay still.
Nurses came to check her temperature and administer medicine. After He Qingchi’s talk, she didn’t return. Wen Shuchen didn’t appear either, perhaps to avoid suspicion, only informing the secretary assigned to care for her.
Her immigration procedures had already been completed, but the sudden illness delayed things for several days.
By the third day in hospital, Shen Tingji could get out of bed.
Wearing oversized hospital clothes, she often sat quietly by the window watching the blue sky outside, unmoving for hours.
She recalled many things. She didn’t love the cello. As a child, she hadn’t understood which hobbies were expensive—until she overheard a neighbor complaining about how sending her daughter to learn cello nearly consumed the family’s yearly income. The phrase “consume it all” lodged in her heart.
Later, when Shen Fu asked what interested her, she drew a cello on paper.
She knew life was already hard for him—balancing school and caring for her—yet she deliberately chose the most expensive lessons to burden him. From butterfly hair clips to princess dresses, she demanded the best, while he wore clothes bought in bundles from recycling stations.
Deep down, she despised his “dirty” background. At school, she claimed to be the only daughter of physics professors, with no siblings.
She had never acknowledged Shen Fu as family.
Then she thought of Qu Bixin—who had never despised Shen Fu’s origins. Everyone knew the Qu family’s daughter had thrown herself at a poor nobody. How foolish.
Tears slipped down, cold against the back of her pale hand.
Closing her eyes slowly, she leaned back, recalling He Qingchi’s soft words before leaving: “You should step out of that hatred and find your own happiness.”
Find happiness?
She laughed and cried at once. Having witnessed her parents’ murder as a child, her tongue cruelly cut out—how could she dream of love? To this day she remained trapped in the pain, while the man who once shared it had moved on.
No one in this world would accompany her anymore.
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