Forced Cohabitation After a Hit Romance Variety Show with My Rival Actress - Chapter 6

“What did you just say?!”

Even through the phone, Chi Yu could feel her young manager’s temper flaring.

“How can you turn down such a great opportunity? The company fought so hard to secure this for you!”

Chi Yu paused, considering. “If it was so difficult to get, maybe we should give it to someone else.”

Lu Man seemed to pinch the bridge of her nose, struggling to regain her composure.

“Are you joking? You’ve only just returned to the country—do you even realize how popular this dating reality show is? Countless people would kill to be on it! You may not have the most impressive resume yet, but you have a strong public following and a down-to-earth image. You only got this spot because the original guest had to drop out. How can you possibly back out now?”

Chi Yu chuckled evasively.

Lu Man grew even more frantic.

“You’ll be on this super-hot dating show with Ruan Feiyu! We can generate buzz by playing up a ‘couple’ angle. Isn’t that perfect?”

“Yeah, sounds great.”

Chi Yu turned and glanced through the glass curtain wall, catching sight of the scene unfolding on the ground floor.

At that moment, Gu Yuan was already downstairs, preparing for her shoot.

Holding the phone to her ear, Chi Yu’s gaze drifted to the slender, elegant figure on the first floor.

Suddenly, Lu Man’s tone sharpened with suspicion.

“Wait a minute… why don’t you want to go? Are you secretly dating someone behind the company’s back?”

Dating…

Chi Yu’s bright, deer-like eyes slowly shifted to the first floor, focusing on the center of the bustling crowd.

She chuckled. “Dating who?”

The manager sighed in relief and began to lecture her earnestly. “Chi Yu, you need to think about this. Your career is on the rise—now isn’t the time to be reckless. You should cherish every opportunity, not squander your rare audience appeal…”

But Chi Yu didn’t hear a word.

On the first floor, the makeup artist was touching up Gu Yuan’s makeup. The lipstick was twisted out and applied to Gu Yuan’s crimson lips.

The pressure of the lipstick slightly stretched her lips in the direction of the application, but the highly elastic skin quickly snapped back into place after the swipe.

They looked soft, plump, and utterly tempting.

Framed by her pale skin, they resembled a sweet fruit, glistening with fresh dew, hanging from a branch.

Gu Yuan casually flicked her hair over her shoulder with one hand, revealing the graceful curve of her butterfly bones.

The memory of that night flooded back—

It was also September, just two weeks into the new semester.

The weather was even hotter than now, the cicadas’ shrill cries piercing the eardrums from the parched branches.

She and Gu Yuan, both glistening with a thin layer of sweat, hid in a secluded corner of the campus, kissing.

That day, Gu Yuan wore a high-necked, sleeveless floral dress. The ruched neckline left half her back exposed, the delicate butterfly bones pressing against the fabric’s edge, the pale skin clinging to the stunning contours of her skeleton.

When Chi Yu’s fingers traced the delicate skin over her shoulder blades, a fine tremor would ripple across the pale flesh, like ripples spreading across a pond of spring water stirred by a gentle breeze.

Gu Yuan’s floral dress, like the jasmine scent that clung to her skin, seemed to possess an almost bewitching power.

The woman, usually aloof and distant like a flower on a high mountain peak, had dressed with meticulous care. When Chi Yu, clad in her loose-fitting blue high school uniform, cornered her against the wall, kissing her until the corners of her eyes flushed crimson, her gaze shimmered with a radiant, watery light.

Gu Yuan felt like she was about to faint from lack of oxygen, barely managing to stay upright by clinging to Chi Yu’s shoulders.

Chi Yu, despite holding Gu Yuan’s warmth in her arms, mischievously bit Gu Yuan’s lip.

“Sister, what did you come looking for me for?” Chi Yu murmured, her lips still pressed against Gu Yuan’s soft ones, brushing lightly against that crimson mouth with each word. Her breath, warm and moist, fanned across Gu Yuan’s reddened lips, sending shivers through her entire body.

Gu Yuan parted her lips slightly, her voice barely audible, as if echoing the slender figure downstairs who was now playing with her hair. “I should be asking you… what are you doing?”

Being kissed to the point of fainting, and she’s still asking what I’m doing?

Chi Yu smiled, rolled up her sleeve to reveal a stretch of her delicate, pale forearm. The loose-fitting blue school uniform looked surprisingly good on her. Though still a high school senior, she was already as tall as the slender, graceful Gu Yuan. Her swan-like neck, pale and elegant, emerged from the uniform’s unzipped collar, accentuating her palm-sized face and making it appear even more fair and luminous.

Chi Yu’s doe-like eyes and high ponytail framed a pure, innocent smile. Yet her slender, pale arms, wrapped possessively around Gu Yuan’s waist, exerted a surprising force, betraying the innocent facade on her face.

“My dear Sister Yuanyuan, you said you came to see my eldest sister, but she doesn’t have class today. Did you get lost, perhaps? Wandering from the performance arts department past the physics faculty next door, all the way to the affiliated high school?”

“I even skipped evening study hall for you, but it’s worth it. After all, I’m the most important person to you, aren’t I?”

Chi Yu narrowed her eyes and pecked Gu Yuan’s crimson lips. “It’s getting late, Sister. Be careful not to wander into the lion’s den—you might get eaten.”

“……”

Gu Yuan’s eyes were hazy as she gazed at Chi Yu’s strikingly beautiful face at close range.

Her eyes were rimmed with red, her ears burned, and the feverish heat radiating from her body intensified her delicate, alluring fragrance.

“Who’s eating whom isn’t certain yet,” Gu Yuan murmured. “How can you be so sure I’m the one who’ll be devoured?”

Chi Yu laughed, her eyes curving into crescents as she pressed her developing body against Gu Yuan’s soft, yielding form.

The tone was genuinely joyful, unlike her current detached and perfunctory demeanor.

“My dear Sister Yuanyuan, what do you think?”

Gu Yuan took a deep breath, her usual cool composure cracking, her voice trembling slightly.

“Are you so certain I’m not the one with ulterior motives?”

Chi Yu tilted her head, resting her chin against Gu Yuan’s delicate collarbone, deliberately gazing up at her from close range.

“Then what could Sister want from me?”

“My heart or my body?”

Though nearly the same height as Gu Yuan, Chi Yu leaned in provocatively, her chin pressed against that exquisite collarbone, her head tilted, her large, watery eyes blinking up at her.

Gu Yuan’s heart skipped several beats.

Slowly, Gu Yuan raised a hand and gently stroked Chi Yu’s chin, like scratching a kitten.

She smiled, lowering her gaze to the girl nestled against her shoulder. “What else could I want…?”

“I want you.”

Across the river of time, those words echoed once more in her mind.

Chi Yu gazed at the figure downstairs and involuntarily blurted out, “Because there’s no one here I want anything from.”

The words traveled through the phone signal, transforming into electrical impulses that reached her manager’s ears on the other end.

For some inexplicable reason, Lu Man detected a hint of flirtatiousness in her tone.

Ah, no wonder the fans have dubbed her a natural flirt, Lu Man thought. Even when she speaks softly, it feels like a gentle tug on your heart, leaving a faint, ticklish sensation.

And with that youthful, innocent, and stunningly beautiful face, she truly was a “femme fatale”—the kind of woman who, in ancient times, would have been accused of “ruining nations and bringing calamity to the people.”

Lu Man feigned a cough. “Ahem! What did you say, Xiao Chi?”

Chi Yu offered another perfunctory smile. “Nothing.”

“……”

Lu Man paused for several seconds before slowly replying, “Ahem, what does it matter if you want something or not? It’s not like they’re actually asking you to find love on the show. Even if the audience knows it’s unlikely to work out, who doesn’t enjoy watching beautiful actresses cozying up to each other? This is a great opportunity—you should seize it! The fact that you don’t want anything from it is precisely why you should go!”

Lu Man’s voice grew increasingly urgent as she spoke.

Chi Yu, too lazy to argue further, suddenly thought, What does it matter if Ruan Feiyu is on the show? Gu Yuan isn’t.

With this thought, Chi Yu’s fingers traced the glass, her fingertips landing precisely on the delicate curve of that slender, swan-like neck.

She smiled. “Mm, sounds good.”

Lu Man’s voice lit up with surprise. “You agree? Ah, I knew you were smart enough to figure it out without my guidance…”

Chi Yu cut her off. “Then, Sister Manman, who will I be paired with?”

A brief silence hung in the air on the other end of the line.

“Is it Ruan Feiyu?” Chi Yu asked.

To her surprise, the manager’s silence stretched even longer this time, ending with an awkward chuckle.

“…No. You’ll find out when the time comes.”