She Said: A Passionate Kiss [Entertainment Industry] - Chapter 11
An Linlin leaned closer to Qiang Huai. “He gave it to me.”
“Speak without getting so close to me.” Qiang Huai stood up from the sofa and moved to the floor-to-ceiling window, her back to the light.
“You’ve been in contact with him all these years?” she pressed.
An Linlin looked uneasy, like she had something hard to confess.
Qiang Huai gestured to Xiaoyu to get her a glass of hot water. “Speak. Since you came to me yourself, you must want to resolve this properly.”
“Why aren’t you saying anything now?”
An Linlin took the water, sipped it, and looked around nervously. “Is there surveillance in here?”
Qiang Huai shook her head.
An Linlin then stood up and took off her coat and inner layers, revealing a body covered in scars.
“What—?” Qiang Huai widened her eyes. There wasn’t a single palm-sized spot on her body that wasn’t injured.
“Yu Lele did this.” An Linlin choked, “If he hadn’t gone out to hire more bots, I wouldn’t have been able to escape.”
Xiaoyu quickly grabbed a blanket to cover her up.
“So, everything about me—he forced you to do it?” Qiang Huai was incredulous.
An Linlin curled up on the sofa in the blanket. “Yes.”
“But not entirely,” she lifted her eyes and stared at Qiang Huai. “Do you know how miserable I’ve been all these years?”
“Qiang Huai, I hate you!” Her emotions exploded out of nowhere, shrieking hysterically.
Qiang Huai took a moment to collect herself. She hadn’t even made sense of the full situation yet and now she was being blamed?
“An Linlin, talk properly if you want to keep this conversation going.” Qiang Huai discreetly took out her phone and turned on the voice recorder.
“Heh… Qiang Huai, did you know I liked you?” An Linlin said hoarsely.
“You? Don’t joke,” Qiang Huai dismissed it as if she had farted.
Xiaoyu rushed to close the office door—but before she could, she saw Gu Pingwan standing outside.
“Chief Engineer Gu…” Xiaoyu said nervously, peeking inside the room.
An Linlin was confused, but Qiang Huai froze.
Did Gu Pingwan hear that?!
“Uh, if you’re busy, I can come back later.” Gu Pingwan poked her head in, catching sight of An Linlin in only a blanket and Qiang Huai, having heard everything.
Qiang Huai hadn’t recovered yet when Gu Pingwan added, “Don’t worry, I didn’t hear a thing.”
“No no no, Gu classmate, come in!” Qiang Huai rushed over and pulled her in.
“Ahem, we’re all classmates here. No secrets.” Qiang Huai tried to explain.
An Linlin’s eyes widened. “Gu Pingwan? What are you doing here?”
Gu Pingwan ignored her and said to Qiang Huai, “About the program I gave you last night—I thought you might need help understanding it, so I came to explain.”
Xiaoyu, watching this unfold, felt like Gu Pingwan was asserting dominance like a rightful girlfriend.
“Thank you, Gu classmate. You wrote it clearly—I understood everything.” Qiang Huai found herself naturally standing beside Gu Pingwan.
Gu Pingwan finally turned to greet An Linlin. “Long time no see.”
An Linlin frowned. She’d disliked Gu Pingwan since high school. She rushed over and grabbed Qiang Huai’s hand, whining sweetly, “I wasn’t finished talking, Huai-huai~”
Everyone in the room sucked in a breath.
“Maybe I should just leave,” Gu Pingwan said.
Qiang Huai quickly pulled her hand back. “No! An Linlin is just here to explain about the photos.”
Things were getting more and more out of hand.
“Say something,” she nudged An Linlin to explain.
An Linlin flopped back on the sofa, acting coy. “What do you want me to say~?”
Xiaoyu thought to herself: this is starting to feel like a mistress getting caught by the main wife.
“I’m innocent with her, Gu classmate. Please believe me.” Qiang Huai felt like she couldn’t explain herself even if she tried—but why did she even care this much about explaining?
Gu Pingwan chuckled. When she saw the scars on An Linlin, she more or less pieced together what had happened.
After Xiaoyu explained the whole story in the middle, An Linlin picked up where she left off.
“Did you know Yu Lele went to your university looking for you?”
Qiang Huai nodded. “So?”
“I went too,” An Linlin tightened the blanket. “On the way there, I caught Yu Lele secretly taking photos of you.”
“I told him to delete them, and he said he would—if I slept with him.”
“So I did.”
“But when I woke up, he was gone. Then he sent me my nudes.”
“He blackmailed me to send him money regularly, or else he’d release the photos. I had no choice.”
“It went on for over a year. He moved in with me after losing his job, living off me. If not that, then beating me.”
“I don’t even know if we were in a relationship… but I liked you,” An Linlin began to sob again.
“Every time he forced me to sleep with him, I told myself that if I endured the pain, he wouldn’t go after you.”
This kind of soap-opera drama didn’t even exist in Qiang Huai’s scripts. Even Xiaoyu was stunned. Gu Pingwan’s ears turned bright red hearing all this.
An Linlin pulled open the front of her underwear. Her chest bore thick scars spelling out “Qiang Huai”—clearly carved by a knife.
“Yu Lele likes you too,” An Linlin said as she closed her clothes. “He tied me up and carved it on me, one cut at a time.”
Qiang Huai was speechless. After a long pause, she asked, “Did you bring any evidence today?”
An Linlin quickly pulled a hard drive out of her coat pocket. “It’s all in here—every file he forced me to post about you, plus surveillance videos.”
“Do you want me to call the police?” Qiang Huai took the drive.
“I’m scared he’ll post my nudes,” An Linlin gritted her teeth. “He set up an account to auto-post if I disobeyed him—just needs one click.”
Before Qiang Huai could speak, Gu Pingwan raised her hand like she was in class. “Do you know which platform the photos are stored on?”
“Some foreign site, but the photos are on the drive too,” An Linlin replied.
Gu Pingwan turned to Qiang Huai. “I can try to intercept it. I think I can do it.”
An Linlin’s eyes lit up. “Really?!”
“Yes, but I still suggest going to the police,” Gu Pingwan said, reaching for the office computer. “Mind if I borrow this?”
Qiang Huai nodded and handed her the drive, while Xiaoyu called the police.
As they waited, Gu Pingwan used the data to trace the upload path, got into Yu Lele’s account, and deleted the scheduled post.
Meanwhile, Qin-jie contacted legal counsel to prepare a lawsuit. The hard drive was full of fake posts going back six years.
Police in Jin City also reached out to Shandong and found Yu Lele in a net café private room—hugging a body pillow printed with Qiang Huai’s face.
An Linlin trembled in front of the officers. She didn’t know if she’d broken any laws, but she truly felt helpless.
She and Qiang Huai both gave statements at the police station. Reporters even followed them there, crowding around for updates.
Qin-jie had the PR department draft a statement to release once Qiang Huai came out of the station.
Qiang Huai finished first. When she came out, Gu Pingwan was waiting in the hallway. The white tiles inside the station gleamed blindingly bright.
“Qiang Huai,” Gu Pingwan said as she approached, “I think An Linlin might have Stockholm syndrome. Should we get her a psychologist?”
Qiang Huai had sensed the same. From the start, she could tell something wasn’t right with An Linlin—her mood swings were too extreme.
As soon as they stepped out of the police station, a swarm of reporters rushed forward.
“Miss Qiang, are the online rumors true?”
“Why did you come to the police station?”
“Why haven’t you released a statement yet?”
…
A flood of questions came crashing down. It was overwhelming.
Qiang Huai smiled. “No comment.”
“Why not? Are you scared?”
“Are you hiding something, Miss Qiang?”
She gave that answer to protect An Linlin. The police hadn’t released a statement yet, and conflating the two issues would cause more damage.
Defamation was one thing. An Linlin’s abuse was another.
Online buzz about Qiang Huai’s trip to the police exploded—until Huai Sheng Group released a formal announcement.
It clarified the high school photo issue, refuted each false rumor, and confirmed legal action against the slanderers.
Soon after, the police issued an official notice about “Mr. Yu” fabricating rumors about “Miss Qiang.”
Public support for Qiang Huai grew rapidly. Some users even dug up that Yu Lele had been her classmate in high school.
…
Back at the office, Gu Pingwan returned to her desk. She had taken just a few hours off to help Qiang Huai with the program, but now she had to catch up on work.
She stared at the screen, unable to type a single line of code. An Linlin’s words—I like you—kept replaying in her head.
Qiang Huai was busy too. Without An Linlin’s evidence, this whole situation might’ve dragged on much longer.
She asked Qin-jie to find top-tier lawyers and a PR team for An Linlin. Even if she didn’t like her, it had all started because of her.
This society already judged women too harshly. An Linlin was an influencer—if her story leaked, it’d cause another media storm.
Qiang Huai deeply understood the pain of being in a public smear campaign. She also understood what An Linlin was afraid of. In this world, it didn’t matter if you were right or wrong—if you were a woman, you were wrong.
Skirt Skirt (Qunqun) saw the news and immediately called.
“Huaihuai, you heard already?” Skirt Skirt’s voice was soft.
“Of course I did! An Linlin likes me—why didn’t you tell me before?” Qiang Huai shouted.
Skirt Skirt was shocked. “What?! An Linlin likes you?!”
“Ah! Wait—I wasn’t talking about that!“ she blurted.
Qiang Huai blinked. “Wait… what are you talking about then?”