Chapter 6 — CEO Phong, Stop Chasing Her—She Already Has a Marriage Certificate

Nhã Kỳ was about to turn around and leave the glass hallway, find a hidden corner to calm her nerves before deciding what to do next, when a familiar childish voice rang out from the stairs leading down to the banquet hall, making her stop.

"Mom Thi, I want to sit next to you and dad!"

It's Bảo Nhiên's voice.

Nhã Kỳ turned around and looked down through the transparent glass. Her daughter was standing next to the main banquet table, pulling Diệp Uyển Thi's hand, her little face looking up with anticipation. And Diệp Uyển Thi, instead of being shy or correcting the child's address, just smiled gently, bent down to pick up Bảo Nhiên, and placed a light kiss on her cheek.

"Okay, please sit next to me," Uyển Thi replied, her voice was sweet and not at all forced, as if this wasn't the first time she was called by that sacred call.

Not the first time.

Those three words rang into Nhã Kỳ's head like a broken bell. If this is not the first time Bảo Nhiên called this woman "mother", then how many times before has her daughter had the opportunity to be with Diệp Uyển Thi, close enough to blurt out the call so naturally? How many times did Chính Nguyên take his child to meet this woman without saying a word to her?

Nhã Kỳ's mind was spinning, trying to recall each of her husband's business trips over the past year, the times he said "bring Bảo Nhiên along to let me know more about the outside world", the times she returned home, chirping about "a very beautiful, very fragrant girl" that Nhã Kỳ then simply thought was some employee of the company, a passing social acquaintance during the trip. She never had the slightest doubt, never once asked more carefully, because she trusted her husband absolutely, so much so that she did not allow herself to think of bad possibilities.

Now, watching her biological daughter fall into the arms of a strange woman, calling her "mother" as naturally as breathing, Nhã Kỳ felt like the entire foundation of trust she had built over the past seven years collapsed in an instant.

She looked at Chính Nguyên, waiting for some reaction - a correction, a reminder to her daughter, an expression of guilt. But he just stood there, smiling slightly at that scene, not showing any surprise or awkwardness, as if this were a completely normal thing, a part that had long been ingrained in the lifestyle of this small family.

Nhã Kỳ clung tightly to the railing, feeling like her legs no longer had enough strength to stand. She tried to take a deep breath, reminding herself to stay calm and think carefully before making any hasty conclusions. Perhaps, she told herself in despair, this was just a childish term of endearment learned from somewhere, not necessarily reflecting a deep relationship like she feared.

But her reason, no matter how hard she tried to defend herself, could not overcome the painful intuition screaming in her heart: a six-year-old child did not suddenly call a stranger "mom" after just one or two social encounters. That language, that intimacy, must be built through an iterative process, through many close contacts, through intentional cultivation from both sides — from the other woman, and perhaps, from the father who silently allowed it to happen.

She looked down at the banquet table again. Bảo Nhiên was sitting in Diệp Uyển Thi's lap, her two little hands playing with her pearl necklace, smiling widely when Uyển Thi whispered something into her ear. That scene, if Nhã Kỳ didn't know the truth, she would probably think it was the image of a normal happy family - a mother, a father, a little daughter surrounded by tangerines.

The only thing is, the mother in that picture is not her.

Tears began to rise to the corners of Nhã Kỳ's eyes, but she gritted her teeth, not allowing herself to cry right now. She had learned, through seven years of living in a family that always valued dignity, that tears should only be shed when no one was watching. She retreated deeper into the darkness of the hallway, leaning her back against the cold wall, trying to control her increasingly rapid breathing.

She remembered all the nights she stayed up to take care of Bảo Nhiên when her child had a high fever, the mornings she woke up at five o'clock to prepare a nutritious breakfast for her child before going to school, the fairy tales she told every night before her child fell asleep. In the seven years she had been a mother, she had poured into it all her love, all the most meticulous care a woman could give her child.

Yet now, with just a few meetings, another woman was able to occupy that sacred position in her daughter's heart, even if it was just through a spontaneous call.

Nhã Kỳ understands, no matter how painful it is, that the fault does not entirely lie with an innocent six-year-old child who is not aware enough to distinguish the boundaries of relationships. Children easily give love to anyone who treats them gently and thoughtfully, regardless of the complications behind it. But precisely because Bảo Nhiên is too young to understand, the responsibility to protect that boundary, the responsibility to keep her daughter properly aware of her family, should have belonged to adults - to Chính Nguyên herself.

And he completely failed in that responsibility.

In Nhã Kỳ's head, fragmented memories began to automatically merge into a more complete, more painful picture. She remembered three months ago, when Chính Nguyên took Bảo Nhiên on a two-day business trip to Da Nang, and when she returned, she brought a new doll, saying it was given to her by her "father's friend",She remembered the time her daughter asked her, in the middle of dinner, "why doesn't our family have a girl who smiles like the one at Dad's company?", at that time Nhã Kỳ just laughed, thinking she was talking about idle childish things, not caring at all to find out more. She remembered the times when Chính Nguyên came home later than usual, citing long meetings, but now, standing in the darkness of this hallway, she was no longer sure whether all those evenings were really just meetings or not.

She didn't want to think about the worst possibility — that there had been a relationship that went beyond friendship between her husband and this woman. But no matter what the truth was, even if it was just an emotional attachment stemming from a past obsession like Chính Nguyên's statement on the stage, one thing had become indisputably clear: during the seven years of marriage, there existed a private space that her husband shared with another woman, a space in which she - the legal wife, the child's biological mother - was completely left out, unaware.

That's what broke her heart the most. Not because of ordinary jealousy, but because of the feeling of being betrayed in a silent, long-lasting, cleverly concealed way that she - a wife who always tries to observe and take care of every little detail in family life - is not even aware of it.

She stood silently for a while longer, until the music in the banquet hall gradually subsided, signaling that the party was about to end. She took one last look at the banquet table, where Chính Nguyên was holding Bảo Nhiên who had fallen asleep on her shoulder, while Diệp Uyển Thi stood next to her, gently stroking her hair with a gesture so gentle that it was difficult for outsiders to distinguish between true feelings and calculations.

She took out her phone and opened the photo of Bảo Nhiên at birth, when the baby was still red, lying in her arms in the middle of the maternity ward. Seven years ago, she swore to herself that she would spend her whole life protecting this child, so that he could grow up in a perfect home, without lacking love from both parents. She never thought that in order to keep that home intact for her children, one day she herself would have to learn how to leave it.

Nhã Kỳ turned around and walked away in silence, leaving behind a bouquet of white Phalaenopsis orchids forgotten on the railing - as a silent symbol of everything she had prepared, hoped for, and now, no longer had any meaning. Her high heels tapped lightly on the marble floor of the hallway, each step seemed like a small end to a chapter of her life that had just closed, even though she herself could not yet imagine how the next chapter would begin.