Chapter 45

Chapter 45: Using Her as a Scapegoat?

She wore a white camisole nightdress, thin enough to suggest more than it showed. Her hair was damp, droplets clinging to the ends and falling one by one, darkening the fabric where they landed.

It made it painfully obvious she’d only just washed up.

Qiao Qing Yan had always been famous for her beauty, but today it was the kind that made people afraid to look too long.

Maybe she found his embarrassment boring. She casually pulled an outer layer on, loose and unbothered, as if she were dressing for a lazy morning instead of being dragged into a fight.

The assistant finally forced himself to lift his head, face burning.

“Miss Qiao, the car is downstairs. I’ll… I’ll wait for you down there.”

Sister Lan had given him his task. No matter what, since he’d found her, he had to bring her back to the company.

Qiao Qing Yan watched him flee with a soft chuckle.

Innocent. Too innocent for this line of work.

Could he really handle it?

*

An hour and a half later, Qiao Qing Yan sat in the Artist Department conference room.

A contract was tossed onto the table in front of her.

“Post a clarification,” the agent said coldly. “Say the person in the photos is you. Say the one who was with Director Liu that night was also you.”

“After that, the company will allow you to terminate your contract successfully.”

Qiao Qing Yan glanced down at the contract. It was the one the original host had signed—one year left before it expired.

She already knew what was inside: the harsh clauses, the suffocating restrictions, the enormous breach-of-contract penalty.

The original host’s first eighteen years had been like running on a cheat code. Calling her a favored darling wouldn’t have been an exaggeration. At eighteen, she’d won a grand slam.

To this day, no one else had achieved that at such an age.

And then it had all turned into misery.

Like the god of misfortune had clung to her the moment she turned eighteen—dragging her straight from a national darling into someone mocked by everyone, hated by everyone online.

She’d survived these years by riding heat, even black-red heat, just to stay afloat.

And she wasn’t even a popular black-red entertainer. She was a washed-up one.

Qiao Qing Yan curved her lips into a faint smile and rested her cheek on her hand. Her neatly groomed fingertips tapped the contract—tap, tap, tap—soft and steady.

“Does the company think netizens are idiots?”

The photos had been taken with people blocked right at the door of the room. Solid. Clear. Like iron.

Did they really think she could reverse the tide with a few typed sentences? Even with that so-called recording of her arguing with some wealthy noble lady—

Photos and surveillance footage were facts. Things that didn’t change because someone wanted them to.

The agent lifted her chin. “That has nothing to do with you. You just need to post.”

Qiao Qing Yan’s smile didn’t reach her eyes. “So the company wants me to be the scapegoat.”

She tilted her head slightly, gaze cool. “Did you ask if I agreed?”

By the window sat a peerless beauty—face luminous as jade, eyes tipped like peach blossoms. A red tear mole beneath one eye made the expression even more mesmerizing.

Her gaze shimmered as if it were broken into fragments, deep and rippling with flirtation like autumn water.

It was the kind of face heaven would have been satisfied to create once and never repeat.

And yet, in her stillness, she also looked hazy—like moonlight veiled in mist, hard to grasp. Dangerous to study.

Wu Lan had always known Qiao Qing Yan was beautiful. The kind of beautiful with no dead angles. In the past, it had been loud, brash—beauty with vanity clinging to it.

Today, it was different.

Today, it was the kind that made people feel they’d stepped too close to something they shouldn’t touch.

Especially her eyes—clear and shallow, without the slightest ripple. They drew you in… and made you afraid to look deeper.

Wu Lan had witnessed the change through the live stream at the awards ceremony. But seeing her in person was something else entirely.