The Preparation

November 30, 20XX (Friday)

Zhao Manor

Yang woke up late because of last-minute work he needed to do. It was already one o'clock in the afternoon when he was ready to go to work.

Upon opening his door; he was horrified as four servants run pass by him in a hurry saying things like, "The flowers have arrived." and "The cake needs to be brought into the banquet hall." and "One of us needs to help Miss Mei Li with preparing the guests' name cards."

Hearing the last sentence being uttered by the middle-aged servant that was usually is in charged with cleaning the gardens, Yang called Secretary Bai immediately.

When the secretary picked up, Yang said with a grin, " I won't be going to the company. I am helping prepare Yue's banquet!"

Secretary Bai rolled his eyes and replied monotonously, "Yes, CEO Zhao."

After the CEO had ended the call, Secretary Bai muttered complains out loud as he stamped papers after papers for the CEO, "Little Yue had banquets before, and you weren't helping! Mei Li is probably there, and you're too opportunistic to let this chance to be on her good side go."

Secretary Bai glared at his phone before sighing helplessly and promising that if Mei Li married his CEO in the future, he would use Mei Li to manipulate the CEO to do more work so he could also rest on a paid vacation. Bali or the Maldives sounds nice. Of course, it would be paid by the CEO.

Meanwhile, the CEO had hurried to the Banquet Hall and saw the room filled with people busily arranging flowers on top of the face in the table. Some were table skirting the guest's roundtables, the long table that would have the buffet were still bare as people cleaned it meticulously. People were on a ladder putting long strings of flowers on the ceiling as if it came down like rain; there were also four people in the front at the small raised platform arranging the backdrop behind the long table that he knew the Zhao Family members would be seated at while facing the guests.

His eyes scanned for the woman he was hoping to see. He spotted someone carrying a large stack of cards into an already decorated table and had started to fold the cards like tents so they would stand up.

His stride towards her was wide as he ignored the people around gossiping to each other and spoke to Mei Li, "It's better if we don't use guest cards for not too important people and let them choose for themselves."

"What if it causes a riff?" Mei Li asked after blinking innocently at him.

Yang saw Mei Li had eyed his messy hair. He had comb it down, but when he had used the hair blower in a hurry and had not gelled it down, it had somewhat turned unruly on him.

"Like what?" He subconsciously sleeked his hair back and exhaling in anger as his hair probably became more unruly. He had not stopped to think if he had looked good; now he regretted not doing so. Now, she finally saw him so disheveled.

"For example, Hao Chen would sit on this chair, and four women would fight who would sit next to him."

Yang snorted in amusement before replying, "Firstly, nobody would dare to cause trouble in Zhao Manor. Secondly, if you want to make that example again and then make it believable, you should use Dr. Zhang Li Xi's name. He is the playboy while Hao Chen is the innocent lamb."

Suddenly, Yang felt the hair that he had pulled backward returning to its previous place as it covered his forehead and touching his eyes. His eyes went up as if glaring at those pieces of hair.

Mei Li giggled at him and asked, "It's the first time I saw you without gel."

"I was in a hurry," Yang defended himself.

Mei Li was about to retort when one of the people she had instructed to prepare the food interrupted them, "Miss Wu, we have already done preparing the ingredients needed for the food. The head chef said that he would start cooking the dishes at 3 pm so it would still be warm when 5:30 comes."

Mei Li nodded, "As long as everything is done on the scheduled time so the guest will not have to watch the food being hauled in."

The servant nodded and excused himself, and another servant came to report causing Yang to frown at how busy she was to talk to him. He sat down and waited for Mei Li to be done with a sulk.

The fact that two days after this day she would move out of the manor inside into that little and cramp condo of hers made him sulk turn gloomy. She was safe in the Zhao Manor; she had everything in the Zhao Manor! Why can't she be dependent on them and stay? At least then, he had more and better opportunities to woo her.

Mei Li lived to give him hardships- Hardship in love and hardship in lust. Even wearing a sweater as she was wearing today had not hindered the largeness of her boobs. Yang quickly pushed those thoughts out from his mind because if he continues, he would be dealing with said hardship again and be had just showered too.

The daydreaming CEO that was unconsciously staring at the flowers on the vase was taken by surprise when Mei Li's face appeared in his sight with a grin causing him to jump on his seat.

The CEO's cold heart melted upon hearing Mei Li's laughter echoing into his ears. Oh, her laughter was sweeter than any honey could bring in his coffee. He was sure her lips would be even sweeter. He licked his chapped lips.

"Do you have a tuxedo ready to wear for tonight?" Mei Li asked him when her laughter had subsided.

Yang nodded, "My mother had sent me one."

"Mother Zhao also asked me to help you prepare if needed," Mei Li glanced at her watch so she could not see the surprised look that had his cheeks flushing with embarrassment at her words. Did she mean that she would dress him up? Does that mean she would also undress him beforehand?

"Your mother said I have to put a face mask on you so your dry skin wouldn't worsen. While we're at it, we need to find that lip balm we bought for you."

Yang's excited face turned horrified at the thought of putting a horrifying death mask and blurted out, "I'm not putting on a death mask! I am a man, not a girl!"

Mei Li glared at him, making him take a step back. He knew how savage this woman was when she is stressed, lacked sleep, and angry; he didn't want to be the cause of those.

"You will go to my room at four pm," Mei Li pointed at him with her fingers poking on his chest.

"You will put on a FACE mask," Mei Li poked his chest repeated as she continued and emphasizing the word Face loudly, "You will have your lips scrubbed."

Mei Li could not believe how this manly man was afraid of putting on a face mask. She then poked below his chest repeatedly," You will put on lip balm or lipgloss, that face of yours will be leathered with the needed products that will make it more handsome or else..."

Mei Li poked his side making him jump, "I will make your dress in a skirt and parade you in the company! Let's see then if your manliness is still questionable!"

"Yes, Ma'am." Yang gave up his cause.

He would endure, dammit.

Hopefully, moisturizers wouldn't affect his face too much.