"You're good at pleasing elders," Qin Tianyi said with a chilling expression, striding ahead.
Gu Susu hurried to catch up, wondering what whim had suddenly made him unhappy. This man was truly unpredictable, his moods shifting without warning.
She practically jogged to keep up with him back to their room, unable to fathom why he was angry again. She tried to explain, "Are you upset because I prepared a separate gift for the old lady? I was afraid the gift would seem too meager if I didn't tell you. I didn't expect the old lady to like it so much..."
Qin Tianyi furrowed his brow and interrupted her in a deep voice, "This isn't the only thing you've kept from me."
Gu Susu lowered her head in a panic. "There's nothing else I haven't told you. You already knew about Yi Wei's situation, and it was your suggestion that I bring it up at the old lady's birthday banquet."
"That's not what I'm talking about," Qin Tianyi said, pulling a pill from his jacket pocket and placing it in his palm for her to see. "What is this?"
Gu Susu looked at the white pill and shook her head, bewildered. "I don't know. Is it medication you take? What does it treat? Stomach problems?"
"You don't recognize it?" Qin Tianyi asked, moving to open the drawer where she kept her personal items. "I don't take medication. If I did, wouldn't I recognize it?"
Gu Susu suddenly understood, a chill running down her spine. How could he have found the birth control pills she had hidden?
Qin Tianyi had already emptied all her clothes from the drawer, scattering them on the floor. Only the unlabeled medicine bottle remained.
He grabbed her hair, forcing her face close to the bottle. "Tell me the truth, what is in this bottle?"
But Gu Susu clung to a sliver of hope, trying to deflect. "It's sleeping pills to help with sleep. I take a couple when I can't sleep..."
"Is there a single truthful word in your mouth?"
Qin Tianyi held onto her hair, forcing her to lift her head. "I've already had this pill analyzed. It's birth control... You've been secretly taking birth control pills."
Gu Susu was thrown into a panic, never expecting her carefully hidden birth control pills to be discovered. She tried to find an excuse. "We just got married. I just don't want to have a child so soon... We're still young. I think it's fine to wait until our relationship is more stable before having children..."
Qin Tianyi laughed in fury. "What kind of female liar are you? You don't even blink when you lie. You act all obedient, drinking the tonics prepared by Grandma and Rong Ma every day, while secretly taking birth control pills, playing us all. You've had children before, haven't you? Whose children? Where are they?"
"No, how could that be? Where would children come from!" Gu Susu immediately denied it, unwilling to let Qin Tianyi know about Little Star.
Qin Tianyi released her hair and pushed her down. "Still not a single truth. Actually, even if you said nothing, I would know. You have no intention of having children with me!"
"Yes, I don't want children yet. But seeing how much Grandma and Rong Ma are looking forward to a great-grandchild, I couldn't say it directly. It's good that you know. Actually, I'm not good enough for you, and I'm not worthy of bearing your children." Gu Susu spoke with resignation. "If you're not satisfied, you can divorce me and marry someone better."
"Divorce? Right, I see. You married me just to divorce me!" Qin Tianyi said with a cold smile.
Gu Susu also felt exhausted. Two people who shouldn't be together were forced together, and she had to be cautious and cater to him without any freedom.
"I told you, I never wanted to get married. It was out of necessity. What more do you want? Are you forcing me to have a child? Even if I had a child, I wouldn't be a good mother." The thought of Little Star, still suffering, made her feel incapable of taking on the responsibility of being a mother to another child.
Qin Tianyi suddenly felt foolish. Because of her, he no longer wanted to pretend to be oblivious. He wanted to implement his long-planned scheme sooner, to protect her, to give her a stable home.
But she was completely heartless, and he blamed her for casting a spell on him, making him infatuated.
"You're right, I was wrong. I actually thought of you as my wife. I forgot why I got married, why I needed a wife." Qin Tianyi's gaze turned icy as he restrained Gu Susu, who was trying to get up from the floor.
He wanted to control her again with his overbearing and domineering ways. "Divorce... Don't even think about it. And whether you have children or not is not up to you."
Pressed against the cold, hard floor, Gu Susu lost control of her emotions. "Qin Tianyi, you bastard! You got married, you needed a wife, just so you could vent your frustrations?"
"Yes, otherwise why would Grandma go to so much trouble to marry a woman for me?" Qin Tianyi tore her clothes without any tenderness, no longer needing to consider her feelings.
Gu Susu struggled and resisted desperately, but she couldn't match Qin Tianyi's strength. She was completely pinned down, unable to move.
They both fell into a frenzy, fueled by their resentment towards each other. But Qin Tianyi remained the one in control, like a monarch dominating her body, capable of reducing her to utter humility at any moment.
After that night, Qin Tianyi became exceptionally indifferent to her.
Before, she thought Qin Tianyi was like an iceberg, but there were occasional moments of gentleness. Now, he was not only an iceberg but also a particularly dangerous and terrifying millennium-old ice stone.
She could no longer find any flicker of emotion in his eyes, and he wouldn't say an extra word to her. Only then did she understand what true heartlessness and coldness meant.
Gu Susu felt that every day with him was like a dark, overcast night, tormenting her to the brink of despair.
But she gritted her teeth, never yielding to him, nor begging for mercy. The two of them were engaged in a daily psychological and physical battle, unseen by outsiders.
One day, Qin Tianyi had the driver take Gu Susu back to the Qin residence first, while he and Xiao Anjing went off to attend to some unknown business.
Gu Susu returned alone, feeling a sense of relief, no longer having to face the constant struggle.
As she entered the small building, intending to go to her room to rest, Rong Ma appeared with a smile. "Young Madam, you're back so early today. Weren't you with Young Master Tianyi?"
"Xiao Anjing needed to see him about something, so I came back first," Gu Susu replied with a smile.
Rong Ma said, "That's perfect. The old lady wants to see you in her room."
Upon hearing that she could go to the old lady's room, Gu Susu thought she finally had a chance to see what the old lady's room looked like, and if there were any password boxes. If she could get the documents related to Ai Shunan's villa project from the old lady, she could then threaten Ai Shunan.
"Does Grandma want to see me about something?"
"The old lady didn't say," Rong Ma replied with a smile. "You'll know when you get to her room, Young Madam."
"Okay." Gu Susu started upstairs, then paused, wondering if the old lady calling her to her room was a good thing or a bad thing.
Had Qin Tianyi already told the old lady about her secretly taking birth control pills?