met free Chapter 118 One Hundred Million Yen
Chapter 118 One Hundred Million Yen
About twenty minutes later, Li Long called.
"Boss, there are currently six customers in the West Island Cafe. Initial observation has revealed nothing unusual."
"But at the entrance of the bookstore diagonally across from the coffee shop, we spotted a suspicious figure. Judging from the build and disguise habits... it looked a lot like Miss Judy."
They did follow us, just as expected.
Lin Xiuyi smiled slightly and said calmly, "Ignore her. Continue to monitor her and notify me immediately if anything unusual happens."
After hanging up the phone, he glanced at the time: three o'clock sharp.
The tea in the cup had gone cold. Lin Xiuyi put down the teacup, straightened his clothes, calmly got up, pushed open the door of the teahouse, and walked steadily toward the shop with the "Xiti Island Coffee" sign not far away.
Upon entering the West Island Cafe, Lin Xiuyi habitually scanned the entire room.
The six individual travelers were each focused on their phones or the pages of their books, and nothing seemed amiss.
His gaze then fell on the corner.
It was a young girl with black hair, sitting quietly by the window.
The sunlight perfectly outlined the contours of her profile, soft and bright.
She was wearing a simple off-white knit sweater, her hair was slightly curled at the ends, and her hands were neatly placed on her knees.
When Lin Xiuyi's gaze met hers, the girl stood up almost reflexively, her movements showing a hint of urgency while trying to maintain a proper composure.
"Hello, Mr. Lin."
"Ms. Miyano." Lin Xiuyi nodded in response, walked over, and sat down opposite the girl.
"Excuse me, Mr. Lin, I already ordered you a black coffee without permission. I wonder if it suits your taste?"
The girl sat down again, her hands clasped on the edge of the table, a gentle smile playing on her lips.
When she smiles, her eyebrows curve into a soft arc, and shallow dimples appear on her cheeks.
Lin Xiuyi had seen too many beauties—charming, aloof, flamboyant, melancholic—but rarely had he encountered such a clean smile.
"Mr. Lin?" The girl tilted her head slightly, like a puzzled kitten, and called out softly.
Lin Xiuyi snapped out of her daze and smiled calmly: "Oh, it doesn't matter, I'm not picky about coffee."
He reached for the cup of black coffee, took a small sip, and then put it down.
"I prefer tea to coffee. Bitterness is too one-dimensional, unlike the layered sweetness of tea."
"If I had known this earlier, I would have invited Mr. Lin to meet me at the teahouse."
The girl smiled again, this time with a more genuine sense of relaxation.
She seemed relieved; at least the start went relatively smoothly.
The two chatted casually for a few minutes.
When Lin Xiu asked her how long she had been waiting, she said about twenty minutes, as she had come during her lunch break.
Lin Xiuyi said that the shop's signature dish seemed to be cheesecake. She nodded and said that she had noticed it when she passed by before, but had never tried it.
The conversation was bland and devoid of any substance.
Lin Xiuyi remained calm and composed, holding the coffee cup with a steady posture, showing no sign of urgency.
It was as if they were just there for an afternoon get-together with old friends, completely unaware of the true purpose of the meeting.
On the contrary, Akemi Miyano was the first to become restless.
Her fingertips tapped lightly twice on the edge of the table unconsciously, then quickly returned to her knees, as if she were suppressing some kind of emotion.
"Mr. Lin..." the girl finally spoke, "Aren't you curious about who I am?"
Lin Xiuyi put down his coffee cup and looked up at her: "Ms. Miyano will naturally say what she wants to say. The one thing I have no shortage of is patience."
His more than two decades of experience in America had already honed him into a rock that had sunk to the bottom of the sea.
The initiative is in his hands today. The one who speaks first may not be the winner, but he will definitely be the one with the more urgent need.
As expected, Lin Xiuyi's calm and composed demeanor made Miyano Akemi feel an invisible pressure.
She bit her lower lip, leaving a faint white mark on the rosy lip from her pearly teeth.
After a moment, the girl took a deep breath, raised her head, and looked directly into Lin Xiuyi's eyes.
"Mr. Lin, my name is Akemi Miyano."
She spoke slowly and deliberately, much slower than before.
"My parents ran a clinic called Miyano Clinic more than 20 years ago."
"Is that so?" Lin Xiu nodded, her expression remaining calm and composed, as if she had only heard the other person mention that the weather was nice today.
Who else but those two sisters would invite people under the name "Miyano Clinic"?
Akemi Miyano lowered her eyes, her gaze falling on the back of her clasped hands.
Her voice was even lower than before, as if she was trying to suppress some kind of embarrassment:
"My parents... once saved Mr. Lin's life."
The girl paused, her Adam's apple bobbing slightly.
"So, there's something I'd like to ask Mr. Lin for help with."
The moment the words left her lips, she almost instinctively shrank her shoulders. Of course, she knew what those four words, "repaying kindness," meant.
But she had no other choice.
Lin Xiuyi did not respond immediately. He picked up his coffee cup and slowly took another sip.
"Ms. Miyano, as far as I know, both your parents are doctors, right?"
"Yes..." Miyano Akemi nodded, puzzled.
"As a doctor, isn't it my duty to treat patients?"
Lin Xiuyi put down her cup and smiled faintly.
"If someone is obligated to repay a doctor's life simply because they were saved by one, then who in this world would dare to go to the hospital so easily?"
Akemi Miyano's face instantly drained of color, and even the smile on her lips froze.
She hurriedly tried to explain, her voice trembling slightly: "Mr. Lin, that's not what I meant... I just..."
"Do you need money?" Lin Xiuyi interrupted her.
He suddenly remembered what path this girl had ultimately chosen in the original timeline in order to bring her sister out of that dark organization.
They formed a gang of robbers to rob banks, using one billion yen to buy a vague and elusive "freedom".
In that gamble, she staked everything, never considering a way out.
"Is one billion yen enough?"
"Huh?" Miyano Akemi was completely stunned.
She had prepared herself for the difficult task of asking for the loan, and had even mentally rehearsed how to tactfully propose the loan and explain the enormous sum involved.
To her surprise, before she could even speak, Lin Xiuyi had already uttered that number.
One billion yen. That was the price the organization offered, the price she and her sister paid for their freedom.
For ordinary people, that is an astronomical figure that they could never reach in their entire lives.
In her original plan, "asking for help" was not even an option.
Robbing a bank may be crazy, but at least you don't owe anyone anything.
But last night, when she saw Lin Xiuyi on the TV news, that thought started growing wildly like weeds.
He is very wealthy.
She knew. One of the things Akemi Miyano learned during her years in America was that some people were at the top of the wealth ladder, and a billion yen was just a number to them.
And this person happened to owe her parents a favor.