Chapter 1

"You can quit your job after marrying me. You just need to take good care of me at our home and give birth to a son for me within a year! No daughters, please. Daughters are expensive to raise!" a man said condescendingly. He sat in front of Corrinne Carew. He was her prospective partner during a matchmaking session. At the age of nearly 40, his hair was thinning, and he had a potbelly. Corinne's stepmother, Lilliana Reece, was worried that Corinne might end up marrying someone good, so she forced her to meet with this crass, middle-aged man. The middle-aged man was initially very displeased with Corinne's dark makeup because it was really heavy on the eyeshadow. However, upon seeing her slender figure and decent character, he could imagine how deliciously beautiful she would be if she stood naked in front of him. "And how tall are you?" he asked. Corinne absent-mindedly stirred the coffee inside the cup and replied curtly, "A hundred and sixty-eight centimeters." The middle-aged man was delighted to hear her answer. "Hmm... That's more or less the standard of a woman that's fit for me. My height is nearly one point eight meters, so I guess that's what they call the perfect height difference for a couple! You'd have to tiptoe whenever you kiss me in the future, but that's not really an issue. I can still bend down and kiss you!" It was known to girls that when men said that their height was nearly 1.8 meters, their true measurements were only 172 centimeters at most! Corinne rolled her eyes and said, "I don't think you're aware of how tall a man is if his woman needs to stand on her toes to kiss him." The middle-aged man frowned unhappily. "What do you mean by that?" At that point, a tall and stern-looking man walked into the cafe. He had a majestic aura to him. As Corinne looked up and laid eyes on him, a playful twinkle appeared in her eyes. She stood up and walk over to him. "Hey there, handsome. Could I borrow you for a sec to demonstrate what a true perfect height difference is?" The man frowned. Before he could refuse, Corinne grabbed his tie, yanked it downward, and tiptoed to give him a peck on the lips swiftly. "See? You need to be at least as tall as him for women to stand on tiptoe and kiss you!" "How dare you..." The middle-aged man was embarrassed and angry. He stood up in a rage and pointed at Corinne, saying, "You wh*re! Who the hell just grabs a random man and kisses him? I'll tell the person who introduced us to each other about your sluttiness soon enough. Your notoriousness will soon spread within the matchmaking circle, and you'll never be able to find your match here." 'That'd be perfect!' Once word of her actions got out, her stepmother Lilliana would surely have a hard time trying to matchmake her with all those weirdos again! Corinne snorted in disdain, kicked the crass, big-talking man away, and then waved her hand to thank the tall man who 'stood up for her'. "Thanks for helping me out there, kind sir! See you around, I guess. Bye!" With that, she turned around to leave, but a cold palm grabbed her wrist. "Are you just going to leave after kissing me without my consent?" A hoarse, stern male voice reached Corinne's ears, and an oppressive chill came up her spine. She felt fascinated when she looked up and saw the man's handsome face. His attractiveness knew no bounds. There was a certain maturity and meticulousness in the way he styled his hair, chiseled facial features on his fair-skinned handsome face, and an expression brimming with danger and fierceness. 'Uh-oh!' Corinne had been so worked up about the man from her blind date that she just randomly chose the tallest man in sight without paying attention to his appearance. Upon a closer look, she came to realize just how uniquely handsome he really was! As if that were not enough, she could tell at a glance that there was more to him than met the eye! Corinne frowned slightly. "What do you expect me to do?" The man looked at Corinne sullenly, and his thin lips parted open as if he was about to say something. At that point, his black-clad subordinate who stood beside him had just ended a phone call. He stepped forward with a solemn expression and said, "Sir, there's been a change of situation! Miss Sophia's flight was forced to turn back due to bad weather, and she won't be able to make it into the country today. What are we going to do? Your engagement banquet is tonight, and it's almost time." The man frowned after hearing this. That engagement banquet was, quite frankly, crucial to his grandfather who had been urging him to get married because he was still a bachelor at the age of nearly 30! It was not too long ago that the old man was so anxious that he had a heart attack which necessitated a life-saving heart transplant operation. He agreed to proceed with the operation on the condition that his grandson got engaged today and married in three days! Sophia, the woman whom he had hired to act out the plan to please his grandfather, was unable to make it. Since the man didn’t loosen his tight grip on Corinne's hand, she impatiently asked, "Is there anything else you need, mister? Could you let go of me now?" The man, Jeremy Holden, stared silently at Corinne as a cryptic look flashed across his eyes. All of a sudden, he smiled coldly and said, "This young woman right here has delivered herself to me on a silver platter, so we might as well have her replace Sophia." His special assistant, Tommy Jenkinson, was taken aback. He turned to look at Corinne and sized her up with a rather displeased expression. A girl who used heavy eyeliner, had unkempt hair, and dressed like a brat was hardly fit to be his employer's partner! "But sir, she's a little..." "I've made up my mind. We'll go with her!" Tommy did not dare to object any further. "Sure!" Corinne felt that something was off and asked warily, "Me? Why me? What are you going to do to me, mister?" The man looked down at her and answered her coldly, "I want you to take responsibility for kissing me." 'Responsibility?' Corinne grimaced in disbelief. "You can't be serious, right? You want me to take responsibility because I kissed you? I gave you my first kiss, you know, but I didn’t demand you to take responsibility for me after I just gave you my first kiss!" The man raised his eyebrows with interest. "Your first kiss?" Corinne sighed pitiably. "You bet! I kept my first kiss for nearly twenty years now, and I gave it to you today just like that!" She was bold, if nothing else. Jeremy's expression turned cold, and he said softly. "Bring her with us, fellas." It took just a couple of seconds for Corinne to be pushed into a black luxury car by several men in black suits. Situated within New Capital City was Lunar Century Manor, the most high-end urban manor in the entire country. There, Jeremy—the young master of a famous first-tier family known as the Holdens—had organized a grand engagement banquet. "I wonder who's the lucky young woman Mister Jeremy is going to be engaged to!" "I'm sure she's what many would call the perfect woman—someone who has a solid family background and is an outstanding individual herself! Ordinary women will never be able to pique Mister Jeremy's interest!" "Look, there he is! Gosh, he's so handsome..." "Hold on. Is the girl standing next to him…his legendary fiancee? Why does she look… Well, how should I put this..." "Different from what we imagined her to be?" Everyone stared intently at Jeremy as he led an eccentric-looking girl into the center stage at the banquet venue. The host of the engagement banquet stepped forward to hold the microphone and began to speak. "Good evening, everyone, and welcome to Jeremy Holden's engagement ceremony!" Corinne's heart raced after she was forced to stand on the stage. She admitted she was at fault for taking advantage of him without permission earlier, but the most she expected him to do was to report her to the police for sexual harassment. If it came to that, she would accept whatever punishment that was meted out to her. Never in her wildest dreams did she expect him to do something even worse—forcing her to get engaged to him at an engagement banquet!