Volume One, Chapter 9: I Can't Handle Your Lawsuit
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The village chief burst through the door, grabbed the fortune-teller, and shouted, “You unfilial brat! Stealing your grandmother’s old clothes to play at being a spirit medium again? Take all that stuff off the table!”
“Ow, Grandpa, you’re hurting me! I won’t do it again, I promise. Please let go!”
The fortune-teller removed her robe and hat, revealing herself to be nothing more than a fifteen- or sixteen-year-old girl.
The village chief turned to apologize to Zhou Jincheng, who was standing nearby. “The girl usually attends school in the city. She came home for summer vacation, and I spoiled her. She didn’t mean to make sport of an honored guest.”
“I heard there was a spirit medium in this village.”
Zhou Jincheng gave the girl a brief glance, a trace of disappointment buried in his eyes.
So it was all fake.
“There used to be one. She was this girl’s grandmother, but she passed away last year.”
“Our village is remote, and few outsiders know about it. That gave this girl the chance to impersonate her and collect money.”
The girl pouted and muttered, “I only said a few auspicious words and asked for a little tip. I didn’t deceive anyone.”
“Why did you say she wasn’t dead? And how did you know I was here looking for someone?”
Zhou Jincheng was meticulous and logical. His deep-set eyes fixed on the girl before him.
“A child at the entrance to the village told me you were here to ask the spirit medium about someone’s whereabouts. Naturally, I told you she wasn’t dead and was still alive.”
“If you wanted her dead, why would you travel all this way to ask? You even resorted to such a superstitious method.”
“Judging by your clothes, you look educated. So tell me, do people like you believe in spirits too?”
The girl had a remarkably quick tongue. With barely a movement of her lips, she could outtalk anyone.
The village chief seized her sleeve and scolded her. “Stop fooling around. Apologize.”
The girl snorted. She was stubborn and did not think she had done anything wrong.
“There’s no need.”
Zhou Jincheng spoke first, his voice cool and clear. He turned and walked out.
“Wait, honored guest! Your money—” the village chief called after him.
The money placed on the table before the shrine remained untouched.
“She said something auspicious. It’s her tip.”
Zhou Jincheng continued walking without stopping.
On his drive home, he passed a private hospital and decided to get some sleeping pills.
After collecting the medicine from the pharmacy, he saw a little girl in the corridor, around four years old, wearing a beautiful princess dress.
She looked vaguely familiar. After a closer look, he recognized her as Yu Jin’s daughter. Her name seemed to be Xiao Jing.
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He had seen Xiao Jing’s photograph among the documents Attorney Bai had given him.
The child was adorable, like a finely crafted porcelain doll. She had an oval face, large double-lidded eyes, and dimples at the corners of her mouth when she smiled.
Her hair was black as ebony, her skin white as jade. At a glance, she was clearly a child from a wealthy family.
A young woman dressed in extravagant clothes held Xiao Jing’s hand in one hand and carried an expensive crocodile-skin handbag in the other. A nanny and a bodyguard followed behind them.
“Mommy, when can we stop going to the doctor?” Xiao Jing asked, tilting her head up.
She was so small that she barely reached the woman’s thigh.
She came to the hospital every month and hated the place. She disliked the doctors in white coats; they always looked so stern.
“After Xiao Jing has her surgery next month, we won’t have to come to the hospital so often. But for now, we still have to come in for regular checkups,” Yu Zhu told her gently, stroking her head. Her eyes radiated a mother’s love.
“Okay.” The little girl nodded obediently.
Zhou Jincheng watched the mother and daughter enter a specialist’s office. Not long afterward, when they came out, he pushed open the door and went inside.
“Attorney Zhou, what brings you to the hospital?”
The doctor knew him. Zhou Jincheng had once hired him to handle a lawsuit, and they could be considered old acquaintances.
“Nothing serious. I was just passing by. The mother and daughter who came in a moment ago—the girl has a heart condition?”
Zhou Jincheng remembered that the doctor before him was a renowned pediatric cardiologist in Jingjiang City.
“Congenital heart disease.”
“What a lovely child. It must be hard on her. She has to come to the hospital every month for examinations, and she’ll be undergoing surgery soon.”
“Fortunately, her family can afford it. They’ve brought in a medical team from the United States to perform the operation. The surgery alone will cost over a million.”
“Can they guarantee that the surgery will be completely successful?”
For some reason, Zhou Jincheng felt an inexplicable pain in his heart.
“Even under those circumstances, there’s no hundred-percent guarantee. Heart surgery is extremely risky for a child so young.”
“But the surgery has to be done. If it’s delayed any longer, the child won’t live past ten.”
The doctor answered him honestly.
Then he suddenly asked, “Do you know this family, Attorney Zhou? Are they relatives of yours?”
“I was only asking. Sorry to have bothered you.”
Zhou Jincheng turned and walked out. His face was livid. After leaving the hospital, he took out his phone and dialed a number.
“Attorney Bai, before taking on this case, didn’t you look into the client’s child’s condition?”
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“Yu Jin’s daughter has a serious heart condition and is scheduled for surgery soon. The operation will cost over a million.”
“Under these circumstances, do you really think a judge will award custody to her biological mother—a penniless single woman who has only just been released from prison and can barely support herself?”
“We both know the circumstances of the child’s adoptive parents. Her adoptive father, Ji Yanche, is a wealthy businessman in Jingjiang City. His family has been rich for eight generations, and their businesses span the globe.”
“His wife is a homemaker who can devote all her time to caring for the sick Yu Jing. They also have an entire staff of servants and bodyguards at home.”
“If we win this case, do you have no ability to judge whether it will be good or bad for the child?”
If Xiao Jing returned to Yu Jin, she might not even survive. Yu Jin’s monthly salary would not cover the cost of a single heart examination at a private hospital.
On the other end of the line, Attorney Bai was silent for a moment before saying, “I’m sorry. I truly didn’t know any of that.”
She had not yet had the chance to investigate. She had pitied Yu Jin and, as a fellow woman, empathized with her suffering, so she had hurriedly taken the case.
Unexpectedly, the very next day she became entangled in a complicated lawsuit overseas and could not get away to return home and help Yu Jin. That was why she had handed the case over to Zhou Jincheng.
“I don’t want this to happen again.”
Zhou Jincheng’s tone was stern, the same uncompromising manner he used when dealing with work.
In Attorney Bai’s eyes, he was a cold-blooded man who cared only about whether a case could be won—professional, rigid, and unfeeling.
Zhou Jincheng ended the call. When he turned around, he saw Yu Jin not far away.
She stood very close to him, less than three meters away. She had heard everything he said; the only question was how much of it she had heard.
Yu Jin held a microphone and an interview script. Blue shoe covers wrapped her feet, as though she had just finished conducting an interview inside the hospital.
Her face was frighteningly pale. She stared at him without blinking, the knuckles of her right hand reddened from gripping the microphone too tightly.
Severe congenital heart disease…
How could this be? Could it have been caused by the fright she had suffered while carrying the child?
When she had first been imprisoned, she dreamed every night. She dreamed that Zhou Jincheng had broken up with her, that her father had fallen from a building, that her mother had taken her own life in the sanatorium…
For months on end, she had never slept peacefully. Whenever she awoke, her entire body was drenched in sweat.
Zhou Jincheng strode toward her with his long legs, his gaze cold, one hand tucked into the pocket of his suit trousers. His tone was utterly flat.
“Since we’ve run into each other here, I won’t have anyone notify you separately.”
“I can’t take your case. The firm will compensate you with three times the retainer, as stipulated in the contract.”
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