House Dad's Literary Life

Chapter 443: The Furious Father-in-Law

Seeing the unfamiliar man in the photo smiling as he looked at his daughter and granddaughter with an “insidious and cunning” expression, Mo Henian’s breathing became as heavy and rapid as that of an Angus cow with bloodshot eyes.

“Finally, you’ve shown yourself!” Mo Henian gritted his teeth and slammed a fist down on the table.

He vividly remembered what Mo Fei had been like when she returned to the countryside pregnant more than five years ago. He had pressed her for answers, but no matter what, she refused to say anything, and she even hid in her room and secretly cried.

If Xixi hadn’t been born later, and the little girl’s soft, babyish murmurs hadn’t temporarily calmed his anger, no one knew when the bitterness in Mo Henian’s heart would have finally subsided.

But now, that man had appeared again! The resentment and fury Mo Henian had felt back then surged up once more.

That scoundrel had gotten his daughter pregnant before marriage, then left her to raise their child all alone for three or four years!

He had already abandoned her once, so what did it matter that they had gotten back together now?

Could this possibly cover up the fact that he had been a scumbag before?

Mo Henian couldn’t let it go!

He suddenly stood up, accidentally knocking over the chair beneath him, but the old man had no intention of picking it up. He stormed into his bedroom and took an old Remington M870 from the locked gun cabinet.

With its long barrel and classic wooden fore-end with horizontal anti-slip grooves, it looked no different from an antique.

But Mo Henian took several red-tipped, brass-based shotgun shells from the ammunition box and, gritting his teeth, stuffed them into the magazine. With a click, he worked the pump and pushed the shells into firing position, and this antique gun suddenly became a formidable weapon!

“If I don’t blow that scoundrel away, then my surname isn’t Mo!” Mo Henian gritted his teeth, set the gun aside, and began packing his clothes.

……

“Ah, Mengyu, really, Feifei got married, and you didn’t reveal a single bit of news. Have you forgotten about your best friend? Or were you worried that I couldn’t afford the wedding gift?” When she received a call from an old friend from the entertainment industry, who was half congratulating her and half reproaching her, Mo Fei’s mother, Zhou Mengyu, was completely bewildered.

After asking a few questions, Zhou Mengyu got a clear understanding of what had happened.

Of course, Zhou Mengyu’s feelings toward Yang Yi were about the same as Mo Henian’s. It was just that she was calmer and wouldn’t be so impulsive as to resort to violence without getting to the bottom of things.

She also knew Mo Henian’s temper, so after Zhou Mengyu put down the landline phone, she didn’t dare continue making calls at home. Instead, she put on a windbreaker, picked up her handbag and phone, and hurried out to a coffee shop in town to call her daughter.

But Zhou Mengyu had never expected that the doodles and scribbles she habitually made on the notepad would actually be seen by Mo Henian, and that Mo Henian would follow the trail and investigate it.

At this moment, Zhou Mengyu, who was unaware of what had happened, was dialing Mo Fei’s number, but Mo Xiaojuan answered the phone.

Mo Xiaojuan seemed quite surprised by Zhou Mengyu’s call, and was even somewhat flustered. She said hesitantly, “Auntie, are you looking for me? No, wait, you’re looking for Sister Fei? She’s busy right now, attending an event!”

A woman’s intuition was still very sensitive. Zhou Mengyu heard the panic in Mo Xiaojuan’s voice, so she said suspiciously, “You know why I called, right?”

Mo Xiaojuan stammered and couldn’t get a word out.

How could she not guess?

Previously, whether it was her, Mo Fei, or Yang Yi, they had all been so focused on dealing with the public-opinion crisis caused by the exposure that they hadn’t even thought about how Mo Fei’s parents would react!

The moment Mo Xiaojuan answered Zhou Mengyu’s call, she immediately realized it!

That was right! The media had made such a huge commotion that even if her uncle lived abroad, lived in the “countryside,” and her aunt had left the entertainment industry many years ago, there was no way they could have been completely cut off from the news!

So many days had already passed. It was impossible for them not to have heard even the slightest rumor!

Zhou Mengyu wasn’t in the mood to play the guessing game with Mo Xiaojuan. She continued in a reproachful tone, “Alright, Xiaojuan. You’re getting less and less obedient to your aunt! Feifei got married, and you didn’t even tell me about something this important?”

Mo Xiaojuan stammered, “Auntie, you really can’t blame me for this! Sister Fei was worried that once Uncle found out, he wouldn’t be able to sit still and would go after Yang Yi, so she never knew how to tell you both. And then, somehow, the media exposed it this time…”

“Ah, you two are really going to drive me crazy!” Zhou Mengyu said irritably. “Alright, I won’t say anything about you. Now, tell me, what kind of person exactly is this Yang Yi? Is he Xixi’s father? What’s his character like?”

If this had been Mo Xiaojuan a few months ago, she might still have taken advantage of the situation to speak ill of Yang Yi.

However, Mo Xiaojuan had long since switched sides. Besides, Yang Yi was her financial backer and boss, so she could only do her best to put in a good word for him.

“He’s Xixi’s father, her biological father! Yang Yi and Sister Fei actually have a very good relationship! He’s a pretty good person, too. He’s from a rural area in Anqing Province, and he even served in the military before.”

Hearing this, Zhou Mengyu frowned. She felt that something wasn’t quite right. It wasn’t that she looked down on people from rural areas. She simply felt that Yang Yi and Mo Fei came from such different backgrounds that there would inevitably be a huge gap between them, with too many differences in personality, interests, and so on.

Think about it, a soldier from a rural background and a female celebrity who had returned from abroad and was constantly exposed to new things in the entertainment industry, how many common topics could they possibly have?

Fortunately, what Mo Xiaojuan said next changed Zhou Mengyu’s view.

“But Yang Yi is actually very impressive. He writes novels himself, and his novels sell extremely well, which has earned him a very substantial fortune. He also knows music and personally writes songs for Sister Fei. Auntie, do you know? Sister Fei’s latest album recently sold at platinum-record level again, and twelve of the songs on that album were written by Yang Yi!” Mo Xiaojuan tried her best to list Yang Yi’s strengths.

“That’s not bad…” Zhou Mengyu had, after all, been part of the entertainment industry herself. She knew how difficult it was to achieve platinum-record status, and she also knew that a songwriter capable of writing twelve songs for a platinum-level album was unquestionably talented. The deep frown on her face relaxed slightly.

The call with Mo Xiaojuan lasted for more than an hour. Zhou Mengyu kept asking about Yang Yi’s situation, trying to gain a comprehensive understanding of the husband her daughter had chosen from the perspective of an outsider.

When she returned to the ranch, she happened to see Mo Henian storming out with a bag in his hand.

“Old Mo, what are you going to do?” Zhou Mengyu had an ominous feeling in her heart.

Did he know?

“I’m going back to China to blow that punk away!” Mo Henian waved the Remington in his hand and said furiously. “I’ve let him hide like a coward for years, and now I’ve finally caught him!”

Sure enough, he knew!

But now wasn’t the time to ask how he knew. Zhou Mengyu hurriedly stopped Mo Henian and said, “Old Mo, don’t be so anxious! You have high blood pressure. The doctor said you can’t get angry!”

“Move aside, move aside!” Mo Henian glared and said, “If I can’t get this anger out of my chest, I won’t be able to close my eyes even when I die!”

Mo Henian was different from Yang Chonggui. He was more stubborn and much more hot-tempered, so Zhou Mengyu’s persuasion didn’t have much effect on him at all.

“Come on, put the gun down first. If you’re going back to China, why are you taking a gun with you?” Zhou Mengyu had no choice but to change her way of persuading him.

“I’m going to blow that scoundrel away!” Mo Henian said, glaring.

“You can’t bring it back with you! Do you think they’ll let you take a gun onto the plane?” Zhou Mengyu said, not knowing whether to laugh or cry.

Mo Henian paused for a moment, and after thinking about it carefully, he realized it was true.

So he took a step back, stuffed the gun into his wife’s hands, and said, “Fine, I won’t take the gun. I’ll buy a kitchen knife when I get there and chop him up!”

Zhou Mengyu said softly, “Henian, don’t be anxious, okay? Listen to me. Things aren’t the way you think they are.”

“No matter what you say, I only believe what I’ve seen! That scoundrel abandoned his wife and child and ruined our Mo Fei’s life for five years. Isn’t that right?” Mo Henian said.

“You’re not wrong about that, it’s just that now…”

“No matter what he’s done to make up for it now, I still look down on him! He hurt our daughter, so shouldn’t I beat him up?” Mo Henian interrupted Zhou Mengyu angrily.

Zhou Mengyu could only soothe Mo Henian by rubbing his chest with her hand, letting him calm down a little before saying with a bitter smile, “Yes, yes, he really does deserve a beating! But think about it this way. He’s the junior, and you’re the elder. How could an elder go looking for a junior? He should come to us and apologize for his wrongdoing, right?”

There was some sense to those words, and they managed to persuade Mo Henian.

However, Mo Henian only wavered for a moment before immediately becoming resolute again. “No! What kind of junior is he? I don’t consider him one of my own! He’s just a scoundrel who deserves a beating! Enough. Don’t say anything more, I’m going back no matter what!”