My Cheating Wife Left Him Millions—in Debt

For fourteen years,James Gu has been the neighborhood's laughingstock. While his wife Camila Su carries on a secret affair with Kai Chen, a man a decade her junior,James Gu sits in the alley card house, losing at mahjong while relatives and poker buddies jeer at the spineless cuckold. No one sees that he is counting every cent. In his youth,James Gu managed project books. He never fought it, never filed for divorce. Instead, he kept the evidence: her secondary-card spending alerts, the invoices Kai Chen bragged about at the card table, every yuan the lovers drained from his accounts. He dug into the truth behind her "school-district apartments" and luxury cars. Fourteen years later, Camila Su is dying. Before him, she signs her will: 125 apartments and 35 cars go to Kai Chen. Then she sneers: "You played cards your whole life and end up with nothing."James Gu leans close and whispers: "I have a secret too. I've kept it for fourteen years." The apartments were never hers. They are long-term rental custody agreements—a scheme Kai Chen staged through Camila Su's cousin, each month's rent plugging the last month's hole. The cars are mostly unpaid. The debt on the books: 43.86 million. He waited fourteen years for this: her choice made, her name signed, the 125 keys and the 43.86-million debt landing in Kai Chen's hands together. When Kai Chen learns the truth, he turns and leaves. Camila Su begs James Gu to come back. He only says: "I hated you fourteen years ago. I don't anymore." He closes the card house and opens a tea house, keeping clean books for the shops nearby. The seven of hearts is still there, its corner still chipped. Some losses should be walked away from the day you find them. Some people, once you see them clearly, you leave at the table.